And here we are to close the decade with the top 20 Worst Wrestling moments in the 2010’s, now this I am really going to enjoy discussing because there were A LOT of moments that sucked from burials, from behind the scenes dramas, companies fall from relevance, insulting storylines, shocking retirements, and others that will be on this entry so here we go and like from last week what happened this year will also be on this entry.
20. Jim Cornette
(courtesy of NWA)
Well that escalated quickly.
To start this entry is something recent happened not that long ago, Jim Cornette is one of those people who was very outspoken no matter if it’s the taking potshots at Donald Trump, his legendary feud with Vince Russo, or saying people who have done flips and kicks are ruining the business but this happened quite unexpectedly. During an NWA Powerrr episode Jimmy boy made a comment and I quote
“Trevor Murdoch is the only man that I’ve ever known that can strap a bucket of fried chicken on his back and ride a motor scooter across Ethiopia.”
And when that came out the internet reacted very negatively towards the comment and wanted Cornette to apologize rather that the NWA let go Cornette and released a statement, he has made this statement the “fried chicken” and “motor scooter” in the past was it because Cornette forgot which decade it was? Maybe, who knows but the damage was done and NWA Powerrr has Wade Barrett in as a commentator to replace him. It’s not a giant stain on this revival of NWA but it was a short moment that let everyone a bit taken by surprise and not in a good way.
19. Jordan Myles’ departure
(courtesy of WWE)
Yeesh this turned ugly pretty fast.
Jordan Myles or ACH was set to be one of NXT’s must watch stars in the company until this one moment went out of control, granted regardless how it started is going to feel bizarre of sorts. The whole drama began with a release of a T-shirt that had Jordan Miles name on it, nothing wrong however when you see it in full like this.
(the alleged cause of the situation)
Now in hindsight it doesn’t look too bad, until you see something strange. Do you see it? Its almost like a smile with red lips. Now Jordan Myles took acceptation to that as to be fair he went up to the bosses and questioned it and after given the comment he approved it he took it to a rather sudden bizarre point. He would take to Twitter and call out WWE for being racist and this twitter tirade exploded into the public. Wrestling in general has a bad track record regarding racism like for examples, Mexicools riding in lawn mowers, Saba Simba (ugh…), WCW and the Japanese talent, or a guy calling himself the final solution and Jim Neidhart as a Klansman.
Jordan Myles then took it a bit further and said he was doing this for the culture and the blowback from this was not what he expected a lot of guys in and out of WWE took exception to the comment like Titus O’Neill, Mark Henry and ex talent like Shad Gaspard all said: “Hey you might want to tone it down there” but Jordan rather taking some veteran advice continued on with the tirade until he was recently released from the company. I think both sides were at a wrong here, WWE deserves some slack for making the shirt that was pretty lazy, but Jordan also should’ve took some level of responsibility but now he is gone from the company and leaving both sides fuming at each other. Guess no more NXT Breakout tournaments huh?
18. CM Punk leaving WWE
(courtesy of WWE)
Okay this is kind of old news now that he is back which is great maybe to shut up those “Punk” chants but in 2014 CM Punk was let go from the company quite suddenly, also to kick him below the belt was the day of his release was on his wedding day to AJ Lee. Ouch. How did this happen? Well some say it had something to do with a lawsuit between Punk and a WWE doctor and Punk forced to compete at the Royal Rumble with a staph infection which is something that should be taken seriously to avoid a health scenario down the line.
Now the lawsuit really shot up with a podcast between Punk and Colt Cobana in a November podcast he left because of creative differences between him and Vince McMahon, then the Amaan lawsuit between Punk the former WWE doctor had both sides sniping at each other until the point of Punk winning the lawsuit but then came the aftermath of Colt Cabana and Punk not being friends anymore. Uh-oh.
17. Edge Retiring
(courtesy of WWE)
This was a retirement that caught everyone off guard.
