Gee WWE, that sure is one white hot star you have right there! Would be a shame if someone wasted it. These are 11 times WWE wasted white hot stars!
00:00 - Start
01:08 - 11
02:07 - 10
03:21 - 9
04:24 - 8
05:36 - 7
06:44 - 6
07:48 - 5
08:47 - 4
09:45 - 3
10:51 - 2
11:49 - 1
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00:00 - Start
01:08 - 11
02:07 - 10
03:21 - 9
04:24 - 8
05:36 - 7
06:44 - 6
07:48 - 5
08:47 - 4
09:45 - 3
10:51 - 2
11:49 - 1
SUBSCRIBE TO partsFUNknown: https://bit.ly/2J2Hl6q
TWITTER: https://twitter.com/partsfunknown
FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/partsfunknown/
Buy wrestling merchandise here: https://www.wrestleshop.com/
Read more Feature content here on WrestleTalk.com: https://wrestletalk.com/features/
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SportsTranscript
00:00 Boy, I wonder what prompted this topic to land on my desk.
00:04 WWE really had a hard time making new top stars after that John Cena fellow took off,
00:09 and a lot of that comes from the company's inability to capitalize on a ready-made star
00:14 falling in their lap, a problem the company seems to still be suffering from.
00:18 We may be all of nine days removed from WrestleMania 39 and the shocking non-coronation of Cody
00:24 Rhodes, but it is safe to say that the decision and the subsequent sale of WWE paired with
00:28 the confirmation of Vince McMahon's return haven't filled fans with much hope for Cody's
00:33 future.
00:34 But Cody isn't the only one who has felt the moderate heat of WWE's backburner.
00:38 PFK fans, raise your arms and give me your strength.
00:42 I'm gonna try and get through this one without losing my will to live as a wrestling fan.
00:46 Peaceful thoughts.
00:47 I'm Tempest Hailing from PartsFunknown, and these are 11 Times WWE Wasted White Hot Stars.
00:53 But before we get on with this list, make sure of course that you like this video, subscribe
00:57 and enable notifications to always on so you never miss a fun list just like it, and make
01:00 sure you check out the two new episodes of Survival Series that have hit the airwaves
01:05 this month here on PFK.
01:08 Number 11, Damian Mizdow in 2015.
01:11 I was recently asked on our Patreon Mailbag show, subscribe at patreon.com/wrestletalk,
01:16 what small wrestling decision still bothers me, and I would still be hard-pressed to find
01:20 a different answer than Damian Mizdow not defeating The Miz for the right to become
01:25 The Miz.
01:26 No one can possibly tell me that Damian Mizdow wouldn't have taken that gimmick further
01:30 than The Miz has the last 8 years.
01:33 Maybe Mizdow would have actually brought prestige back to the Intercontinental Championship.
01:37 After becoming the, at the time, biggest loser in Money in the Bank history, Damian Sandow
01:41 took on a second career as The Miz's stunt double, which got over more than anyone could
01:46 have hoped, including WWE themselves.
01:49 Damian Mizdow became the best comedy act WWE had had in many a year, and WWE just couldn't
01:54 have that, killing off the duo at WrestleMania 31 after months of teased splits.
02:00 Mizdow was the runner-up in the Andre Battle Royal, and then got beat by The Miz, ending
02:04 the feud and the hottest period of Mizdow's career.
02:07 Number 10, Rusev in 2017.
02:10 Huh, would you look at that, it's Rusev Day.
02:13 What was it that Vince McMahon said about the fans' love of Rusev Day?
02:16 They were chanting it to mock him?
02:18 Christ Almighty, peaceful thoughts, peaceful thoughts.
02:21 This was right in the thick of when it seemed as if WWE would punish stars for getting over
02:25 on their own accord.
02:26 If you weren't told to do it, you better not f***ing do it, no matter how loud the
02:30 people are cheering for you.
02:31 Rusev was one of WWE's funniest wrestlers, giving us such gems as Handsome Rusev, TV
02:37 Champion Rusev, and of course, Rusev Day, the holiest of days, celebrated each and every
02:43 day.
