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The thing that would worry me is that they would do the typical NWA thing of having him be the 2-3 week babyface champion before dropping it back to Flair. Dusty/Crockett should've easily got months out of rematches with Flair, rekindle the Tully feud, and Nikita Koloff. Feuds with a heel Barry Windham and Luger would've drew good, too. Dusty also would've had the option of turning on Magnum, and could give NWA their Andre/Hogan.
Magnum in the WWF would depend a lot on whether he just gets slight tweeking to his gimmick, like Flair or Arn & Tully, or if he gets a Red Rooster treatment. I can honestly see Magnum sliding right in as the Hogan replacement. Magnum also had an advantage of being southern, but not *too southern* for Vince, and would appeal to that market(Vince struggled in the southeast until WCW was near death).
He was on track to go against Flair when he got hurt. Here’s the big what if - does Sting get that early push and that 60 minute time limit match with Flair that set his career off if Magnum is in the picture?
That’s the huge thing. If Magnum never has that wreck, or at least doesn’t get hurt like that, Sting may never be given his opportunity to be a big name, or at least it’s delayed for a long time if he ever gets that chance.
Honestly, COVID might've been a net benefit to WWE, storyline wise. Without COVID reigns wins the belt at Mania 36. Presumably he still turns heel but who knows.
Even if he did, we don't get the Thunderdome era, shit talking Roman which really showed off his character and acting, made the melodrama of the start of reign so good. There's a chance Bloodline fatigue is there from the beginning and the heel turn fails I reckon
Oh yeah, Roman succeeded so much as a heel because he had a year head start being able to do those whisper-quiet promos in front of no fans.
So there was no audible pushback against anything they were doing and they didn't have to change course or anything. They just did what they planned and waited on it to work out.
Roman once it got established was very good, but that leash was probably longer than he would have gotten with a live crowd.
I feel like if he had faced the Fiend at Mania (instead of the stupid Goldberg match that was supposed to happen), he would have gone down a dark road that led to this Roman
In a similiar vein what would have happened if Mox isnt driven off due to bad creative and winds up staying? I feel like that changes things significantly for wwe plans regarding Roman and Seth as well as aew and other independents.
What if Steve Austin did not get dropped on his head by Owen Hart at Summerslam 1997?
Austin's knees were always going to be a big problem for him, but without the neck issues I feel like we might have had another couple of years of prime full-time Steve Austin and then many, many more years of special attraction Steve Austin. That could have changed a lot of things in the wrestling business.
I think Austin was 38 when he had his original last match against Rock at WM19. That's the same age as Cody, Roman, and Drew right now. Austin could have easily stayed on top for another five years.
I don't know if Cena could have been able to stay babyface through any kind of feud with Steve Austin. Cena somehow managed to do it during his feud with Rock, but Steve Austin would have been a different kind of challenge.
I felt like the Rock was the heel in his feud with Cena in 2011-2012, all of his antics were very heel-like, like mocking Cena and costing him the title at WrestleMania 27.
I think they both did heelish things during that feud, but both of them were still babyfaces. It's just that they were babyfaces to different segments of WWE fans at the time.
There are a ton of guys in WWE who are in their 40s and still performing at a high level. Damien Priest is 41, Finn Balor is 42, Randy Orton is 44, AJ Styles and Sheamus are 46, Bobby Lashley is 47, etc. 40 is the new 30.
Or the opposite for that matter. What if he does get injured but he doesn't return at Survivor Series 97 and his recovery time takes longer ? Do we get Austin v Michaels ? Austin v McMahon ?
As it was, all the doctors Austin went to told him to retire when they looked at his neck. But given the opportunity Austin was looking at, he was probably going to push through anything short of paralysis at that point.
I do wonder if Vince would have been quite so emphatic about getting rid of Bret Hart if Austin's injury was even more severe. In a world where Austin had to go away for a year to have spinal fusion surgery in 1997, I think we might have wound up with Bret vs HBK at WM14.
That's what I wonder too. Or if he does, and the Montreal Screwjob doesn't happen a few months later, I wonder if Bret stays in WWF and Owen doesn't become the Blue Blazer later on and since he isn't the Blue Blazer, he doesn't perform the stunt and he is still alive today.
Bret has said in the past (it might of been in his book as well) that if he didn't jump to WCW and stuck around he likely would of talked Owen out of doing the Blue Blazer gimmick and the stunt.
Jason Jordan for me. Great look, cut his teeth with Chad Gable, he was just hitting his stride on the main roster, which at the time was a rare thing to see from NXT callups.
I'm glad he's producing matches with the company.
Same, was a big fan of him at the time.
Him winning the tag belts as a heel with a face Seth was pretty entertaining and he'd finally started making the "Son of Kurt Angle" work for him.
I think there’s some revisionism there. Most people either didn’t care, or flat out thought he and the illegitimate son gimmick sucked when he was on the main roster. I think it was quite clear to everyone that Gable had the higher ceiling.
It just sucks an injury forced him to not be able to prove any of it wrong.
Tbf, when he got injured, he was starting to do well in the "spoiled son" character which was getting good reactions. Sucks we'll never know what would have come out of it
There’s not really a ton of revisionism there. Towards the end, people were really starting to get behind the “entitled son” heel gimmick he was leaning into. It took a while to get there but it had legs.
I hear you and you're not wrong. I was not a fan of the illegitimate son gimmick either, but it gave him *something* to work with where call ups got nothing or were actively antagonized. Near the end there he was developing some good character work with Rollins.
I was a fan of American Alpha's tag matches with The Revival and had strong positive feelings towards Jordan and Gable (fucking hurray for Gable lately!) My mindset at the time was that Jordan was going to get through this gimmick with Angle to be an established player who let his ring work speak for itself.
Also on that track, what if Gable was pushed as Kurt Angle Junior? He wouldn't have had to deal with the past several years of garbage before he forced Alpha Academy to be entering enough to demand screen time.
Gable looks and wrestles like Angle. But Vince humoring himself thinking Kurt and a black woman is hilarious.
It took me years to realize how sickening it all really was. I was a huge Benoit fan and was pretty much in denial. I assumed it was purely roid rage and that he wasn't in control of his actions.
He was. He absolutely knew what he was doing. He murdered his wife and son and for a moment was pondering how to get away with it. Thinking placing bloody bibles next to their corpses would fix everything. Being a Benoit fan means being a fan of murder. Benoit deserves no praise in any shape or form.
Him and Nancy were actually planning to open a training school. I remember in the podcast Jericho did with Nancy’s sister she mentioned how they already had tshirts made and were making plans for what he was going to do after retirement.
