Wrestlers have used the world of grappling and jumping off ropes as a bridge to even
greater success. Unfortunately, we won't be talking about any of those people. Instead,
let's take a look at some of the wrestlers who destroyed their careers in a matter of seconds.
You may remember Brad Maddox from his time as Raw's General Manager on WWE TV.
Ironically, he ruined his career off-screen when he called the crowd, quote, "cocky pricks."
Maddox sat down with Rolling Stone in 2015, a week after the incident, and revealed;
"I didn't think it was inappropriate at all, especially for a dark match.
I was out there trying to work up the crowd. It's not for TV. I'm making
fun of the hometown and their football team and talking to them directly. I was
just trying to warm the crowd up, that was my role. It just didn't work out."
When asked if he felt that there was a level of hypocrisy involved,
since people have said worse things, he explained;
"No, just because those things are cleared ahead of time. You could call this 'going
into business for myself.' Which I really didn't do. I didn't think that I'd go out
there and call them pricks and get noticed more. That's not what I was doing at all.
My words weren't cleared ahead of time though. That's the real difference."
Robbie McAllister was one half of The Highlanders,
a tag team in WWE during the noughties. McAlister was caught in attendance at a TNA
show while under contract with WWE in 2008, and it goes without saying that that's a big no-no.
In an interview with World Wrestling Insanity's ClubWWI McAllister shed some insight, claiming;
"I don't even understand why I did it. But it could have been
a subconscious thing that I did it because [WWE] weren't using us."
The trouble didn't stop there, however. McAllister went on to explain some of
the heat he got when he returned to his hotel, where some other WWE stars were
also staying. The most notable response came from The Undertaker and Fit Finlay.
"Actually, [The Undertaker] was all over me. In the end, there was Fit Finlay, he was all over me,
I'm like, 'Listen, guys. I can't tell you why. I screwed up. It's a screw-up on my
part. Why do you think I'm standing in front of ya? I need to hear this because
I just did the stupidest thing in my life? And I'm going to hear the repercussions.'"
According to WhatCulture, both Robbie and his tag-team partner Rory McAllister paid
for his mistake. The outlet claimed the two were
"[...] pulled from their planned WrestleMania appearance,
and lost a $5,000 paycheck because of it."
The duo was released from their contracts in August of that year.
Kevin Wacholz, better known as Nailz, had a brief run in the WWE in 1992.
Appearing as an ex-con character, Nailz entered the WWE and feuded with the Big Boss Man. The
feud went over well and even landed Nailz some matches against the era's top stars
such as Sgt. Slaughter, The Undertaker, and The Ultimate Warrior. However,
hopes of top-stardom were rinsed down the drain after SummerSlam '92.
As R.D. Reynold's writes in WrestleCrap: The Very Worst of Pro Wrestling, Nailz [...]
"[...] approached Vince McMahon behind the scenes, upset about his payoff."
Nailz reportedly proceeded to pummel the Chairman in his office. Although there are no comments on
the incident from the two involved, those who were there have spoken out, such as Bret Hart.
It goes without saying that if you mess with the big man, there will be a price to pay.
And that price came when Nailz was subsequently terminated for unprofessional conduct.
For those who don't know, The Brawl for All – often called the stupidest idea in wrestling — was
a real-life boxing tournament featuring professional wrestlers. Bart Gunn, one half
of The Smoking Guns tag team, won a tournament that sent the winner to the main event. There,
Gunn got to face knock-out aficionado Butterbean, in a boxing match at Wrestlemania, where Gunn was
knocked out in mere seconds. When reflecting on the event, Butterbean told The Hannibal TV;
“Yeah, that’s part of life. I mean, he knew two grown men are going in there
are gonna do combat. You know something bad’s gonna happen.”
Ken Anderson has a history with both WWE and TNA. Although he got fired from both companies,
it's how things went down with TNA that really put the nail in the coffin.