02:44 The act of Rusev and Aiden English worked better than you would expect, and caught fire
02:48 at Clash of Champions 2017, where the lovely lads challenged for the SmackDown Tag Team
02:53 titles.
02:54 WWE don't seem to call audibles very often, but they would have been more than justified
02:58 had they pulled the trigger on Aiden and Rusev given this incredible response.
03:01 It's the SmackDown Tag Titles, it wouldn't have mattered.
03:05 Instead WWE seemed inclined to remove the Stone of Shame from Rusev's neck, and instead
03:09 attach the Stone of Triumph, having him get pinned by Jinder Mahal at WrestleMania 34,
03:14 get betrayed by Aiden in a storyline that went nowhere, and then turn heel by WrestleMania
03:18 35.
03:19 Happy Rusev Day indeed.
03:21 #9 - Cesaro in 2014
03:24 Oh to travel back to early 2014, when Cesaro had only been on the main roster for two years,
03:29 and he was having excellent matches with Sami Zayn and NXT until it was time to split from
03:33 Jack Swagger at WrestleMania 30.
03:35 A time where there was still hope.
03:37 And at WrestleMania 30, what a f***ing moment he had.
03:40 Cesaro won the inaugural Andre the Giant Royal Memorial Battle Memorial, back when there
03:44 was also hope for that stipulation, in one of the biggest highlights of a pretty darn
03:48 decent WrestleMania, and people were excited.
03:52 And then the very next day, WWE cut the knees out from under the babyface run of Cesaro
03:56 precisely 24 hours in.
03:58 The very next night on Raw, WWE took a prospective new top babyface star and put him with Paul
04:04 Heyman.
04:05 Now, Cesaro and Paul Heyman sounds like a winning pair, but the problem then became
04:08 WWE never actually followed through with Cesaro's ascent to the main event scene.
04:13 Cesaro never so much as sniffed a pay-per-view main event until 2021, when he was also quite
04:18 hot, albeit with no crowd, but even in this case, Cesaro got beat and slipped back down
04:22 the card.
04:23 #8.
04:24 Asuka in 2018 As we continue to get into, booking babyfaces
04:29 has never been WWE's forte.
04:31 It has been too complicated much of the time, with the company too often relying on beating
04:35 their heroes like a dusty rug at spring cleaning, resulting in those stars losing their shine
04:39 like Rey Mysterio in 2006, Sami Zayn in 2016, or Bayley in 2017.
04:45 Now how do you fix that problem?
04:46 Surely, a babyface with a huge undefeated streak takes that problem right out of your
04:50 hands.
04:51 Asuka arrived on the main roster at TLC 2017, and immediately the vibes were just off compared
04:56 to her run in NXT.
04:58 She still won a bunch of matches, but no longer was she an unstoppable force, instead selling
05:02 for folks like Emma and Nia Jax when she had been killing them in NXT.
05:07 But it's just a little less over, it's still good, it's still good.
05:10 She won the Royal Rumble, really the only finish that made sense given the occasion,
05:14 and all signs pointed to Asuka beating Charlotte at WrestleMania 34 until that very much didn't
05:19 happen.
05:20 But she's just a little less undefeated, it's still good, it's still good.
05:23 But then rather than having that distinction elevate Charlotte, she lost to Carmella twice
05:27 in a row, and to really hit the point home, Asuka then lost to Carmella twice in a row
05:32 as well.
05:33 But she's just a little, oh it's gone, I know.
05:36 #7 Dolph Ziggler in 2013 Oh Dolph, it should have been me, Ziggler.
05:41 At one point, it really should have been you.
05:44 At a few points, really.
05:45 The biggest of which, of course, has to be the once greatest Money in the Bank cash-in
05:49 ever in 2013 where Mr. Ziggles won the World Heavyweight Championship on the Raw after
05:54 WrestleMania.
05:55 The moment that had been built up to for 9 months and paid off perfectly, seemingly ready
05:59 to launch Dolph into the main event scene, and then Dolph got a concussion.
06:03 Now granted, that is out of WWE's control.