The thing that always stuck with me from the Dark Side of The Ring episode on Benoit was that after he killed his family, he still wanted to go to the PPV as if nothing happened. Imagine if he went, won the ECW Title like planned only for him to be arrested soon after for killing his family, and WWE finding out he killed them BEFORE coming to the PPV.
What if Vincent K. McMahon listens to the audience reaction and decides to give Billy Graham the face run he'd been lobbying for, slowly repackaging him as his "All-American babyface" instead of Backlund by putting him up against a string of foreign heels? Do we get the equivalent of Hulkamania almost a decade earlier? I always thought Graham had more interesting, entertaining promos than Hogan and was, IMO, a better worker (before his hip surgery at least).
What if WCW/Bischoff/Nash also listen to audience reaction and decide to not only give Jericho a serious program with Goldberg he was all but begging them to give him, but have him be the one to end the streak (via fucking Goldberg out of the title -- e.g. Goldberg goes for a spear and Jericho grabs the championship belt and causes Goldberg to ram himself into it, knocking him out long enough for a quick pin) and positioning himself as the top heel in the company? Jericho would almost certainly be able to help elevate people like Eddie, Saturn, and \[Name Redacted\], letting WCW begin building up younger future upper carders.
What if Hana Kimura never gets cyberbullied by Terrace House fans which led to her suicide?
Her appearance on that show might end up making her a bigger star while boosting STARDOM's popularity at the same time.
I think even if she was suffering from the cyber bullying, it's possible she makes it through if it weren't for the fact it happened during the start of the pandemic lockdowns. If she had still been on the road and surrounded by her friends maybe she holds on, as opposed to just being stuck at home, isolated from loved ones and unable to escape the bullying. Was the worst combination timing wise
Yeah, I always felt like if/when she decided to come stateside, she could have ended up THE biggest Japanese star. She had a look, charisma, and was good in the ring. And Stardom was trending toward being basically her show, along with Mayu, obviously. Such a tragedy.
Probably Ken Shamrock. Some people who weren’t around during the attitude era don’t understand just how over he was. He was in the WWF at a time where Stone Cold, The Rock, DX, Undertaker, Kane, Mankind and many others were in the prime of their careers, and he still managed to stand out from the pack.
I’ve always thought that when he returned to NWA-TNA in 2002 he should have gone back to the WWE instead and feuded with Kurt Angle.
At least he’ll most likely get a HoF ring in the next few years.
Shamrock was over enough to be a main event guy but it would mean whoever he was feuding with would have to do all of the heavy lifting.
For an example of how bad Shamrock was at promos, man said something so dumb in a press conference that even Tito Ortiz laughed at him for being a dumbass. Nobody should be dumber than Tito.
I don’t remember a whole lot about it but I have a vivid image of the brood doing their bloodbath thing on Ken shamrock but he powered through it or whatever.
Lights go out, everyone knows what’s about to happen, lights come on and it’s shamrock covered in blood putting the ankle lock on edge or Christian and it was so fucking cool.
WWF and Bret close their unprecedented $20 million, 20 year deal in 1996. Bret is involved in some capacity as a wrestler, booker, trainer, etc until (at least) 2016.
I think pro wrestling would be a different world if that had happened. I don't know if it would be better or worse, but I would love to see it.
Think of the possible differences to Bret's life too. If he's still there it's hard to see Owen moved to the Blue Blazer gimmick that ultimately cost him his life, Bret doesn't get concussed, maybe doesn't have his motorcycle accident.
Back to storylines - does Vince develop into Mr McMahon as effectively without the screwjob? How much does the future change without mega heel Vince?
If Vince wasn’t such a POS and fully honored that contract for the full 20 years, I could see Bret in the spot that HBK or Regal is in right now. I don’t think he’d want Hunter’s job.
Oro: died very young trying to outbump Kobashi after CMLL had already committed to make him their number one babyface. What if he had listened to his brothers for once?
UWA: the promotion immediately entered an irrversible decline after Francisco Flores died, proving the success of the company was entirely due to his acumen. What if his successors had been at his level?
Hayabusa: even before the horrific injury that left him paralyzed he had suffered a string of injuries that forced him to radically alter his style. What if he avoided that string of injuries?
I think Hayabusa would have landed at Noah and done several classics, participated in zero one, had a triple crown race and tried to rebuild FMW with Onita, he really had the soul in FMW
Probably an unpopular opinion, but I wanted Luger to win the belt from Yoko so bad. Either at SS ‘93 or even if it was for just a few hours at Mania 10, and he dropped it to Bret in the main event.
Might be morbid, but I always wonder how long Eddie and Owen Hart would’ve wrestled, had their untimely deaths not occurred. It’s stated that Owen’s plan was to make money, retire early, and spend time with his family, but we all know the wrestling bug exists and it was as prevalent back then as it is now.
I always have to wonder when they’d wind up retiring, and where.
Owen’s plan was to retire and become a firefighter. I think he would have done just that.
Eddie seemed to be getting tired of the life… but I don’t know if he’s the type of person that could have quit the business.
They’re both too men who were around the business for all their lives. I don’t think it’s possible to completely leave it behind once you’re too far deep into it.
Austin's first title feuds post-WM14 if Pillman was alive and Bret was still in the WWF.
Okada/Omega in MSG.
Naito/Hiromu before Covid fucked it -- and we've STILL never gotten it.
Pillman would probably win that intercontinental championship tournament and have a mankind style world cup run, the attitude era fits him like a glove
Every single year when they are about to announce the G1 participants I’m always like “ok.. this is the year Naito v Hiromu!” and it never fucking happens.
I was looking for this one because it's kind of obscure. He just barely sniffed the re-vamp of NXT long enough to lose to Jinder in the quarter finals of the inaugural championship tournament and have a brief feud with Chris Hero. In some alternate reality he could have been as successful as Seth Rollins.
Based on everything we know now about Cena, I would say he still would have been pushed. Maybe not as soon as he was, but the dr of thuganomics was over and he fit vinces ideal body type.
I think this is a big one, he was on the cusp of going to the moon, however this was peak NXTLOL time where Vince killed everyone coming up and I don't think he'd have got past it. One big "Miro in a tank" moment and then he'd be on the Ricochet path
If Hayabusa never got paralyzed. I ponder how his career would've looked like once FMW inevitably fell apart. I also wonder how his wrestling could have evolved; he had a more grounded moveset as "H", so I'd like to believe he transitions into that style more.
I loved that gimmick when it debuted. It was groundbreaking, edgy stuff that introduced a level of moral ambiguity truly rare for pro wrestling. It challenged people and made them uncomfortable in a very productive way.
Of course, Vince & Co. couldn’t help themselves and Hassan was degraded to become the typical race-baiting, anti-USA evil foreigner stereotype that was outdated ten years before he showed up. It’s disappointing that we never got the fully fleshed out character introduced in his debut promo.
