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In professional wrestling, backstage influence can be more powerful than fan support. This video explores six wrestlers who were masters of the political game but struggled to translate that power into box office success.
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From vipers who may or may not have used their fangs for bad behind the scenes
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to heartbreak kids who weren't afraid to throw their toys out of the pram
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This lot could all be classed as some of wrestling's most famous, er, politicians
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but also not exactly folks you'd go out of your way to spend money on
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With that in mind, I am Gareth, this is WhatCulture Wrestling, and here are six backstage wrestling politicians who never drew a dime
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Number six, Randy Orton. Randy Orton looked so much like a star in Vince McMahon's eyes
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that he was going to be presented and coddled like one, even if the metrics didn't indicate that he was much of a star at all
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WWE's monopoly distorted the idea of draws and stars forever. In effect, provided they didn't pull alarmingly low numbers or destroy the baseline
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a wrestler could be marketed as a star, and most fans would simply accept it
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How could Randy Orton not be a star? He's headlined countless premium live events and won 14 world titles
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It just screams star. Now, Randy Orton wasn't much of a politician, granted
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His bad reputation in wrestling mostly derives from his history of obnoxious, disrespectful behaviour and angry, abusive outbursts
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He was a vandal, an unprofessional nightmare, an impulsive liability in front of fans
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You've all heard the stories. He's always held a degree of influence, though, and has seemingly wielded it on occasion
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He was allegedly instrumental in the immediate firing of Mr. Kennedy. Kennedy
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Orton was the recipient of a scary botched backdrop suplex on the May 25th, 2009 Raw
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And Kofi Kingston might not have been demoted to the midcard had Orton not screamed that he was stupid, stupid, stupid over and over again in a match held a year later
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Yep, you've all seen that clip too. Orton, as one of the most decorated world champions in history
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was pushed heavily by WWE for longer than most wrestlers, well, ever
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In 2026, he is more over than ever, without really being involved in the main event picture up until the road to WrestleMania this year
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But this wasn't always the case. WWE's version of events clashed with reality
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As part of this relentless initiative, Orton was cast as the top babyface on SmackDown throughout 2011
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He dropped the World Heavyweight title to Mark Henry at Night of Champions on September 18th
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And the week prior to the switch, WWE recorded its worst weekend house show business of the year
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Attendance then rebounded slightly with Henry on top. The September 23rd SmackDown drew the highest rating in months
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It was 3.26 million. But this was no anomaly. Henry was a consistent TV draw
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SmackDown frequently exceeded 2 million viewers during his reign. Where that had only happened twice between WrestleMania and Night of Champions
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As of early September 2024, a WWE NXT show for which Randy Orton was advertised
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set to emanate from the Enterprise Center in his hometown of St. Louis, Missouri
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had sold just 2,104 tickets before it was hastily moved to the far smaller The Factory at the District in Chesterfield
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As difficult a challenge as it definitely was for Orton to draw a big crowd under the NXT branding, he still failed
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Put it this way, folks. Randy Orton is what happens when you're able to control the narrative
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and build a superstar from the ground up and all that, of course
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Oh, and speaking of that line. Number five, JBL. With his light speed push, John Bradshaw Layfield
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at least until the crowning of Jinder Mahal, was the most inexplicable WWE champion ever
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Unlike Mahal, who afforded absolutely nothing, JBL had a few things going for him, at least
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While his matches were largely terrible, he could deliver the required main event level drama when turning blood effects on against Eddie Guerrero and John Cena
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All the red stuff. If the content of his promos was cheap and ugly, the delivery was fantastic
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He had a great nasty bellow in him. He mastered the art of playing the blowhard who thinks he knows what he's talking about because he can shout the loudest
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Also, what a finisher by the way. By default, even his worst matches as champion, those that resembled elongated 1998 mid-card bouts, had a great ending
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Bang! He took their damn heads off. JBL was not a draw, though
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The best thing you can say about him is that his presence felt less surreal as he grew into the role
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But yeah, he still wasn't a draw. TV ratings patterns didn budge when Eddie Guerrero dropped the title to him And JBL first brand pay main event against The Undertaker at No Mercy 2004 drew 140 domestic buys