06:06 What wasn't out of their control, however, was WWE playing this off as comedy with Dolph
06:11 forgetting that he had cashed in, and then losing to notable prick Alberto Del Rio in
06:15 his first title defense at Payback.
06:17 It was Vince's thought that giving Dolph the title was merely the right thing to do
06:21 for that moment, but he had no intention of giving Dolph the accompanying push.
06:26 Seems dumb to me, but what's dumber is getting another chance to give Dolph the rub a year
06:29 later with a fantastic performance at the 2014 Survivor Series, and rather than following
06:34 that up with any sort of big moment for Dolph, they brought the authority back and fired
06:38 Dolph in kayfabe a month after his triumph.
06:41 It should have been you, Dolph.
06:43 It should have been you.
06:44 Number 6, Zack Ryder in 2011.
06:47 Woo, woo, woo!
06:48 You blew it, bro.
06:50 Before Matt Cardona was the self-anointed king of the indies, Zack Ryder was the internet
06:54 fan's champion.
06:55 Quite literally, in fact.
06:56 Look at him with his internet championship.
06:58 At the start of 2011, Zack Ryder was comfortably the bottom of the WWE roster totem pole.
07:03 Ryder then took to YouTube and Twitter with his show, Z True Long Island Story, which
07:07 got steadily more and more popular until fans campaigned for him to be featured regularly
07:11 on TV.
07:12 He actually did the thing WWE always calls for their stars to do, get themselves over,
07:18 make their own opportunities, and grab the brass ring.
07:21 Except they don't actually want that.
07:22 That is a lie.
07:24 Ryder managed to win the United States title at TLC 2011, but lost it in short order before
07:28 being the biggest victim of John Cena's asshole nature, stealing Zack's girlfriend,
07:33 and then striking him while Zack was getting pushed off stages in wheelchairs.
07:37 Not exactly the main event push WWE fans were clamoring for.
07:40 The magic was gone for Ryder after this, as he went back to being routinely beaten into
07:44 powder by the actual stars that WWE were interested in promoting.
07:48 Number 5, The Nexus in 2010.
07:51 Lord above, John Cena does not come out of this list looking good, does he?
07:54 Yeah, turns out that when WWE was looking to waste one of their white hot stars, feeding
07:58 them to John Cena was their go-to move.
08:00 In the case of The Nexus, their debut was the high point of Raw in 2010, giving WWE
08:05 their big summertime angle.
08:07 Wade Barrett and his band of merry men were due for a major win at Summerslam, but John
08:11 Cena quite literally said, "That doesn't work for me, brother."
08:14 The Nexus went from being the biggest invading force WWE had had since The Invasion, to John
08:19 Cena's verbal punching bags in one night.
08:22 Cena beat them decisively at Summerslam, and then went on Raw the next night, calling them
08:26 names, comparing them to fast food mascots, and he may as well have looked right down
08:30 the lens of the camera and told WWE fans never to take these men seriously again.
08:35 And really, they didn't.
08:36 The Nexus storyline went down as one of the biggest missed opportunities in the company's
08:40 history, and it didn't have to be this way.
08:42 They could have just beaten Cena at Summerslam.
08:44 Like, why was that so hard?
08:47 Number 4, The Fiend in 2019.
08:50 For the first match of a new character, you can't ask for a much better showing than
08:53 The Fiend's match with Finn Balor at Summerslam 2019.
08:56 I would know.
08:57 I was there.
08:58 The Fiend's invincibility worked perfectly into this one-sided debut match, and a strong
09:03 win and bone-chilling entrance combined for a great introduction for a new and intriguing
09:07 top star on Raw.
09:09 And then WWE decided to immediately book him in a Universal title match that they didn't
09:13 want him to win.
09:14 Why did they do this?
09:15 Well, I can't tell you, because I don't know.
09:18 This was WWE in 2019, after all, not the time in which they were making their smartest decisions.
09:23 Hell in a Cell 2019 was the site of maybe the worst main event in WWE history, effectively
09:28 killing off the runs of Seth Rollins, The Fiend, the Hell in a Cell stipulation, and
09:32 pretty much all interest in the main event scene of Raw.