Edge or as Tony Chimel calls him the “Rated R Suuuuuuuuuuuuperstar” is one of WWE’s true underrated talents the guy is charismatic and can be over as a face and hated as a scathing heel as which I was a fan of Edge as a heel more than a face, in 2011 Edge revealed on RAW he was forced to retire from active competition due to a serious neck injury the same that forced Steve Austin into retirement and everybody was surprised and who knew that a spear towards Brodus Clay (even though it wasn’t his fault) would end his career and his last match will be against Alberto Del Rio at WrestleMania 27.
Edge’s legacy is not something to be sad about in his career had many great rivalry matches those against Batista, the Undertaker, Chris Jericho his years teaming with Christian and help build the TLC matches what it was today with The Hardys and the Dudleys and of course his longtime rival John Cena with many famous encounters some would be regarded as classics. A multiple time World Champion, a multiple tag champion and now a WWE Hall of Famer, Edge has done it all, do I really need to see him in the ring? No, but the Rated R Superstar will continue to shine years later.
15. Hogan’s leaked racism tape
I feel like this is something should be a bit higher, but a lot trounced it to this spot on the list, but it was something out of nowhere.
Now to talk about this its kind of hard that goes along what I said about the racism stuff that I opened and ooh boy. It was nothing but a Fat Man being loaded up and the mini nuke fired upon in 2015. News immediately broke up that a sex-tape involving Hulk Hogan and Bubba the Love Sponge’s wife was leaked by Gawker and Hogan dropping several N-words that caused quite a stir and controversy. The minute after that was leaked Hulk Hogan was removed from the WWE Hall of Fame page, his merch was removed so did was his Rock ‘N Wrestling cartoon series from the WWE Network then removed from WWE 2K’s release of WWE 2K16 and removed from WWE’s revival of Tough Enough.
Hogan then appeared on Good Morning America and then made it more worse for saying that was the times he grew up in Florida, and that led to someone asking that and many people said that was not how they remember Hogan growing up. Of course, this went to trial and Hogan ultimately won and bringing down the website but things like this stick to you for life like Mel Gibson’s tirade or Kramer from Seinfeld and what he said in that comedy club. Plus, I know about the McMahon clip saying a variation of the N-word to Cena. Hogan may have survived this but things like this hindered his legacy.
14. Wrestling related Deaths
Last week was kind of a spoiler that was on this list.
This decade alone had a surprise amounts of wrestlers, managers and announcers who passed away this decade some old, some not even reaching the peak of their age like very young like my age which is scary and some I guess talking about soon makes you feel depressed in a way. We have lost a lot in this decade from legends like Paul Bearer, Roddy Piper, Dusty Rhodes, the previously mentioned Ultimate Warrior, Gene Oklerlund, to one of my favorites Bobby “the Brain” Heenan and Jimmy Snuka say what you will on the Nancy Argentino thing which is a tragedy, but one of the true shocking deaths was Randy Savage a man who felt like the door opened for him to slowly return back into the WWE after a slight tease in a WWE game only to come to a halt the minute Savage passed away in a heart attack in 2011. Honorable mentions also include Chyna or Joana Laurer who was found dead in her apartment room while in the middle of shooting a documentary about her life. She had a rough road after leaving WWE from appearing on several porn films including one involving Sean Waltman or X-Pac that I dare not even want to see, or her sudden rants on WWE and Triple H about a sexual assault that was sudden and drugs which is also ultimately sad, Matt Capitelli, Matt Travis from a careless driver and Connor Michalek a young child who was a fan of Daniel Bryan. Just watch that video about him its, one of those things that makes you feel depressed.
13. Zack Ryder’s short push
There is going to be burials on this list and this one is going to be one of the few inclusions.
Zack Ryder got over all by himself and then when 2012 groaned along he was back to where he was back to irreverence which is a crime. It all started during February in 2011 with the “Long Island Iced Z” videos on Youtube and he started to grow fanbase that would ultimately grow and some of his merchandise sold out as chants of “We Want Ryder” grew louder and louder voicing their support of the guy.