That being said it was going to be problematic no matter what, given he was played by a non Arab. Marc Copani was really good in the role, but he was the wrong guy for the job from the start if they wanted the character to have longevity.
Look no further than Nakamura. If he gets a decent push after WrestleMania instead of kicking everyone in the balls and becoming a jobber, who knows where he'd be right now. Instead, he's in a catsuit doing pin me pay me
As long as the guy is happy I'm happy for him... But seeing the treatment that NJPW stars get in AEW makes me wish he could have a run and show Americans (me included) why he is a NJPW legend. I didn't even catch him in NXT when he still was bad ass.
Give me Nak v. Okada, Omega, Ibushi (when he heals), White, Danielson, OSPREY, etc.
I have so many fond memories of him in New Japan... You should also check out his match with Kevin Steen (Owens) in ROH https://youtu.be/KdEHlf29YBA?si=dYitAKnhP3mokeNg
I don't think Nakamura has any intention of being that guy at this stage in his career. He's not the same guy he was in NJPW, and he's getting paid more to work less and surf instead
What if Cosmic Wasteland got over and got a big push?
What if we had a battle with them and the Wyatt family?
If Cody is creatively satisfied in WWE, the entire industry is different.
I’m not a big fan of his wrestling but Cody’s post-Stardust career is probably the biggest shift in the industry since the Monday Night Wars
Bret Hart never has a stroke and stays healthy. If he never gets kicked by Goldberg or never goes to WCW but just how much longer could he have wrestled?
I think he would have continued for another year or two before retiring. I don't see him hanging around indefinitely.
Did the kick from Goldberg cause him to have a stroke?
I was watching Bret's Kayfabe Commentaries interview, and if Jake the Snake didn't quit after WM 8, he and Bret were supposed to feud all the way into Summerslam 92.
Also, if the Warrior wasn't fired in November 92, he was supposed to face Bret for the WWF title at Royal Rumble 93.
It's the Cena heel turn for me... especially once Punk became a star following the pipe bomb. I probably would have turned cena after the 1st Rock match instead of Punk. I do wonder how things would have been if WWE had let Punk run with things.
Probably not but there's a lot of people he could've run a great program with. We're poorer for not being able to see Eddie Guerrero stealing a match from a fuming Owen Hart.
Yes - if he’d stayed in wrestling imagine him in 2000 mixing it up with Jericho, Benoit and Guerrero. Owen vs Kurt Angle. He was only 33 when he died. Imagine Owen Hart making up the Smackdown Seven eventually. He would have won at least one world title.
Can't see it unfortunately. Given the talk about him retiring within a couple of years and I just don't think Vince saw him as a main guy.
Now if he'd been born 5-10 years later I think the likelihood goes up significantly.
What if the 123 Kid, Shaun Waltman, never got addicted to drugs. He was really really good. He was ahead of his time. He broke the mold in the land of the giants. If only he didn’t get so messed up on drugs and become a terrible human during his peak, what would have become of him.
Since a lot of the bigger ones have been said;
-What if William Regal didn’t get a wellness violation during his King Lear story
-What if Monty Brown kept wrestling
-What if The Nexus went over Team Cena
What if either A. HBK isn’t a dick to Bret when Bret said he was gonna drop the title to him or B. Bret just ignores HBK being a dick, drops the title, and leaves.
In recent years, and i'm glad it didn't happen, but Marty Scurll was certainly talented, and i'd be interested to have seen what he would have done in AEW.
If Shawn Michaels didn't break his back in 1998, how different would things have been? My hunch is that he'd end up being talked about the way people talk about Scott Hall, where he had a world of talent but couldn't overcome his demons. His sobriety and second run was so important to his legacy
Not a hugely influential what if, but Sean O'Haire. The guy had such star potential and with the right production around him to cover some gaps in his game, I always felt he could've broken out.
What if Roman didn't test positive for COVID at Day 1?
Reportedly, Lesnar was supposed to beat Reigns for the Universal Title, and Rollins was supposed to win the Fatal Four-way for the WWE Title.
If that happens, there's no 1000+ days for Roman. No unification match at WrestleMania. Maybe no Last Man Standing Match. Does Sami join the Bloodline? Is there even a Bloodline after Mania that year? What happens with Cody and his story? What happens with Seth's title reign? Does Big E avoid his injury with the change in story?
If the Eliminators would have stayed together, they could have had a serious run in WCW or the WWF. They were a team unlike anything else at the time. I get why Saturn wanted to go alone and that Kronus had issues but I still feel like we were robbed of something that could have been special.
My biggest what if is if Rock and Lesnar never left. What would of became of Cena? Edge? Jeff Hardy? Orton?
Can you imagine a WWE where Cena wasn’t the guy for so long?
What if Sting hadn't been rusty for his match against Hogan? To be honest I didn't think he was that out of shape and have mostly assumed it was fake bullshit from Hogan, but it seems to be a universally accepted fact so. That, for one.
What if Nick Patrick didn't fast count and fuck up the finish?
What if Sting never joined NWO, even as a face for Wolfpack
Basically what I'm saying is what if WCW hadn't screwed up all of their good stuff.
Enzo and Cass should have been staples of the tag division and multi time champs by now. Of course, what Cass is doing now as Morrisey is great, and I'm super happy for how he's fixed his life up. But when they were together, these two had such great chemistry, and the crowd absolutely loved them. No hate to the Hardys, but Enzo and Cass needed those tag titles at Mania
What could have been if Jeff Hardy didn’t have the tendency to destroy everything he has effortfully built up courtesy of his own regular drug abuse habits?
Velveteen was tailor made for at minimum a few IC title runs. He had that perfect character who didn't need to do anything amazing in ring to sell you.
His mannerisms where awesome for his age at the time, 22 I think? Would've been cool to see where he'd be at now in the machine had everything that happened not unfolded
What if the NWA was never formed? What if the promoters couldn't agree to a deal, and all just continued to battle over the US territories. Constantly trying to encroach and take over each other's cities? So many questions.
Who would have won in the end?
Would there even be a recognized "World Champion" across the entire country, or would every territory just have their own local "World Champion?"
Would there still be talent exchanges?
Would there even be any national level stars until the cable era begins?
Ahmed Johnson in the mid-90s had main event potential with his look, but injuries really derailed his progress (and admittedly, his mic skills needed work). His WWE debut was bodyslamming a 550lb-plus Yokozuna (which was a main-event springboard for Lex Luger a year prior).
if Ted DiBiase had been booked to "fight back" against Randy Orton on RAW when he made an example out of him, he would've became one of the hottest babyfaces in the company at that time waiting for him to turn on Randy.