09:35 A terrible feud with The Miz and a speedy loss to Goldberg did not help matters for
09:39 all Fiendy Pops, but it further proved that WWE really didn't have a plan for their
09:43 new top star after the first night.
09:45 Number 3, Daniel Bryan in 2018.
09:48 How is it possible that WWE took a returning Daniel Bryan, the biggest potential babyface
09:54 star they could ever ask for in 2018, fresh off a two-year retirement, and put him in
09:58 a months-long feud with Big Cass?
10:01 Daniel Bryan being able to wrestle again was a dream-come-few for wrestling fans of all
10:05 walks of life, and it would have required great restraint not to simply put him in the
10:08 main event of WrestleMania 34 and win the Universal title immediately, but hot dog did
10:13 they ever go in the opposite direction.
10:15 Instead, Bryan teamed up with Shane McMahon in the second-best McMahon tag match of the
10:19 night to face Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn.
10:21 On paper, a good pairing, but the match started with an attack from the heels, taking Bryan
10:25 out of the match until the finish, and taking the air out of the building.
10:29 But again, one match to ease Bryan back in, understandable.
10:32 Why they then chose Big Bill to be Bryan's next feud, I will never know.
10:36 Bryan's momentum continued to slow throughout the year with an underwhelming feud with The
10:40 Miz before only reaching the top of the card again by turning heel.
10:44 The biggest possible babyface, forced to turn heel in order to be booked well.
10:49 For shame, WWE.
10:51 2.
10:52 CM Punk in 2011 Now I know there will be people who will be
10:55 quick to say that CM Punk got a 434-day title reign out of his 2011, and you would be right.
11:01 However, it is impossible to look at the summer of Punk's circa 2011 as the success that
11:05 it should have been.
11:07 After the all-time classic Money in the Bank main event that saw CM Punk hightail it out
11:11 of Chicago with the WWE Championship in hand, he was the biggest deal WWE had had in a very
11:16 long while.
11:18 And then WWE followed that up by closing out their next four straight pay-per-views with
11:22 CM Punk having been pinned and beaten.
11:24 By the time he won the WWE Championship back at Survivor Series, the uptick in interest
11:28 caused by CM Punk's pipe bomb and subsequent title win had all but depleted.
11:33 It was supposed to be the summer of Punk.
11:35 Instead, it was about the three weeks of Punk before WWE's terrible booking tendencies
11:39 reared their ugly heads.
11:41 Seriously, what part of that Money in the Bank program screamed "This needs more Kevin
11:45 Nash" to y'all?
11:46 Baffling stuff, but not as baffling as...
11:49 Number 1 - Cody Rhodes in 2023 Now I will preface this one by saying that
11:55 there is still time for Cody Rhodes to be saved following his WrestleMania 39 loss to
11:58 Roman Reigns.
12:00 However, boy was that ever the right time to pull the trigger.
12:03 I watched the closing sequence of Owens hitting the Stunner, Sami hitting the Huluva Kick,
12:08 and Cody hitting the Bionic Elbow and Crossroads, and you can argue about adversity all you
12:13 want, but I don't know that you will ever find a more perfect ending to the Roman Reigns
12:17 run of dominance than that moment.
12:19 Cody Rhodes was white hot, peaking at the perfect moment, and WWE elected not to pull
12:24 the trigger after all.
12:25 There is still every chance that it could pay off in the long run, but given that Roman
12:29 isn't scheduled to work Backlash, it really does sort of feel like stat padding at this
12:32 point in an attempt to get him to a thousand days as champion.
12:36 A stat that didn't need to be padded at the sacrifice of the story being told.
12:41 Cody may stay as over as he had been.
12:43 Hell, Sami got a big moment for himself at WrestleMania after everything was said and
12:47 done, but the main event of WrestleMania 39 as of this moment does unfortunately feel
12:52 like one of the biggest wastes of a white hot star in WWE history.
12:58 And that's our list.
12:59 I mostly kept it calm throughout that one, but eh, you know, couple moments there.
13:02 Make sure of course that you check out the latest episode of Survival Series that went
13:05 up, naming every single WWE WrestleMania main event.