So Zack Ryder got a bit of a sudden push into late 2011 he didn’t gun for the WWE Championship but on a more equal level was the United States Championship that he won then the new year started it went downhill massively. Zack Ryder was caught in the middle of the Kane-John Cena storyline and he was beaten to pillar to post to Kane, then he lost his United States Championship, then Eve Torres whom he was onscreen dating was then swooning over John Cena. Uh-oh… but it didn’t stop there, at WrestleMania 28 during a team match Eve would kick him below the belt literally and he was back to being a lowly nobody. Why he got this sudden burial? Spite. WWE can be a spiteful company to be with, the brass thing is always something that is thrown around a lot but the minute you are on this level you are dropped down to Earth so fast unless you are a John Cena or The Rock. Trust me there is other burials that has sort of topped this but man, this was disappointing.
12. Sting vs Jeff Hardy Victory Road 2011
(courtesy of IMPACT)
So, this is what Sting was forced to come back too?
Now to something completely different that may come back as a later entry, Sting was set to face off for the TNA World Title in Victory Road against current World Champion at the time and it was Jeff Hardy. Now how this came to be is weird, they were parodying the 2.21.11 videos that happened a month prior in WWE that ultimately led to the return of the Undertaker, they aired vignettes for 3.3.11 and who that was? It was the return of Sting. Who knew this PPV was to be infamous but not what they expected?
The main event of the match is here Sting waiting for Jeff Hardy then something bizarre happened, Jeff Hardy did arrive but after 40 seconds late when his entrance music hit and he looked out of place stumbling out from the ramp looking drunk. The referee then threw the x sign which is usually a bad thing, then Eric Bischoff then arrived into the ring and the words “just pin him” were uttered and just after ninety seconds Sting rolled up Jeff for the win. This was even more bizarre, as the crowd chanted BS to which Sting chimed in saying “exactly”. You know something is wrong when Sting agrees with the audience, this was considered the worst main event ever on IMPACT and was panned by everyone. Jeff Hardy clearly had years of drug issues and so did Matt, thank goodness both men would turn it around and do better, but this was a low point of Jeff’s career. Sidenote, Sting was rumored to be going to WWE and face Undertaker at WrestleMania 27. Boy this makes you feel sad that this match is never going to happen.
11. “This is your life Bayley”
Yeah sometimes things from the Attitude Era doesn’t work well here.
Alex Bliss is one of WWE’s undepreciated talents say what you will on why she was hired but she is one of WWE’s best speakers on the mic so was Mr. Kennedy. Anyway she was feuding with Bayley who beat her for the title in her hometown previously, yep something else that needs to stop but then came one segment that this feud was culminating on and it went down the rails pretty fast.
Alexa Bliss hosted the “This is your Life” Segment that was aimed to make Bayley the vocal point and make her feel bad but the problem with this problem with this promo is that it dragged on and on and on and what are you doing. This did no one any favors not even Alexa or Bayley and when you look back from her career high in NXT and TakeOver: Brooklyn in her match with Sasha Banks to this, it wasn’t a burial on her but a hindrance on her WWE career.
10. The Ascension burial
(courtesy of WWE)
Yeah let’s not sugar coat this, outside of Bayley recovering from her 2017 drop WWE massively buried these two guys.
The Ascension as of this writing have been granted their release from WWE and the massive rise then sudden fall is a crime WWE surely deserves. Konnor and Viktor of the Ascension were a dominating tag team from NXT going through each man and then a random cameo of Too Cool. In late 2014 they made a surprise debut squashing Sandow and The Miz which was a shock yet something cool for the longest reigning NXT Tag Champs. Then 2015 happened.
The year itself I could say a lot that can be called out and deservingly so but this, they didn’t deserve. The Ascension during each of their squash matches would say they were better than the tag teams of yesteryear like Demolition and The Road Warriors, and it led up to JBL leading a parade of legends I.E. his old running partner Farooq and DX of Road Dogg and Billy Gunn to lay them out in the middle of the ring and ooh boy, this was bad. Yeah, they got their heat back against the Outlaws in the Rumble PPV but this felt like a burial and the Ascension the coolest tag team in recent memory was eating pins after pins. Let’s hope somewhere they can pick up and be that badass tag team they could’ve been.
9. Philanthropy and Marketing
Who remembers this Twitter message from Stephanie McMahon?