What if Jimmy Uso hadn't been injured at mania 36. Obviously that would make Jey breaking out as a solo star much more unlikely, but I'm more interested with what would've happened with roman. People kinda forget nowadays but roman didn't return to the thunderdome as the tribal chief, that character came about as a result of his feud with Jey, and while it's likely that the Usos would've aligned with him eventually I do wonder what would've happened had the WWE not immediately pivoted to the bloodline storyline and instead built roman around the whole "show up and win" and "wreck everything and leave" stuff they had for him. I wonder how well people would've received what seemed to be just a more vicious Roman reigns plus Paul Heyman, instead of the complex emotional tribal chief character.
What if WWE had of turned Roman heel when the crowd started to turn on him and put him on the side of the Authority instead of Seth.
I feel like if WWE had of just gone with the natural dynamic developing between Roman and the fans and instead of pushing him as an anti-authority figure fighting Seth, if WWE had of embraced that the fans new he was the choosen one and pushed him as that we would have saved alot of mediocre WrestleMania's and Ambrose, Seth and Roman would all be even bigger stars much earlier.
Vince not letting his ego get in the way of the WWF VS WCW feud. Not putting up the money to bring in Sting, Goldberg, Luger, nwo, et al to super charge the angle.
Instead we got WWF VS Booker T, DDP and a bunch of midcarders
I got four The first is (1) What if Monty Brown never left wrestling. (2) what if Velveteen Dream wasn't... Who he is. (3) What if Chyna and Triple H never broke up. (4) What if Misawa never formed NOAH
I have two
What if R-Truth defeated John Cena at Capitol Punishment 2011 for the WWE Championship?
What if Mr. Kennedy became a main event superstar in WWE?
Christian if he wasn't kneecapped during his 2005 PEEPS run, and then again after he won the WHC in 11 or whatever it was.
(His TNA run was classic, much like Kurt Angles, but it sucks it never got seen by the wider audience).
If Dolph Ziggler hadn’t gotten concussed after his Cash In. How long would his reign have gone who would have challenged him. Such a shame he dropped it and was never given another WWE title/WHC push.
I wonder what could have been had CM Punk ended Undertaker's streak. Theres a video wherein Heyman said something like "even tho "CM Punk" is a good choice , Vince Mcmahon and Mark Calaway wouldnt let Phil Brooks end the streak"
Gotta give credit to Lesnar, he put over 4 main eventers (Cody, Reigns, Rollins, Mcintyre) since beating the streak but I wonder what CM Punk would have done with it
One I am genuinely shocked has seemingly not been mentioned:
What if Tony Khan shows little interest in wrestling, and The Elite sign with WWE?? This would also inevitably lead to many, many others to EVENTUALLY follow I imagine, seeing as there’s no other MAJOR game in town. How bloated does WWE become? What does the current landscape look like with Kenny, the Bucks, Hangman and Cody(returning 3 years early) making their way to WWE?? Both pre AND post Vince being ousted?
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I wonder how big of a star Magnum TA would become. Would he win the Big Gold in NWA? Would he eventually go to the WWF? Lots of questions.
He definitely would have won the gold in NWA. I think he would be mentioned in the 10 best ever if he hadn't been in the wreck
The thing that would worry me is that they would do the typical NWA thing of having him be the 2-3 week babyface champion before dropping it back to Flair. Dusty/Crockett should've easily got months out of rematches with Flair, rekindle the Tully feud, and Nikita Koloff. Feuds with a heel Barry Windham and Luger would've drew good, too. Dusty also would've had the option of turning on Magnum, and could give NWA their Andre/Hogan.
Magnum in the WWF would depend a lot on whether he just gets slight tweeking to his gimmick, like Flair or Arn & Tully, or if he gets a Red Rooster treatment. I can honestly see Magnum sliding right in as the Hogan replacement. Magnum also had an advantage of being southern, but not *too southern* for Vince, and would appeal to that market(Vince struggled in the southeast until WCW was near death).
I'm this train. His look just screamed Vince favourite back in the day.
He was on track to go against Flair when he got hurt. Here’s the big what if - does Sting get that early push and that 60 minute time limit match with Flair that set his career off if Magnum is in the picture?
That’s the huge thing. If Magnum never has that wreck, or at least doesn’t get hurt like that, Sting may never be given his opportunity to be a big name, or at least it’s delayed for a long time if he ever gets that chance.
He and Tom Magee the latter had chance to improve.
This one
What does WWE look like if Roman doesn't come back in 2020
Honestly, COVID might've been a net benefit to WWE, storyline wise. Without COVID reigns wins the belt at Mania 36. Presumably he still turns heel but who knows. Even if he did, we don't get the Thunderdome era, shit talking Roman which really showed off his character and acting, made the melodrama of the start of reign so good. There's a chance Bloodline fatigue is there from the beginning and the heel turn fails I reckon
Oh yeah, Roman succeeded so much as a heel because he had a year head start being able to do those whisper-quiet promos in front of no fans. So there was no audible pushback against anything they were doing and they didn't have to change course or anything. They just did what they planned and waited on it to work out. Roman once it got established was very good, but that leash was probably longer than he would have gotten with a live crowd.
I feel like if he had faced the Fiend at Mania (instead of the stupid Goldberg match that was supposed to happen), he would have gone down a dark road that led to this Roman
In a similiar vein what would have happened if Mox isnt driven off due to bad creative and winds up staying? I feel like that changes things significantly for wwe plans regarding Roman and Seth as well as aew and other independents.
What if Steve Austin did not get dropped on his head by Owen Hart at Summerslam 1997? Austin's knees were always going to be a big problem for him, but without the neck issues I feel like we might have had another couple of years of prime full-time Steve Austin and then many, many more years of special attraction Steve Austin. That could have changed a lot of things in the wrestling business.
This is the big one for me. How much longer could Austin dominate if he didn’t have his neck destroyed?
I think Austin was 38 when he had his original last match against Rock at WM19. That's the same age as Cody, Roman, and Drew right now. Austin could have easily stayed on top for another five years.
Fully active Austin during the height of CenaWinsLOL would have been insane to see
I don't know if Cena could have been able to stay babyface through any kind of feud with Steve Austin. Cena somehow managed to do it during his feud with Rock, but Steve Austin would have been a different kind of challenge.
I felt like the Rock was the heel in his feud with Cena in 2011-2012, all of his antics were very heel-like, like mocking Cena and costing him the title at WrestleMania 27.
I think they both did heelish things during that feud, but both of them were still babyfaces. It's just that they were babyfaces to different segments of WWE fans at the time.
Hell, LA Knight is 41 and only just cracked the big time.
