Why Mark Henry Was NEARLY WWE's Biggest Ever Flop
The World's Most Enduring Man.
Mark Henry triggered something within Vince McMahon back in 1996.
While he failed to make the Olympic weightlifting podium, few disputed his ‘World’s Strongest Man’ billing; Henry was a legitimate strong man with a powerlifting record that glowed gold. A genuine beast in both physique and stature, McMahon knew that, if this aura was transferable to the squared circle, he had a major star on his hands.
It was not.
Injury robbed Henry of his dreams in Atlanta. It was a telling omen for the first chapter of his pro wrestling career, though this was no hard luck story; Henry was both unlucky and entirely unsuited to his new profession, which he was convinced to transition into to the tune of a guaranteed multi-million 10-year contract. It was eye-watering, especially considering that a contract similar in scope, Bret Hart’s, inexorably changed the course of company history as a result of its apparently unsustainable nature.
In very short order, McMahon’s eyes watered also; reports of Henry’s in-ring development were drastically bad. Comically bad. Dr. Tom Prichard’s training credentials are not to be disputed; the man was chiefly responsible for the development of both Kurt Angle and The Rock. But then, they were naturals. Henry was antithetical to them; lumbering, uncoordinated and dangerous, his struggles were literally painstaking.
Even under the expert tutelage of Dr. Tom, Henry floundered, infamously collapsing under his own weight in an early, routine rope-running drill. His ankle shattered, necessitating a four-man carry-job in the dusty climes of the Stamford warehouse - though you suspect, even in the state-of-the-art Performance Center facility, Henry would have struggled. He was that incompatible with his new profession.
McMahon actively and visibly resented Henry, his buyer’s remorse manifesting as perhaps the most rancid burial ever from a company defined by its toxicity. Tied to a deal blindingly stupid in retrospect, McMahon embarked on a one-man smear campaign in an attempt to bully Henry out of the company. Henry was positioned as a sex addict harbouring a slew of fringe fetishes ranging from humiliating to disgusting. Octogenarians; transvestites; siblings: the love net cast by ‘Sexual Chocolate’ was not above plunging to what was framed as the lowest depths. CONT'D...