Its not so bad but looking back it kind of puts WWE in some bizarre light. Now I’m not going to knock charities there are some that has a worthy cause like cancer awareness, the ones that is putting awareness in our environment and it’s an alarming detail that needs serious action then again some leaders of the world don’t take science seriously I.E. the Australian PM and the ongoing forest fires or climate change denialists I.E. the man sitting in the white house, but when you see this its well… something.
During an important conference that involved WWE and Twitter’s CEO Stephanie tweeted “Philanthropy is the future is marketing, it’s the way brands r going 2 win”. So, you mean everything is a calculative WWE ploy then again Stand Up for WWE was a poor calculative ploy. WWE has done wonders for charity that includes Be. A. Star even though some segments draw the lines of bullying or Susan G. Komen but don’t say its something for brands to win.
8. Dolph Ziggler
This decade was not a good year for the showoff himself, Dolph Ziggler is one of WWE’s most charismatic wrestlers but here I am going to chain line his decade via UrinatingTree and it’s a roller-coaster ride of sorts:
2011: wins World Title but loses it immediately to Edge.
2012: wins Money in the Bank.
2013: wins the World Heavyweight Title then gets immediately injured by Jack Swagger and loses said Word Title.
2014: becomes the sole Survivor in the 2014 Survivor Series match but later turns up meaningless anyway when The Authority showed up again and fired.
2015: part of a storyline between Rusev, Lana and Summer Rae that went overboard the minute Rusev and Lana’s wedding photos were leaked via TMZ.
2016: a slow recovery in 2016 winning the IC Title then loses it to The Miz soon after.
2017. 2018. 2019: meh
Personally, it’s hard to really take Ziggler seriously, the man has had so many stops and go pushes through his career you know the minute he loses te big time matches he’s back to being a nobody which is not his fault I think it had something to do he must’ve rubbed someone the wrong way in the back maybe a Triple H considering he was no fan of him, it might have been that who knows. Will he be around in the new year in the new decade? Maybe but I feel like he may retire you can win many US and IC titles, but it won’t cover the stench how this decade hurt Ziggler.
7. “I wish you died in the Womb”
(courtesy of WWE)
One of the most forgettable feuds in WWE and one of their worst.
It began after SummerSlam 2014 when Nikki Bella turned on Brie to give Stephanie McMahon the assist on their match then both Bellas began to feud with each other that led to one of the cringiest lines ever to utter even when the company today is embracing the Women’s Revolution and things like this were the few stumbles.
Jerry Lawler was invited to RAW and his guests were Nikki and Brie Bella to reconcile both sisters in this feud that no one really honestly cared for until this one line gave them the Wrestling Observer Award for the worst feud ever with the tagline of Nikki saying to Brie “I wish you died in the womb” and the crowd went silent. You can say a lot about the Bella Twins, on how they were shooting on Awesome Kong making fun of her being pregnant than having a miscarriage, ugh… or they were the sole reason why Maria didn’t return to the company, or being the sole vocal point for the now dead Divas division but this was a very drastic low-point ever almost feeling like a soap opera and every time I hear this I want to scream into a pillow but it could not be further from the truth this was terrible and if this is all to get a Emmy. You need to be taken care of with the best people, Indiana Jones style.
6. The decline of IMPACT Wrestling
(courtesy of IMPACT)
IMPACT Wrestling has had a severe drop in decline for years now I’m glad they are in a different direction and turning it around, the decade hasn’t been to kind for IMPACT so let’s run down the decade
2010: they began a Monday war with WWE and were beaten by Bret Hart on the first night of the year then forced to go back to Thursday’s weeks later.
2011: Fortune and Immortal taking up too much spots outside of Joker Sting being the best part.
2012: Claire Lynch… just Claire Lynch…
2013: Aces and Eights running rough shots until it involved Hogan and Brooke the rails began to fall.
2014: this year was the worst mostly by not resigning AJ Styles, hiding Vince Russo as a consultant and an email sent later costed them their spot-on Spike TV.
2015: Dixie Carter again letting an email slip calling the head of Destination America an idiot to which they lost their spot-on Destination America.