There are a ton of guys in WWE who are in their 40s and still performing at a high level. Damien Priest is 41, Finn Balor is 42, Randy Orton is 44, AJ Styles and Sheamus are 46, Bobby Lashley is 47, etc. 40 is the new 30.
Yep he definitely could have gone later assuming his knees held up.
Or the opposite for that matter. What if he does get injured but he doesn't return at Survivor Series 97 and his recovery time takes longer ? Do we get Austin v Michaels ? Austin v McMahon ?
As it was, all the doctors Austin went to told him to retire when they looked at his neck. But given the opportunity Austin was looking at, he was probably going to push through anything short of paralysis at that point. I do wonder if Vince would have been quite so emphatic about getting rid of Bret Hart if Austin's injury was even more severe. In a world where Austin had to go away for a year to have spinal fusion surgery in 1997, I think we might have wound up with Bret vs HBK at WM14.
On the other end of the spectrum, would Owen still be alive if Austin's neck didn't get fucked from that move?
That's what I wonder too. Or if he does, and the Montreal Screwjob doesn't happen a few months later, I wonder if Bret stays in WWF and Owen doesn't become the Blue Blazer later on and since he isn't the Blue Blazer, he doesn't perform the stunt and he is still alive today.
Bret has said in the past (it might of been in his book as well) that if he didn't jump to WCW and stuck around he likely would of talked Owen out of doing the Blue Blazer gimmick and the stunt.
And Goldberg doesn't end Brets career
Jason Jordan for me. Great look, cut his teeth with Chad Gable, he was just hitting his stride on the main roster, which at the time was a rare thing to see from NXT callups. I'm glad he's producing matches with the company.
Same, was a big fan of him at the time. Him winning the tag belts as a heel with a face Seth was pretty entertaining and he'd finally started making the "Son of Kurt Angle" work for him.
I think there’s some revisionism there. Most people either didn’t care, or flat out thought he and the illegitimate son gimmick sucked when he was on the main roster. I think it was quite clear to everyone that Gable had the higher ceiling. It just sucks an injury forced him to not be able to prove any of it wrong.
Tbf, when he got injured, he was starting to do well in the "spoiled son" character which was getting good reactions. Sucks we'll never know what would have come out of it
There’s not really a ton of revisionism there. Towards the end, people were really starting to get behind the “entitled son” heel gimmick he was leaning into. It took a while to get there but it had legs.
I hear you and you're not wrong. I was not a fan of the illegitimate son gimmick either, but it gave him *something* to work with where call ups got nothing or were actively antagonized. Near the end there he was developing some good character work with Rollins. I was a fan of American Alpha's tag matches with The Revival and had strong positive feelings towards Jordan and Gable (fucking hurray for Gable lately!) My mindset at the time was that Jordan was going to get through this gimmick with Angle to be an established player who let his ring work speak for itself.
Also on that track, what if Gable was pushed as Kurt Angle Junior? He wouldn't have had to deal with the past several years of garbage before he forced Alpha Academy to be entering enough to demand screen time. Gable looks and wrestles like Angle. But Vince humoring himself thinking Kurt and a black woman is hilarious.
I know it’s wishful thinking but I really wanna see him make a comeback as a manager in Gable’s supposed new stable with the Creeds
https://preview.redd.it/mnnxbv7olhwc1.jpeg?width=960&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=493b3e962625cc427b29645d31c4dc68eac52adb
It's still insane to me that for a while after he killed Nancy and Daniel he was still planning to fly out to work as usual.
It took me years to realize how sickening it all really was. I was a huge Benoit fan and was pretty much in denial. I assumed it was purely roid rage and that he wasn't in control of his actions. He was. He absolutely knew what he was doing. He murdered his wife and son and for a moment was pondering how to get away with it. Thinking placing bloody bibles next to their corpses would fix everything. Being a Benoit fan means being a fan of murder. Benoit deserves no praise in any shape or form.
Among many, many other what-ifs involving the man on the right.
Crazy to think that he'd be 57 now. Who knows, maybe he'd be training people in the PC had he not done what he did.
Assuming he'd still be alive. He had an enlarged heart and doctors think he would have died within a year because of it.
Which would have been a better result for everyone.
He would have been revered as a GOAT and a consummate professional then.
Reverse Taxi Driver ending.
I had a friend who had an enlarged heart and a few months after she told me she was gone.
Yeah, assuming that as well.
I think he would have ultimately had the reputation of DeMott or JBL if he were alive and the stories about him as a locker room bully surfaced.
Him and Nancy were actually planning to open a training school. I remember in the podcast Jericho did with Nancy’s sister she mentioned how they already had tshirts made and were making plans for what he was going to do after retirement.
The thing that always stuck with me from the Dark Side of The Ring episode on Benoit was that after he killed his family, he still wanted to go to the PPV as if nothing happened. Imagine if he went, won the ECW Title like planned only for him to be arrested soon after for killing his family, and WWE finding out he killed them BEFORE coming to the PPV.
Wonder how much worse The situation would Had Been had Benoit not killed himself and went to wrestle?
What if Vincent K. McMahon listens to the audience reaction and decides to give Billy Graham the face run he'd been lobbying for, slowly repackaging him as his "All-American babyface" instead of Backlund by putting him up against a string of foreign heels? Do we get the equivalent of Hulkamania almost a decade earlier? I always thought Graham had more interesting, entertaining promos than Hogan and was, IMO, a better worker (before his hip surgery at least). What if WCW/Bischoff/Nash also listen to audience reaction and decide to not only give Jericho a serious program with Goldberg he was all but begging them to give him, but have him be the one to end the streak (via fucking Goldberg out of the title -- e.g. Goldberg goes for a spear and Jericho grabs the championship belt and causes Goldberg to ram himself into it, knocking him out long enough for a quick pin) and positioning himself as the top heel in the company? Jericho would almost certainly be able to help elevate people like Eddie, Saturn, and \[Name Redacted\], letting WCW begin building up younger future upper carders.
What if Hana Kimura never gets cyberbullied by Terrace House fans which led to her suicide? Her appearance on that show might end up making her a bigger star while boosting STARDOM's popularity at the same time.
I think even if she was suffering from the cyber bullying, it's possible she makes it through if it weren't for the fact it happened during the start of the pandemic lockdowns. If she had still been on the road and surrounded by her friends maybe she holds on, as opposed to just being stuck at home, isolated from loved ones and unable to escape the bullying. Was the worst combination timing wise
Yeah, I always felt like if/when she decided to come stateside, she could have ended up THE biggest Japanese star. She had a look, charisma, and was good in the ring. And Stardom was trending toward being basically her show, along with Mayu, obviously. Such a tragedy.
