10 Weird Periods WWE Icons Would Like You To Forget

If you're going to have a long wrestling career, the past has told us you may have a short period where things don't click

This is mainly due to the fact that sports entertainment never ends, so if you are appearing on a show every week for every year

yeah, nobody has that kind of batting average. Doesn't mean you can't secure yourself a legendary overall run, but here's some weird periods certain old-timers would like you to forget

Number 10, Kane in 2007. So I will die on this hill, although I do understand it

Kane should never have taken the mask off. I suppose he had to, but my thoughts don't have to make sense

The magicka of that character was sort of lost. This was really reflected in 2007 when WWE didn't know what to do with the guy

Hence, we got to WrestleMania 23, and he was put in a feud with the Great Khali

One of these few occasions where his sentence rhymes, but it's still bad

As we know, the Great One wasn't the most mobile, so it was the big red machine who had to take the punishment and the selling

That's just silly. See, no evil was also in cinemas, so the hook from the movie was brought into proceedings

but that made the whole thing even stranger. Now they were actually trying to kill each other

Big Daddy V was up next, and he too suffered from the exact same issue, so once more Kane was the person just getting his ass whooped

This is not the V. When you do go through the whole year, this is what WWE kept doing too

Maybe because it was a calling card of fake brother The Undertaker at one point

I mean, go through his earlier Mania matches, it was always how on earth can he defeat somebody so much bigger

This was sort of wild, however, because all of the Dead Man's matches were better with smaller opponents

It should have been what we did with Kane 2. You really don't need to watch much of what the Big Red Machine did in 2007

and it's not even his fault. He was just placed in an impossible situation

Number 9, Ric Flair in 2001 and 2002. I quite like Ric Flair coming into the WWE

and being the secret new owner of the company. It was a nice way to remind you that Flair was the man

but behind the scenes, yeah, something was brewing. Triple H had been very vocal about how lacking in confidence Rick was during this time

mostly because WCW had chewed him up and spat him out. Now, even a flare at 50% was still better than most

but it did show in his work, as it would for anyone. Rick felt like he had lost the magic

so sort of sculpted around the place, scared of his own shadow. Let's not pretend that we haven't all been there

It's one of the reasons Hunter did get him into evolution as the legendary veteran, so they could restore faith in himself

The difference is noticeable on TV. Before long, he felt like the old Ric Flair

And from there, everything was far better. Some may say the current Ric is in a similar situation but this is totally different He like a 75 man now When you bring that into the chat yeah kind of makes sense why this would be the way

Number 8, The Big Show in 2003. While Vince McMahon would profess to know exactly what to do with WCW's giant before he signed Paul White

turned out this was all hot air. As soon as he did debut in the WWF as The Big Show, it was the same old thing

and any chat of being used as a special attraction was thrown out the window. It meant there was a lot of back and forth, especially because management was insistent they couldn't push him properly until he lost weight

So when we got to 2003, there were less ideas than ever. Seems odd as you're dealing with a huge man in wrestling

Sometimes things are too obvious and you forget. He did kick off the year as the world champion and ended it with the United States title, but everything in between was a head-scratcher

The show did have a feud with The Undertaker and Brock Lesnar, which had their moments, but by the end of each it felt like he lost more steam

I mean, he wasn't gaining anything from it. The ring-breaking spot with Brock will remain an all-timer, but as 2004 rolled around, there was even some talk that the powers that be were having second thoughts

There's no one today who can say the big show didn't have a Hall of Fame career when all was said and done, but times like these were confusing

He's massive, just let him talk people. Number 7, Triple H in 1996

I suppose the best way to sell this one is that look what Triple H was within five years

Exactly. When he did join the WWF in the mid-90s though, ridiculous gimmicks were in

Therefore, he was introduced as Hunter Hearst Helmsley, a Greenwich blue blood who thought he was better than you because he was rich

All right, then. In 1996, however, I'm not sure the company knew what they were going to do with him because he was feuding with the likes of Duke the Dumpster Drozzy and got wrecked by the Ultimate Warrior at that year's WrestleMania

He also had to have a hog pen match with Henry Godwin. I mean, none of this was good

It wouldn't be until October when a program with Mark Merrow for the Intercontinental title heated things up

From there, it was D-Generation X. We know the rest. But for a good few months there, it looked like Triple H was going to be totally lost

as he fought with the stalker, Freddie Joe Floyd and Savio Vega. There's nothing against those guys

They just so happened to be pegged at a lesser level. Number six, Stone Cold Steve Austin in 2002

We talked about this in the mega ups and downs I did for WrestleMania, and it just stands out like a sore thumb

Despite all his success, the WWE had no clue what to do with Steve Austin in 2002