2016: growing money problems along with backstage turmoil behind the scenes like the in-fighting of who owned the Broken Hardys, talent leaving for better pastures.
2017: the Paige-Alberto Del Rio drama behind the scenes, more money more problems.
I’m glad IMPACT finally is turning around after their decade with 2018 and this year overall, its great they have turned it around however how long do they have left? Its going to be telling with new promotions like MLW or AEW being the fresh new toy and could IMPACT survive with a partnership? Maybe its going to be interesting to see what will happen but this decade was truly the worst.
5. The Fabulous Moolah controversy
In 2018 WWE was preparing for a women’s battle royal to happen at WrestleMania 34 in the middle of a growing Women’s division on RAW, SmackDown and growing popular on NXT especially, and they named it after one of the pioneers of the women’s division: the Fabulous Moolah, great that’s awesome until a moment later controversy brew from a Newsweek article that said Moolah had monopolized women’s wrestling and sexually exploiting women’s wrestlers under her wing.
It got to even a point that a change.org petition was made to change the name of the battle royal that arose to 10,000 signatures and even Snickers the sponsor for WrestleMania 34 then commented that was unacceptable and went to the heads of WWE and I’m pretty sure Vince McMahon was not hoping to have this controversy so much to the point the YouTube video announcing the battle royal at first had disabled comments. Yikes. WWE has made great strands in women’s wrestling but with the past creeping into the spotlight some with negative reactions like this sometimes its better to pave the future in a better highlight than to hear things like this.
4. The emptying arenas
This has been a trend as of late and its not a good thing.
As of late photos of emptying seats have began to surface mostly on WWE on RAW or SmackDown but not only that but it began to bleed into other promotions like Ring of Honor recently from their Summer show in the Maple Leaf Gardens or affecting AEW a new promotion, or IMPACT with their Stadium shows partnering with GFW that only had 50 or 100 people and I pondered why? Then I came into with this answer or theory: has wrestling become unpopular? Granted WWE has segments that has ranged from cringe to insulting but the continuous emptying seats is continuing to trend maybe its tickets sales not doing well, its possible. But whatever this is it is going to possibly affect wrestling into the new year.
3. The Nexus
(courtesy of WWE)
You wondered why this was never in my honorable mentions, here it was.
The Nexus looking back was something very hot when it started in 2010 several notable superstars began to crowd around the ring during a main event match between CM Punk and John Cena then the started to beat down Punk then they turned their attention to John Cena and then beat everyone including the announcers and Justin Roberts who was hogtied by Daniel Bryan and they were called The Nexus and they were in a united front to cause chaos and breakout as a faction and then for the continuous weeks they laid everyone out including hall of fame legends including Ricky Steamboat who has said to have had an aneurism, Undertaker, Vince McMahon and the majority of the RAW and SmackDown rosters until something had to be done about it.
SummerSlam 2010 was the showdown between team WWE and The Nexus, John Cena led a team against Wade Barrett and Nexus and it didn’t go so well at first Daniel Bryan joined team WWE then got laid out by The Miz angrily who was to join Team Cena then Jericho and Edge all turned their backs on Cena and it was down to just him vs. Barrett and Justin Gabriel then it went downhill afterwards… John Cena entered super Cena mode immediately beating Gabriel and then immediately tapping out Wade Barrett for team WWE to pick up the win. On the broad strokes of things this was Nexus’ make or break moment as a unit and it was broken. It was said that Chris Jericho and Edge were all in favor for Nexus to dominate until John Cena said no and after the match Cena met the two men and regretted the decision and out of all the Cena burials you can say a lot about guys like Rusev, Bray Wyatt or the aforementioned Zack Ryder but this was a damning case of why Cena gets made fun of for the Super Cena meme and looking back on the members afterwards wow WWE dropped the ball hard on a group that could’ve been epic also Wade Barrett was to be the man to end the streak of the Undertaker.
2. The absentee Man
(courtesy of WWE)
Well this is still going to linger into the new year. RIP me if this guy finds me.