Inquistr reported that Anderson was sluggish during a 2016 match with Eric Young, which
led to Anderson taking a drug test immediately afterward. They also reported that Anderson;
"[...] ended up testing positive for some medications
of which he did not have a prescription."
While it's never been confirmed what exact drug Anderson was on during his match against Young,
the wrestler did admit during a 2017 interview with The Steve Austin Show
that he was abusing pain pills when he was in the WWE. As he revealed;
"Mostly the pain pill, Vicodin, was my vice."
Back in the 80s to early 90s, pro wrestling's credibility as a real contact sport was still
pretty solid, and "Dr. D" David Schultz was one of — if not the most — feared men at the time.
20/20 reporter John Stossel was working on an exposé in 1984, showing wrestling as a
staged event, and had an interview with Schultz set up by Vince McMahon himself.
As Schultz later recalled to Title Match Wrestling:
“He said David, we got a guy that’s making a joke out of the business.
I want you to go out and do an interview with him. I want you to blast him.”
Fast forward to the interview, where Stossel proceeds to tell Schultz;
"I think this is fake"
Before he could go any further, Dr. D slapped him not once, but twice. Stossel fell to the ground
and would claim after the 20/20 segment aired that he now suffered from permanent ear damage.
We may never know if Shultz's actions were truly at Vince's behest, but what we do know
is that this led to a PR nightmare that subsequently ended with Schultz's firing.
Daniel Puder is a mixed martial artist who retired from the sport with an impeccable record of 8-0,
but his time in pro wrestling had different results. According to Bleacher Report,
it all started during a November 2004 episode of SmackDown, when Kurt Angle challenged the
contestants of wrestling reality TV show Tough Enough to a match. Puder, already an accomplished
MMA fighter at the time, stepped up to the challenge. As Puder later told WrestleShark;
"I caught him in a key lock, pulled him into a kimura, and tried to snap his arm off."
This spelled the end for Puder. While he lost the match against Angle,
he won Tough Enough and earned himself a contract. That being said, the contract
was crummy. An embarrassing elimination came at the 2005 Royal Rumble by Eddie Guerrero,
Chris Benoit, and Hardcore Holly, who pummeled him with some serious knife-edge chops.
Speaking to Chris Van Vliet in 2020 about his time with the WWE, Puder explained,
"It was guaranteed one year, and they let me go after the first year [...] What's
interesting is that they offered me another deal and because I didn't take it,
then they let me go. So, it was a little shady on that."
We guess if WWE wants to get rid of you,
they will. Puder was released from his contract shortly after.
Alundra Blayze was one of WWE's top female performers in the '90s.
She defected to WCW while still the WWE Women's Champion, in the midst
of a five-year ratings battle between the two organizations dubbed "The Monday Night War."
On an episode of Monday Night Nitro, Blayze, now going by Madusa,
went on WCW TV with the WWE Women's title belt and threw it in the trash,
a move she says ruined her. In an interview with the Bischoff on Wrestling podcast, she said;
"I went through crap. That was the defining moment for everybody for twenty years.
I had to live with that. It ruined me. Basically. I never did an interview for
wrestling. I never went to a wrestling signing. In fact,
this is the second or third podcast that I've ever done since I retired."
Regardless of the event, Blayze was still considered a trailblazer in
women's wrestling and was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2015.
Bret "The Hitman" Hart was undoubtedly a wrestling superstar. The five-time WWE champion
jumped to WCW after the infamous Montreal Screwjob at Survivor Series '97, one of the most shocking
events in all of wrestling: Hart not only spits in Vince McMahon's face but is seen
lettering "WCW" in the air. Little did The Hitman know it was the beginning of the end for him.
After one dreadful storyline after another, his career came to a screeching halt when he suffered
a career-ending injury in '99 after a boot to the head by Bill Goldberg. This led to concussion
issues that forced him into retirement, a sad end for the best there is, the best there was,
and the best there ever will be. In an interview with WWE Backstage, Hart reflected;
"If I could do it all over again, I think I'd try to figure out a better way to stay in WWE."
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