WWE: 3 Top Stars Who Could Quit Following CM Punk's Shock Exit
3. Ryback
It might sound absurd for The Ryback to walk out on WWE right now when his value as a potential Star has been purposely tanked by WWE. But that should be reason enough for him. Ryback has been a very unfortunate victim of poor timing, or specifically, getting over at the "wrong time." When he re-debuted in mid 2012 as the jobber smashing cyborg, Ryback got over quickly, and by the HIAC PPV in October that year, he was on fire. With Cena out due to injury, and no other babyface worthy to challenge Punk, WWE took a chance and threw Ryback into the main event, feeling he could only benefit from being in there with Punk, and being elevated to that main event level. However, the very thing that got Ryback over, his undefeated streak, was on the line against Punk's 300 day Title reign, and indeed was the true hook of the match. Punk certainly wasn't losing because plans had already been made for him to drop the Title to The Rock at the Royal Rumble in January 2013. So Ryback had to lose the match, despite him winning matches being the thing that got him over. But plans can't change, regardless of how over someone gets, in WWE. From there, Ryback went on to lose every PPV match for 9 straight months, for seemingly no good reason other than "His opponent can't lose this match." Add to that the failed heel turn on the post-WrestleMania 29 Raw (where he was valiantly cheered as a hero for destroying the ever stale John Cena to end the show), where he was set up as the next monster of the month for Cena to overcome. After that programme, he was dead in the water as a character, and a series of accidents/botches/stiff shots on guys like Punk, Daniel Bryan and Cena landed him in the doghouse for being an unsafe worker. Right now, Ryback is seemingly nowhere on the card, trapped in a go nowhere Tag Team with the failed Curtis Axel project. However, this has lead to him stopping caring about anything other than having fun, and as a result he is now hilariously entertaining. His recent, bizarre Twitter tirades and odd, eccentric behaviour on camera has been fantastic entertainment, combined with his "anti-Bully" shtick earlier in the year,where he ironically showed his support for the B A * Initiative by beating up those he perceived as bullies. But all jokes aside, Ryan Reeves has very legitimate reasons to leave WWE given how they handled his character over the past 18 months. They sacrificed his streak to keep plans in place for WrestleMania 29 (Cena beating Rock for the Title, a match which benefited nobody), they relentlessly jobbed him out to The Shield when they were the new arrivals, to get them over. Then what little steam he had left was thoroughly eradicated by the Cena programme, culminating in the god-awful Payback PPV match. Ryback was a very hot ticket in WWE at one time, and his star has been extinguished purposefully. If that's not good enough reason to leave, what is?
