9 Indie Stars Who Didn't Catch On In WWE

9. Paul Burchill

Paul Burchill Kofi Kingston
WWE.com

There was a whole lot of buzz when Paul Burchill was signed to World Wrestling Entertainment in 2005. Making his debut in 2002, Burchill had become a major name on the European scene largely on the back of his finishing move, the C-4. The man from Guildford came with such a reputation that he was fast tracked to the main roster, making his debut on Velocity not long after arriving in the country. Burchill had everything you could want from a WWE superstar back then, and many predicted big things for The Ripper.

Unfortunately, Burchill was saddled with a conveyor belt of poor stories and worse gimmicks. He was immediately placed with William Regal and the duo were an unsuccessful tag team, before Burchill went off on his own as a pirate.

Amazingly this wasn't the low point for Burchill, as when he moved to RAW in 2008 he did so with his onscreen sister Katie Lea. This all sounds innocuous enough, but the incestuous nature of their relationship was cringe-worthy at best.

Burchill was released in 2010, and retired in 2013.

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Born in the middle of Wales in the middle of the 1980's, John can't quite remember when he started watching wrestling but he has a terrible feeling that Dino Bravo was involved. Now living in Prague, John spends most of his time trying to work out how Tomohiro Ishii still stands upright. His favourite wrestler of all time is Dean Malenko, but really it is Repo Man. He is the author of 'An Illustrated History of Slavic Misery', the best book about the Slavic people that you haven't yet read. You can get that and others from www.poshlostbooks.com.