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That number is pretty pathetic. The worst since In Your House Ground Zero
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which had 136,000 back in September 1997. Look, there are different ways of playing the political game, of course
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JBL wasn't known for undermining potential locker room threats, Nor was he accused of entering deliberately sub-par performances that would reflect poorly on his opponents
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Probably because nobody would be able to tell the difference. JBL, however, was known as a career-long suck-up and yes-man
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He took it upon himself to ingratiate himself with the Upper Management Boys Club by terrorising the greener lockers in the dressing room
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JBL's job, and he did it allegedly through the threat of sexual assault, was to weed out the prima donnas
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JBL was the guy who curated the desired atmosphere of fear A brutal and sadistic office henchman
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JBL was the sycophant who endures in political circles Longer than the people who want to do good
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Right, time for a question and a bit of positivity In an otherwise quite negative list
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JBL isn't what you class as one of WWE's greatest world champions, is he
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But I want to know, right now, who you feel is one of the more underrated out there
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Let me know in the comments down below Number 4, Jeff Jarrett Triple H is not included on this list, but he is a dishonorable mention
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He was the ultimate wrestling politician, so he is as well qualified for inclusion in this list as, well, Vince McMahon is for hell
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Legitimizing his case further, Triple H was nowhere near a draw big enough
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to warrant the longest main event push in WWE history. However, in 2005, Triple H set a WrestleMania pay-per-view buy record
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outside of a boom period because people wanted to see him lose a world title
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He did the same thing for B-level pay-per-views too, until the never-to-be-repeated pipe dream that was Invasion drew 775,000 buys
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Backlash 2000 broke the record for a non-Big Four event with a staggering 650,000
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That is a lot of buys. WrestleMania 19 didn't even do that well
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Now yes, you can argue that The Rock drew that number, not that he would have pulled it with Mr. Assmind
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but you can't argue with those results. Jeff Jarrett in his relentless NWA world champion era was nicknamed Triple J
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Uh-oh. He earned it because like Triple H allegedly did, Jarrett used his stroke to rip and tear through the locker room
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Dixie Carter presided over the company that Vince Russo booked, but really Jeff Jarrett ran it
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Jeff Jarrett always thought he was great enough to main event, jumping around the 1990s to achieve that goal
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and you can half see why. He was one of the best rookies ever when he broke out
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almost in the Kurt Angle class, and he's considered one of the most solid and safest pros ever
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But he wasn't very big, and he wasn't on the level of smaller peers like Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels
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I mean, who was, though, to be honest? And when Jeff Jarrett did get the opportunity
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he became a meme for not drawing. He didn't draw in WCW, but then again, nobody did
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Even wrestlers with a strong history of drawing prowess, like Sting and Goldberg were rendered valueless in 1999 and beyond
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Also, early adopters of TNA were vehement in their disgust of Jarrett's constant quest for heat
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and bored of his ceaseless crowd brawl matches. And Jarrett, no stranger to the NWA title either side of it
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underwent his own lengthy reign of terror between June 2nd, 2004 and May 15th, 2005
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Ah, Papa H would be proud. Fans were particularly angry when Jarrett didn't drop the title to Monty Brown at Final Resolution 05
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That was the moment that Jarrett could no longer justify his spot as some sort of gatekeeping need
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Who cares if Monty wasn't ready? The fans believed in him, and if he wasn't, well, you switched the title back, simple as that
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Jarrett's loss to Sting at Bound for Glory 2006 drew between 55,000 and 60,000 buys
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That is some number when you consider how difficult it is to do anything notable in the shadow of post-2001
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WWE. Jeff however didn't have to bring fans into the impact zone, entry for which was free with the
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price of admission to Universal Studios, so it's literally impossible to determine whether he was
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a draw or not. This isn't helped by the fact that they used to make memes about how little the impact
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ratings changed week to week. Jarrett legitimized TNA, which is sort of oxymoronic, but you get the
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meaning. He didn't draw fans to it as a talismanic top star or anything, but while he does deserve
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of inclusion here. Conversely, he probably deserves more plaudits in retrospect. Before we go any further today, make sure to give that subscribe button right down below