This really is underlined when you watch his match with Scott Hall at WrestleMania 18

but cause of just a lot of nothing. Part of this was to do with Hall personal issues with the finish even being changed because management wasn convinced they could rely on Scott That also why Kevin Nash doesn do much of anything on the outside The second half of the year was even worse as Stone Cold was so down on creative he walked out of the company

but actually this wasn't a massive shock. From January to this point it felt like the Rattlesnake had feuded with everyone

the Hill Turn hadn't gone as we thought, and Steve didn't want to work with Hulk Hogan, didn't trust him

It all imploded when Austin went on the bike this show and very legitimately aired his grievances against his storytelling

was then told to lose to Brock Lesnar. We know the rest

It is such a shame as it feels like a lost period of Steve's career these days, but either way, not like the rest wasn't all time

It absolutely was. Number five, Daniel Bryan in 2011. Yes, I know

2011 is when Daniel Bryan won the Money in the Bank briefcase and became the World Heavyweight Champion

That was great, but always will be. The issue was WWE sort of just did this and then forgot

I am not kidding. It all began at the start of the year when Bryan was the United States champion

but you know the deal there. Any mid-card title was ignored. They've lost all their charm

It didn't get defended until Mania when he lost it to Sheamus, and when he won the briefcase, if word is to be believed

it was actually a last-minute decision to try and surprise the fans. He subsequently lost to Cody Rhodes, Sin Cara, and Wade Barrett

Two weeks before he cashed in, he lost in 120 seconds to Alberto Del Rio

There was no interference either. He got wrecked. The Money in the Bank win did give us some hope, but yeah, Daniel was the champion in name only

WWE had no clue what they had. It was going to take him a good few years to find out too

Number four, Randy Orton in 2015. Randy Orton is a Hall of Famer

He is way better than most people give him credit for, but he's been going so long he falls foul to this curse more than most

Some years WWE just shrugged their shoulders. 2015 started out okay as he feuded with the authority before beating Seth Rollins at Mania with one of the best RKO's of all time

The thing is, who was standing tall by the end of the night? The technical loser of that match

It did mean he was the first contender for this title, but he was not victorious

Then he was back to fighting Sheamus, even though he had recently feuded with Sheamus

We sort of meandered from there until Randy very sadly hurt his shoulder And while you never want anyone to get injured, there was an upside to this

Going away from TV for a while meant when he returned he felt super fresh again

Even then though the Jinder Mahal thing happened, I think sometimes WWE takes order for granted

Hopefully never again. 3. Becky Lynch in 2017 Becky Lynch is one of the most popular wrestlers around right now People pretend this isn true That nonsense It been quite the rise because there was once this idea she was the fourth out of the four horsewomen when they were making noise

but this was mostly because WWE wasn't taking advantage of what they had. Do you remember that

tag team with Naomi? It was just so random. Becky did become the first ever Smackdown Women's

Champion, but it was another one of these title crownings where we didn't treat it properly

She soon lost it to Alexa Bliss, and then yep, did nothing. Now it actually turned out for the

best because Lynch would use this in her promos when she was becoming the man, but the fact you

have a whole year when she was persona non grata is just so damn short-sighted. It is all there

though. She did get overlooked for many opportunities. When WWE tried to turn her heel and the audience

rejected it, we all knew she ruled. Number 2, Goldberg in 2003. Well, we all know this. WWE

knows it. Bill knows it. The fans knew it and it was so obvious. We just didn't use Goldberg as

goldberg instead the powers that be decided we had to wwe the wcw legend which meant longer matches

problem was nobody wanted to see that we just wanted the wrecking machine we got a couple of

years before this dudes like lance storm and rosie got ran through but as soon as bill was put in any

program that featured a top star it all got extended the average goldberg pay-per-view match

in 2003 was 14 minutes i mean come on off his aura alone he still became the world champion but

it was all such a struggle due to the above. WWE just didn't get it

and then they put him in a wig. This was dumb, and nine times out of

ten I love dumb, this wasn't it. His return in 2016 was the way

to do it, and it only took management 13 years to realize this. Whoops

Number one, The Undertaker post-streak. So this is one for the debating team

Was The Undertaker's loss at WrestleMania 30 the turning point of his

WrestleMania career? It certainly took away from his magic at the show of shows for

obvious reasons because any Mania match after this just wasn't as fun. I mean at Mania 31 he

faced Bray Wyatt which was a double-edged sword because nobody wanted to see Taker lose back to

back but we also wanted Wyatt to win. This is not an ideal scenario. 32 was Shane McMahon and 33 was

Roman Reigns, a match even the Deadman has said should have been better. 34 was Cena was super fun

but also kind of just there. He wasn't even on 35, didn't turn up. 36 was the Boneyard match which

was excellent as a goodbye but i do get this it was always going to happen for the obvious reasons

as soon as the streak was over at wrestlemania the undertaker became just another guy

so my word that's something to get into pens at the ready go