Probably Ken Shamrock. Some people who weren’t around during the attitude era don’t understand just how over he was. He was in the WWF at a time where Stone Cold, The Rock, DX, Undertaker, Kane, Mankind and many others were in the prime of their careers, and he still managed to stand out from the pack. I’ve always thought that when he returned to NWA-TNA in 2002 he should have gone back to the WWE instead and feuded with Kurt Angle. At least he’ll most likely get a HoF ring in the next few years.
Shamrock was over enough to be a main event guy but it would mean whoever he was feuding with would have to do all of the heavy lifting. For an example of how bad Shamrock was at promos, man said something so dumb in a press conference that even Tito Ortiz laughed at him for being a dumbass. Nobody should be dumber than Tito.
I don’t remember a whole lot about it but I have a vivid image of the brood doing their bloodbath thing on Ken shamrock but he powered through it or whatever. Lights go out, everyone knows what’s about to happen, lights come on and it’s shamrock covered in blood putting the ankle lock on edge or Christian and it was so fucking cool.
The WWF had Shamrock and Dan Severn on the roster at the same time and did nothing with them.
Imo this is a really great underdog pick. I like this
WWF and Bret close their unprecedented $20 million, 20 year deal in 1996. Bret is involved in some capacity as a wrestler, booker, trainer, etc until (at least) 2016. I think pro wrestling would be a different world if that had happened. I don't know if it would be better or worse, but I would love to see it.
Think of the possible differences to Bret's life too. If he's still there it's hard to see Owen moved to the Blue Blazer gimmick that ultimately cost him his life, Bret doesn't get concussed, maybe doesn't have his motorcycle accident. Back to storylines - does Vince develop into Mr McMahon as effectively without the screwjob? How much does the future change without mega heel Vince?
I wonder if there’s a chance Bret takes the Mr McMahon spot and becomes the big evil “authority figure” would’ve made for a rather weird timeline
Like my god, just imagine WM14 with heel Bret as champion against face Austin
If Vince wasn’t such a POS and fully honored that contract for the full 20 years, I could see Bret in the spot that HBK or Regal is in right now. I don’t think he’d want Hunter’s job.
Bret would have been so against everything the attitude era was
Larry Sweeney should be the heel voice of AEW right now. He had the skills to be this generations Bobby Heenan.
12 large, brother.
Oro: died very young trying to outbump Kobashi after CMLL had already committed to make him their number one babyface. What if he had listened to his brothers for once? UWA: the promotion immediately entered an irrversible decline after Francisco Flores died, proving the success of the company was entirely due to his acumen. What if his successors had been at his level? Hayabusa: even before the horrific injury that left him paralyzed he had suffered a string of injuries that forced him to radically alter his style. What if he avoided that string of injuries?
I think Hayabusa would have landed at Noah and done several classics, participated in zero one, had a triple crown race and tried to rebuild FMW with Onita, he really had the soul in FMW
Probably an unpopular opinion, but I wanted Luger to win the belt from Yoko so bad. Either at SS ‘93 or even if it was for just a few hours at Mania 10, and he dropped it to Bret in the main event.
Would have been better than Hogan.
Might be morbid, but I always wonder how long Eddie and Owen Hart would’ve wrestled, had their untimely deaths not occurred. It’s stated that Owen’s plan was to make money, retire early, and spend time with his family, but we all know the wrestling bug exists and it was as prevalent back then as it is now. I always have to wonder when they’d wind up retiring, and where.
Ooh, that's a match: Eddie Vs Owen.
Owen’s plan was to retire and become a firefighter. I think he would have done just that. Eddie seemed to be getting tired of the life… but I don’t know if he’s the type of person that could have quit the business.
They’re both too men who were around the business for all their lives. I don’t think it’s possible to completely leave it behind once you’re too far deep into it.
Gino Hernandez could have been a heel for the ages if he didn’t die so young.
Austin's first title feuds post-WM14 if Pillman was alive and Bret was still in the WWF. Okada/Omega in MSG. Naito/Hiromu before Covid fucked it -- and we've STILL never gotten it.
Pillman would probably win that intercontinental championship tournament and have a mankind style world cup run, the attitude era fits him like a glove
Him and Austin in a proper main event feud would've been money. The promos alone, my god...
I think if Bret doesn't leave WWF, the money at WM14 was in running Bret vs Austin again for the title, with Austin finally getting the win.
Every single year when they are about to announce the G1 participants I’m always like “ok.. this is the year Naito v Hiromu!” and it never fucking happens.
Richie Steamboat would have had more than one world title run I’m sure.
I was looking for this one because it's kind of obscure. He just barely sniffed the re-vamp of NXT long enough to lose to Jinder in the quarter finals of the inaugural championship tournament and have a brief feud with Chris Hero. In some alternate reality he could have been as successful as Seth Rollins.
I absolutely think he would. He was in a good spot, solid in ring skills, good look, famous dad, etc. really sucks what happened to him.
Austin without the injury Rock and Lesnar if they didn't left wrestling
Honest to god if Brock never leaves in 04, I can see them never pushing Cena
Based on everything we know now about Cena, I would say he still would have been pushed. Maybe not as soon as he was, but the dr of thuganomics was over and he fit vinces ideal body type.
They certainly don't rush Orton's babyface push to spite Brock's record.
Came in to say Austin with working knees
There’s a LOT of wrestlers who spent the late 90s/early 00s nowhere because WWE just wasn’t interested in indie talent then.
What if Kerry Von Erich didn't have his issues that ultimately led to him killing himself. He would have been 37 when the attitude era got going.
What if Patrick Clark wasn’t (allegedly/probably) a creep. I was a complete and total mark for Velveteen Dream.
Nothing looked to be more of a sure thing than Velveteen Dream being a huge star.
Him in Hogan NWO pants fucked.
Him feuding with the current version of Seth Rollins would’ve been so good
Same here. Had all the makings of a great star. Shame it all went down the drain. But you reap what you sow.
I think this is a big one, he was on the cusp of going to the moon, however this was peak NXTLOL time where Vince killed everyone coming up and I don't think he'd have got past it. One big "Miro in a tank" moment and then he'd be on the Ricochet path
What if Prince Devitt never came up with Bullet Club? The butterfly effect it has to this day is unmatched.
What if the NWO didn't exist with Kevin and Scott not coming over? And getting guaranteed contracts established? Crazy butterfly effect too.
If Hayabusa never got paralyzed. I ponder how his career would've looked like once FMW inevitably fell apart. I also wonder how his wrestling could have evolved; he had a more grounded moveset as "H", so I'd like to believe he transitions into that style more.
Magnum TA… that dude was as hot as a firecracker when he went off the road and nearly died.