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a smash if you haven already I waiting Smash it Is it smashed All Alright carry on Number three Shawn Michaels Shawn Michaels thought nothing of burying his peers in the pro wrestling brotherhood
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if it meant that he could eliminate any threats to his main event position. He was also so self-interested that his nose would stream
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and his red eyes would itch whenever he came into contact with almost losing a title, the poor thing
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He felt something coming on when it was time for the dudes with attitudes to drop the WWF Tag Team Championships
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In reality, Diesel was days away from winning the WWE title. He could hardly lose a lesser belt to Sparky Plug
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But if you track Shawn's first singles run between 1992 and 1998
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you'll note many more good excuses. In fact, it apparently took The Undertaker threatening to break Shawn's ass in half
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for him to finally do a proper job in a title match for the next Hulk Hogan at WrestleMania 14
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Sean would later publicly embarrass the actual Hulk Hogan at SummerSlam 2005 in revenge for doing the job
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Sean undermined Vader at SummerSlam 1996, throwing a mid-match conniption fit over a timing error
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Sean, and this was horrific even by the standards of wrestling politics
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but is rarely talked about since it was overshadowed by the Montreal Screwjob
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petitioned to win the European title from Davey Boy Smith at one night only
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The Bulldog had vowed to win it in honour of his dying sister. Davey probably shouldn't have talked so adamantly in the build
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even if he was set to win the match originally. But it was still an awful thing to do on Sean's part
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He didn't need the lowly tertiary belt, and it meant nothing to him
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He dropped it to Triple H in a sham comedy match that the DX buddies only pretended to wrestle in
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So how did Michaels get away with it? I mean, it's not as if Sean was a box office draw
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If anything, the opposite was true. Sean had one exhibit to justify his ego
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On March 17th, 1996, he teamed with Diesel in a match against Bret Hart and The Undertaker
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that both set a record-high house show gate and sold out Madison Square Garden
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This was the first non-pay-per-view sellout since the mid-1980s. Thought to be a good omen ahead of his WWF title win at WrestleMania XII
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fate instead told him to suck it. Sean was a poor draw
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His main event against Vader at SummerSlam was a bloody disaster, drawing just 157,000 buys
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This was down 30% from SummerSlam 1995. And Mabel headlined that show
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Yep, Mabel. 1997 was meant to be bigger than most Royal Rumble shows
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And in a way, it was. On top of the titular attraction, Shawn Michaels was going to win his WWF title back from Psycho Sid
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in his hometown of San Antonio, Texas. The 60,000 plus attendance was very much inflated
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20,000 of the 48,000 who actually paid did so using $5 to $7 coupons with Taco Bell orders
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And the show was down 27% from Royal Rumble 1996 on pay-per-view
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In what Bret Hart might deem a karmic twist of fate. Sean went on indefinite hiatus as soon as the WWF exploded in popularity at WrestleMania 14
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and returned in 2002 unable to arrest the tumbling downfall. Breaks your heart
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Number two, the Hurt Syndicate. Shelton Benjamin is almost the definition of a solid hand
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Look, standards were lower in the 2000s. WWE was the only major operation in the United States
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by which time Vince McMahon had lost both the ability and the necessity to build new stars
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Fans projected top star potential onto many wrestlers who were very good but not intangibly great
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because there were so few options. Benjamin was not especially charismatic and could not really talk
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but he had a banger in him at a time when the banger was still rare and rather special
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Impressive longevity, meant to be a pretty swell guy, but he was not and is not a pro wrestling star
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Bobby Lashley is, at least to a further extent. When he won the WWE title on the March 1st, 2021
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Monday Night Raw, he initially proved a modest ratings hit with the male 18-34 demographic
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But his YouTube clips sometimes ranked number 5 from that given week's episode of Raw
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which was hardly great for the WWE Champion. Lashley held the belt for 196 days in 2021
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the year in which AEW Dynamite for one hot summer closed the gap. Lashley did not hemorrhage
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viewers and was not exactly responsible for Vince McMahon's weekly creative atrocities
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But you can't call him a great draw either, even though some of his quarter hours yielded
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standout numbers compared to the rest of the show. Lashley's big title loss to Big E on September 13th, which only happened as a result of Dynamite's
