9 Early 2000s WWE Failures The Company Had Huge Plans For

9. Kenzo Suzuki

Fun fact: remember in 2004 when WWE started billing Chris Jericho and Chris Benoit as now residing in Manhasset, New York and Atlanta, Georgia, respectively? Well that's because they wanted them to feud with Kenzo Suzuki, who, billed as Hirohito (after the WWII Emporer) was going to be brought in as a main event player on Raw. Thankfully, Suzuki had a word with his employers and they dropped the Hirohito name/gimmick (despite airing vignettes for the character). That would have caused some serious damage to the Japan/WWE relationship, which was a very lucrative one back then. Suzuki was shipped off to Smackdown instead, debuting at the disastrous Great American Bash with a weak win over Billy Gunn. From there, Suzuki won the WWE Tag Team Titles with Rene Dupree and then began a feud with US Champ John Cena. However, by this point it was clear that Suzuki was beyond hope between-the-ropes and his promo and character work was notably shoddy, too. Suzuki didn't win the US Title and became something of a comedy jobber, before suffering a collapsed lung and taking time off to recover. He was drafted to Raw in the 2005 draft but never made an appearance for the red brand as WWE fired him in July. It's incredible to think that WWE were going to bring in Suzuki to immediately feud with World Heavyweight Champion Chris Benoit followed by Chris Jericho over the summer. Hell, it's amazing to think that they had him feud with the promising Cena, considering the talent at their disposal at the time.