DIRTY BASTARDS That Made Wrestling GROSS! ?
8. TL Hopper
First a quick history lesson on why the TL Hopper gimmick comes in for a little more flack than it probably deserves, ahead of explaining why all the criticism is simultaneously totally justified.
Hopper was portrayed by experienced hand Tony Antony, and was one of several heavily gimmicked wrestlers brought in by WWE between late-1995 and 1996 to try in vain to compete with the all-star bouts Monday Nitro ran on what felt like a weekly basis. Tracy Smothers was Freddie Joe Floyd, Bill Irwin was The Goon, Al Snow was Shinobi and Avatar before they made him a Rocker, and on it went. The strategy didn't work because fans saw through the bouts for the extended squashes they were, but that's why a wrestling plumber had a job for a while.
Even a purpose-serving performer can be a creative disaster though, particularly when Vince McMahon's holding the pencil. The former Chairman infamously thought nothing was funnier than faeces, and as if to illustrate that point, he had Hopper bite down on one while doing some plumbing work on the SummerSlam 1996 pre-show. The old weirdo almost certainly loved his job of being a total lunatic so much that he assumed everybody else did too.