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narrow key demo win the week prior was not a draw In fact Dynamite eked past the Raw demo number again Dynamite got 0 and Raw got 0 A once set of circumstances informed this aberration
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And the inaugural Monday Night Football show annihilated Raw. But the number was still really bad, even with that context in mind
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Oh, and MVP was never a big draw either. Collectively, the Hurt Business were pushed big on Raw in 2020
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when WWE reached the bottom. The ratings had never been worse. The pandemic hardly helped, granted
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I mean, fans were sympathetic. The booking was typically abysmal, which was a particular shame since the stable looked so much like stars
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Hardcore fans bemoaned the missed opportunity on seemingly every other Reddit thread
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MVP also sensed that the Hurt Business boasted huge potential. He constantly questioned why the stable was de-emphasized and broken up
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He could not let it go, So much so that the faction, minus Cedric Alexander, made its way to AEW as the Hurt Syndicate in 2024
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The early run was awesome too. They picked up the coolest possible synonym for the trademarked business
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Shelton Benjamin was booked very strong early, thus avoiding the designated jobber stigma
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and the world tag team title win over Private Party was a chest-pounding, elongated squash
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At some point though, the idea that the Hurt Syndicate should be a big deal was conflated
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Without boosting business in any appreciable way, dreaded stories followed the Hurt Syndicate around
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Bobby Lashley vs Swerve Strickland didn't get a rematch. MJF was booted from the group in such a way that abruptly was a synonym for suspiciously
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Dave Meltzer subsequently reported that an unnamed core member did not want MJF involved
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Various reports buried MVP in his Miro-style ex-WWE guy ego. If this was overstated, and MVP is said to be very generous with advice, it must be said
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he did not help himself by constantly talking over his rivals and even his stablemates in awkward promo segments
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If all this chat was inconclusive, the finish to the World Tag Team Title three-way at Forbidden Door was almost incontrovertible
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Brodido dethroned the Syndicate in a three-way match by pinning FTR. The holders did a 1990s-style non-job
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It didn't matter much in the end, since fans loved Brodido regardless, but come on
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That's as sly as it gets, right? Oh, and on the subject of that ex-WWE guy ego..
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1. The Modern Ex-WWE Club Some dishonourable mentions to complete the list
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WWE is incredible at brainwashing. It takes some fans a while to look past the production values of a new company
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when they first grow angry at WWE's booking and wish to seek out an alternative
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How good can it be, really? The word of mouth is strong and the critics rave about it, but it looks like crap
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Some WWE fans never make that breach. They either stick with WWE, even if passively
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or they end their journey with wrestling there and then, which is quite sad, really
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WWE has, for years, marketed itself as the recognized global leader. Hell, at this point, WrestleMania is more important than money to the vast majority of pro wrestlers
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You're almost more susceptible to this level of conditioning. Nixon Newell, allegedly, was unhappy with a 2025 AW collision booking
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So much so that she and tag team partner Miranda Elise walked out of the taping after trying and apparently failing to finagle their way into getting more minutes
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Oh yeah, and just so we're clear, the title does not specify whether the wrestlers were any good at playing politics
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Malachi Black, again this is all alleged You will have to take the professional wrestler's word for it
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Was said to not have enjoyed getting pinned It must be nothing more than a coincidence
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That Malachi took the pin on a once per year basis Yeah
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Similarly Miro was said to have the dreaded I've been in WWE
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I refuse to job in this rinky dink mud show attitude too
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Which might explain why he was only cleanly defeated by Sammy Guevara and Brian Danielson in singles action
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Probably just a coincidence again though, right? Miro actually did well as TNT champion, quarter hours wise
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but he allegedly acted like Andre the Giant under Vince McMahon Sr
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If those alleged rumours are to be believed, both men had their phones on silence when asked to do a job
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Again though, those near immaculate win-loss records. Suspicious for two wrestlers never considered pay-per-view headliners
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are probably just coincidental. Yeah, completely coincidental. And guess what? There is more where this sort of fantastic wrestling stuff came from, my friend
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Click on this 121 secret backstage stories WWE doesn't want you to know video next
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Oh, it's a biggie, but you can never have too much of a good thing, right? I'm sure that's the saying
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Yep, that's what I'm going with. Have a great day. See you later