Brock Lesnar has had multiple runs as World Champion in WWE however, the one problem people have and still have towards the man is he barely defends a title regardless if it’s the Universal or the WWE Championship now this sort of thing maybe common in the UFC world but in the wrestling world how has he not lost this title multiple times? Now is it because of the contract WWE had him to sign? Of course, the fans however grows impatient each time Brock has a title in him and never stripped of the title and who would be the one to ask then after someone is found missing the next week?
In hindsight Brock Lesnar is still one of the best guys to have he has as of late best matches with Finn Balor, Daniel Bryan, AJ Styles, some forgettable ones with Jon Moxley or Dean Ambrose or Bruan Strowman. The case here how long will Brock go? It all depends on the new year but we will continue to see a missing main title to linger into 2020 and fans will still have to sit and be patient who will beat Brock. Tyson Fury or Cain Velazquez isn’t getting me hopeful.
Now for some dishonorable mentions and woo boy there was a lot from this year that raised a stink so I’ll run this down
Daniel Bryan eliminated from the Royal Rumble/Reigns wins Rumble (2015)
#CancelWWENetwork (2015)
Dog Food segment (2019)
The wedding segment (2019) – this was a last minute entry and I hated it.
Abyss wining the X-Division title (2011)
ECW Hardcore Reunion? (2010) – I’m not hating it but it was full of botches galore and oh yeah the “f–k Vince” thing please don’t follow the road of IMPACT or WCW AEW.
Jinder Mahal as WWE Champion (2017)
The Enzo sexual assault situation (2018)
Rich Swann and his exit (2018)
Joey Mercury’s tweet about ROH (2019)
ROH firing Kelly Klein (2019)
Not capitalizing on Cesaro’s hype (2014)
lack of coverage of RAW 25th in the Manhattan Centre (2018)
Reigns vs. Undertaker (2017)
Stand Up for WWE campaign (2011? 2012?)
Damien Sandow lack of push (2016)
The legend of Sin Cara and his botches
Cruiserweights on RAW (2016)
Fans souring on the Universal Championship (2016)
I was planning to put Braun Strowman and Nicholas but I’ll reserve judgment maybe Nicholas will be a wrestler someday
Alberto Del Rio’s Periscope rants (2016)
People losing titles (2019)
two occasions of Muaro Renallo being chased away
The child from Extreme Rules in 2014 speaking spooky… ugh…
Sin Cara vs Sin Cara (2012 or 2011…)
“You’re little brother didn’t have it in you” promo (2015)
1. WWE and Saudi Arabia
(courtesy of WWE)
And this is the worst moment in WWE that has happened.
WWE and Saudi Arabia announced a ten-year partnership to promote the country’s Saudi Vision 2030 plan which is to use less oil, promote diversity in economy, develop public sectors like tourism and such. Which is all good until you look further on the country as a whole. Saudi Arabia has a bad track record when it comes to the LBGTQ community, the situation in Yemen at the time, human rights violations up the chimney, locking up critics to the current Saudi government and of course the one thing that arose was the murder of the Saudi journalist.
Jamal Khashoggi was a Washington Post journalist who was very critical of the current Saudi Prince and his government was found murdered in Turkey in the Saudi consulate on October 2nd 2018 and many claims jumped around who did until it was revealed to be hired goons from the Saudi Prince. WWE was in the crosshairs after many groups left their partnerships from Saudi Arabia and pressure from Democratic and Republican senators wanted WWE to do the same which is shocking to here but WWE held the course with the continuous bad press even trying to hide the country in where Crown Jewel was taking place. But no one was fooled, say what you will about the Goldberg vs Taker being a mess, or the turmoil of the roster trying to leave the country or the good of having a Natalya and Lacey Evans compete much to the dismay of the government but each time they go here that is forever going to loom over.
And that pretty much covers the worst moments from wrestling that has happened in this decade, let’s cross our fingers for any hope in the new year in the new decade that wrestling can recover and be good again then again with Loser eats Dog Food matches being a future norm in the new year I guess it’s telling that we maybe in a stumble for the new decade. Anyway happy holidays everybody and a have a great happy new year to all, and see you fresh in the new year for more column pieces like this.
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