Vince McMahon's 10 Biggest Failures

Two years later, MacDaddy was back at it with another closed circuit idea: Japanese wrestling superstar Antonio Inoki versus heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali.

The idea stemmed from Ali challenging any Oriental fighter for a million dollars, and Inoki responding by offering The Greatest $3 million for a fight in Tokyo in which Ali would lose. While Vince McMahon Sr. played a more prominent role in promoting the fight, his ambitious son conceived the original plan for how the fight would go down.

Obviously, Ali didn’t want to lose. But McMahon laid out a scenario in which both men would keep their credibility – In the fifth round, Inoki would discreetly cut his forehead, compelling Ali to demand the fight be stopped. As Ali would plead with the referee, Inoki would hit an enzuigiri from behind for the win.

Unfortunately, this plan didn’t translate the day of the showdown. Ali felt like he was being set up, and Inoki refused to lose. So the conditions of the legit fight were that Inoki had to keep both hands and a foot on the ground the whole time. It was a poorly-received snoozefest.