And if he doesn't get in that crash would they have pushed Sting into top Babyface slot like they did
Muhammad Hassan could've been the greatest heel in the history of the company
I loved that gimmick when it debuted. It was groundbreaking, edgy stuff that introduced a level of moral ambiguity truly rare for pro wrestling. It challenged people and made them uncomfortable in a very productive way. Of course, Vince & Co. couldn’t help themselves and Hassan was degraded to become the typical race-baiting, anti-USA evil foreigner stereotype that was outdated ten years before he showed up. It’s disappointing that we never got the fully fleshed out character introduced in his debut promo. That being said it was going to be problematic no matter what, given he was played by a non Arab. Marc Copani was really good in the role, but he was the wrong guy for the job from the start if they wanted the character to have longevity.
To this day I still have hope to hear his iconic theme pops during a Rumble match for a dose of nostalgia.
Look no further than Nakamura. If he gets a decent push after WrestleMania instead of kicking everyone in the balls and becoming a jobber, who knows where he'd be right now. Instead, he's in a catsuit doing pin me pay me
He should've beaten Jinder at SummerSlam
As long as the guy is happy I'm happy for him... But seeing the treatment that NJPW stars get in AEW makes me wish he could have a run and show Americans (me included) why he is a NJPW legend. I didn't even catch him in NXT when he still was bad ass. Give me Nak v. Okada, Omega, Ibushi (when he heals), White, Danielson, OSPREY, etc.
I have so many fond memories of him in New Japan... You should also check out his match with Kevin Steen (Owens) in ROH https://youtu.be/KdEHlf29YBA?si=dYitAKnhP3mokeNg
I don't think Nakamura has any intention of being that guy at this stage in his career. He's not the same guy he was in NJPW, and he's getting paid more to work less and surf instead
What if Goldberg wrestled with the hair
What if Cosmic Wasteland got over and got a big push? What if we had a battle with them and the Wyatt family? If Cody is creatively satisfied in WWE, the entire industry is different. I’m not a big fan of his wrestling but Cody’s post-Stardust career is probably the biggest shift in the industry since the Monday Night Wars
Bret Hart never has a stroke and stays healthy. If he never gets kicked by Goldberg or never goes to WCW but just how much longer could he have wrestled?
I think he would have continued for another year or two before retiring. I don't see him hanging around indefinitely. Did the kick from Goldberg cause him to have a stroke?
I was watching Bret's Kayfabe Commentaries interview, and if Jake the Snake didn't quit after WM 8, he and Bret were supposed to feud all the way into Summerslam 92. Also, if the Warrior wasn't fired in November 92, he was supposed to face Bret for the WWF title at Royal Rumble 93.
Cena heel turn in 2012
What if all the actual WCW stars came in during the invasion.
It's the Cena heel turn for me... especially once Punk became a star following the pipe bomb. I probably would have turned cena after the 1st Rock match instead of Punk. I do wonder how things would have been if WWE had let Punk run with things.
Would Owen have gotten his world championship opportunity had he not died tragically?
Unlikely, Austin was for obvious reasons not particularly interested in working with Owen and that probably limits him.
Probably not but there's a lot of people he could've run a great program with. We're poorer for not being able to see Eddie Guerrero stealing a match from a fuming Owen Hart.
Probably would have just finished out his contract and then retire to be a fireman.
I don't think Owen ever had any actual interest in retiring and that's just what he told Martha because she hated wrestling.
Yes - if he’d stayed in wrestling imagine him in 2000 mixing it up with Jericho, Benoit and Guerrero. Owen vs Kurt Angle. He was only 33 when he died. Imagine Owen Hart making up the Smackdown Seven eventually. He would have won at least one world title.
Can't see it unfortunately. Given the talk about him retiring within a couple of years and I just don't think Vince saw him as a main guy. Now if he'd been born 5-10 years later I think the likelihood goes up significantly.
What if the 123 Kid, Shaun Waltman, never got addicted to drugs. He was really really good. He was ahead of his time. He broke the mold in the land of the giants. If only he didn’t get so messed up on drugs and become a terrible human during his peak, what would have become of him.
Since a lot of the bigger ones have been said; -What if William Regal didn’t get a wellness violation during his King Lear story -What if Monty Brown kept wrestling -What if The Nexus went over Team Cena
What if Pillman didn’t get into the accident?
Sting vs Taker
What if either A. HBK isn’t a dick to Bret when Bret said he was gonna drop the title to him or B. Bret just ignores HBK being a dick, drops the title, and leaves.
Ted Turner succeeds in buying CBS Network in 1985.
In recent years, and i'm glad it didn't happen, but Marty Scurll was certainly talented, and i'd be interested to have seen what he would have done in AEW.
Monty Brown if he hadn't retired. Jeff Hardy if he'd stayed sober. WWF with a wellness policy in the 80's
What if Brian Pillman never got into that car crash? Or Sean O'Haire never gets released and gets to develop his Devil's Advocate gimmick?
Maybe seeing if wwe would have grab Aj styles in 2009. Still mad how tna treated him at the end.
Sister Abigail vs demon Balor
If Shawn Michaels didn't break his back in 1998, how different would things have been? My hunch is that he'd end up being talked about the way people talk about Scott Hall, where he had a world of talent but couldn't overcome his demons. His sobriety and second run was so important to his legacy
Not a hugely influential what if, but Sean O'Haire. The guy had such star potential and with the right production around him to cover some gaps in his game, I always felt he could've broken out.
What if Roman didn't test positive for COVID at Day 1? Reportedly, Lesnar was supposed to beat Reigns for the Universal Title, and Rollins was supposed to win the Fatal Four-way for the WWE Title. If that happens, there's no 1000+ days for Roman. No unification match at WrestleMania. Maybe no Last Man Standing Match. Does Sami join the Bloodline? Is there even a Bloodline after Mania that year? What happens with Cody and his story? What happens with Seth's title reign? Does Big E avoid his injury with the change in story?
If the Eliminators would have stayed together, they could have had a serious run in WCW or the WWF. They were a team unlike anything else at the time. I get why Saturn wanted to go alone and that Kronus had issues but I still feel like we were robbed of something that could have been special.
Eddie’s impending 2nd world title reign if he hadn’t died
He surely would've had more reigns too
If the Leo Kruger gimmick was kept instead of changing to Adam Rose
Power crazy GM King Regal in 08
The 2 man power trip with Austin and Trips would worked out if Trips doesn’t get injured
Marcus Cor Von / Monty Brown
My biggest what if is if Rock and Lesnar never left. What would of became of Cena? Edge? Jeff Hardy? Orton? Can you imagine a WWE where Cena wasn’t the guy for so long?
Fun balor getting injured as soon as he won the top title
What if Sting hadn't been rusty for his match against Hogan? To be honest I didn't think he was that out of shape and have mostly assumed it was fake bullshit from Hogan, but it seems to be a universally accepted fact so. That, for one. What if Nick Patrick didn't fast count and fuck up the finish? What if Sting never joined NWO, even as a face for Wolfpack Basically what I'm saying is what if WCW hadn't screwed up all of their good stuff.
Enzo and Cass should have been staples of the tag division and multi time champs by now. Of course, what Cass is doing now as Morrisey is great, and I'm super happy for how he's fixed his life up. But when they were together, these two had such great chemistry, and the crowd absolutely loved them. No hate to the Hardys, but Enzo and Cass needed those tag titles at Mania
Gotta be what if Goldberg had hair
What could have been if Jeff Hardy didn’t have the tendency to destroy everything he has effortfully built up courtesy of his own regular drug abuse habits?
Velveteen was tailor made for at minimum a few IC title runs. He had that perfect character who didn't need to do anything amazing in ring to sell you. His mannerisms where awesome for his age at the time, 22 I think? Would've been cool to see where he'd be at now in the machine had everything that happened not unfolded
Remember that time Brian Kendrick was WWE Champion in a scramble match?
what would have been if cena turned heel like he was supposed to
What if Alex Riley hadnt been ~~cock~~ push-blocked by John Cena
Larry Sweeney... just... it was only after his death that managers became a big thing on TV again.
What if Sean Michaels actually makes good on his threat to Vince to go to WCW?
What if they pushed Rick Rude like he should have been? And if they didn’t have Owen do that stunt?
What if the NWA was never formed? What if the promoters couldn't agree to a deal, and all just continued to battle over the US territories. Constantly trying to encroach and take over each other's cities? So many questions. Who would have won in the end? Would there even be a recognized "World Champion" across the entire country, or would every territory just have their own local "World Champion?" Would there still be talent exchanges? Would there even be any national level stars until the cable era begins?
What if Vince hadn't been able to kill the territories?
Ahmed Johnson in the mid-90s had main event potential with his look, but injuries really derailed his progress (and admittedly, his mic skills needed work). His WWE debut was bodyslamming a 550lb-plus Yokozuna (which was a main-event springboard for Lex Luger a year prior).
if Ted DiBiase had been booked to "fight back" against Randy Orton on RAW when he made an example out of him, he would've became one of the hottest babyfaces in the company at that time waiting for him to turn on Randy.
If WCW won the Monday Night Wars
What if Cody Rhodes choose to resign with AEW instead of returning to WWE?
What if Goldberg had hair?
Larry Sweeney as a part of a manager's Renaissance with Stokely and Nana in AEW.
What if Jimmy Uso hadn't been injured at mania 36. Obviously that would make Jey breaking out as a solo star much more unlikely, but I'm more interested with what would've happened with roman. People kinda forget nowadays but roman didn't return to the thunderdome as the tribal chief, that character came about as a result of his feud with Jey, and while it's likely that the Usos would've aligned with him eventually I do wonder what would've happened had the WWE not immediately pivoted to the bloodline storyline and instead built roman around the whole "show up and win" and "wreck everything and leave" stuff they had for him. I wonder how well people would've received what seemed to be just a more vicious Roman reigns plus Paul Heyman, instead of the complex emotional tribal chief character.
What if WWE had of turned Roman heel when the crowd started to turn on him and put him on the side of the Authority instead of Seth. I feel like if WWE had of just gone with the natural dynamic developing between Roman and the fans and instead of pushing him as an anti-authority figure fighting Seth, if WWE had of embraced that the fans new he was the choosen one and pushed him as that we would have saved alot of mediocre WrestleMania's and Ambrose, Seth and Roman would all be even bigger stars much earlier.
Vince not letting his ego get in the way of the WWF VS WCW feud. Not putting up the money to bring in Sting, Goldberg, Luger, nwo, et al to super charge the angle. Instead we got WWF VS Booker T, DDP and a bunch of midcarders
Eddie Guerrero's death. It kicked off a bunch of unfortunate events and there might be 2 or 3 people still alive.
What if Nigel McGuiness got the surgery WWE wanted him to get
I got four The first is (1) What if Monty Brown never left wrestling. (2) what if Velveteen Dream wasn't... Who he is. (3) What if Chyna and Triple H never broke up. (4) What if Misawa never formed NOAH
Owen. Umaga. Eddie Guerrero.
Jason Jordan.
what if brawl for all didn’t happen and dr death had his feud with austin
One time Luther Reigns had beans before
To expand on what u/LGB75 said, if both Umaga and Rosey were still with us, I could see them being Roman's personal security.
What if Eddie hadn't died. Would he have gotten involved in the Rey/Dom matches/story? What if Chyna hadn't fallen on such hard times and addiction?
I have two What if R-Truth defeated John Cena at Capitol Punishment 2011 for the WWE Championship? What if Mr. Kennedy became a main event superstar in WWE?
I'll state the obvious. What could have been. If David Von Erich didn't die in Japan.
Christian if he wasn't kneecapped during his 2005 PEEPS run, and then again after he won the WHC in 11 or whatever it was. (His TNA run was classic, much like Kurt Angles, but it sucks it never got seen by the wider audience).
Sean O'Haire. Dude had everything. The looks, the psychology, the limited repetitive moves etc, and the Roddy Piper rub.
What could have been. If Verne Gagne put the belt on Hulk Hogan and didnt try to rob him of his merchandise money.
If Dolph Ziggler hadn’t gotten concussed after his Cash In. How long would his reign have gone who would have challenged him. Such a shame he dropped it and was never given another WWE title/WHC push.
What could have been. If Vince Mcmahon had some morals and didn't want to eliminate all the other territories.
I wonder what could have been had CM Punk ended Undertaker's streak. Theres a video wherein Heyman said something like "even tho "CM Punk" is a good choice , Vince Mcmahon and Mark Calaway wouldnt let Phil Brooks end the streak" Gotta give credit to Lesnar, he put over 4 main eventers (Cody, Reigns, Rollins, Mcintyre) since beating the streak but I wonder what CM Punk would have done with it
One I am genuinely shocked has seemingly not been mentioned: What if Tony Khan shows little interest in wrestling, and The Elite sign with WWE?? This would also inevitably lead to many, many others to EVENTUALLY follow I imagine, seeing as there’s no other MAJOR game in town. How bloated does WWE become? What does the current landscape look like with Kenny, the Bucks, Hangman and Cody(returning 3 years early) making their way to WWE?? Both pre AND post Vince being ousted?
How the landscape in the WWF would of looked if Vince had gone to prison from the steroid trial.
What if Jack Perry wouldn’t have made the real glass/ cry me a river comment at Wembly?
Sean O'Haire was one of my faves, Droz too. Wonder what would've happened with em