Unluckiest wrestlers

[Chris B]

Inspired by the conversation around Wardlow, who appears to have the unfortunate hobby of randomly injuring himself.

Who have been the unluckiest wrestlers, either in terms of timing, injuries, or other things? Obviously, Magnum TA is up there, but also things like people who just missed the right era.

[SuperBacon]

Owen Hart.

[Chris B]

If a mod could close the topic, we're clearly done here...

[SaitoRyo]

Ken Kennedy is a pretty famous one. 

Suffered a bad injury just a couple of months into his initial big push. Came back, worked his way up the card and won the MITB at WrestleMania 23. Suffered an injury, which was thought to be serious, so WWE had him quickly drop the briefcase to Edge. Then it turned out the injury wasn't so bad after all and had been misdaignosed, but Edge had already cashed-in on Undertaker (aslo injured) to win the World Heavyweight Title. 

Soon after Kennedy was scheduled to be revealed as Vince's illegitimate son (which would have come with a major push), but he was implicated in the Signature Pharmacy steroid scandal right beforehand and got suspended instead.

[BomberPat]

My first thought is how many female wrestlers just missed out on being taken more seriously - so many from the 2000s that never got a look in when WWE were only interested in signing swimsuit models, and then were on the way out by the time they were actually becoming interested in hiring wrestlers. Madison Eagles, Nicole Matthews, and Portia Perez all strike me as wrestlers who could have done so much more.

Sticking with women's wrestlers, there was a time when I'd have put Ayako Hamada among the best in the world, but her drug arrest meant that any chance of ever getting work in Japan again went completely out of the window, and given that she hasn't worked in the United States since her arrest either (in fact, she hasn't worked there since years before getting arrested) it makes me wonder if she's not legally able to work in that country. So she's reduced to wrestling Mexican independents, with most people assuming she's retired, when without any of her legal troubles I'd have thought she'd be a dead cert for a veteran run in AEW's women's division, if not remaining on top of some of the smaller Joshi companies in Japan.

[The King of Old School]

8 minutes ago, BomberPat said:

Sticking with women's wrestlers, there was a time when I'd have put Ayako Hamada among the best in the world, but her drug arrest meant that any chance of ever getting work in Japan again went completely out of the window, and given that she hasn't worked in the United States since her arrest either (in fact, she hasn't worked there since years before getting arrested) it makes me wonder if she's not legally able to work in that country. So she's reduced to wrestling Mexican independents, with most people assuming she's retired, when without any of her legal troubles I'd have thought she'd be a dead cert for a veteran run in AEW's women's division, if not remaining on top of some of the smaller Joshi companies in Japan.

I mean fair enough I have never heard of her, but this part doesn't strike me as someone who is unlucky?

Edited September 10, 2025 by The King of Old School

[Supremo]

I often think about that crop of wrestlers from the early ROH years, who just missed out on NXT/WWE becoming more accepting of Indy talent, followed by the emergence of AEW. They must be gutted they were five to ten years too early. My boy Paul London could’ve been something special!

Wardlow reaching his muscle tear years is extra heartbreaking. He‘s truly living the cursed version of Batista’s career. What Big Dave could have been if everything went wrong.

Drew McIntyre probably deserves a shout, too. Hit the jackpot; pencilled in to win the WWE Title as the top babyface in the main event of Wrestlemania…then ends up wrestling Big Show in a weird bonus match in an empty warehouse.

[BomberPat]

I think it's unlucky in that a drug possession arrest certainly wouldn't, and hasn't, curtailed the careers of an awful lot of wrestlers in other countries, but the combination of Japan having a very heavy-handed approach to enforcing drug laws and there being fewer opportunities for women in wrestling in general, means it's something that she has been unable to meaningfully come back from, while people who have done far worse got little more than a slap on the wrist for it.

[jm29195]

William Regal - 2008. Recovers from addiction, turns his life around, well respected backstage. Gets his first main event push, and then is apparently suspended for testing positive for some sort of performance enhancing drug that he didn't even realise was one. Never gets another push like it, despite others like Jeff Hardy for example, being given multiple chances. Always felt bit sorry for him, really.

[westlondonmist]

British Bulldog in his 97-98 run. Came along, got injured fairly early, came back then almost got paralysed because WCW put a fucking trapdoor in the ring that wasn't safe to land on. I get the impression they didn't put a marker so people could avoid it. WCW then released him because of their fuck up. He came back to WWF a shadow of himself and nowhere near mobile. The guy had other issues sure, but WCW treated him like dog shit. 

 

 

[Carbomb]

Droz is one of the first that comes to mind, but there's also Jimmy Rave, and Nik Bali.

Thing is, if we're to get any meaningful discussion out of this thread, it might be best to caveat it with "Who's had the most blighted/ill-timed career?" Deaths and career-ending injuries are tragic, pretty final, and probably deserve individual discussion.

 

It might be an odd one to suggest, given how successful he's actually been, but I'd like to mention Dustin Rhodes - I think he was good enough to be a world champ in any promotion, but never has been, in any major promotion; not in WWE, wCw, ECW, TNA, or AEW. It just never seemed to pan out for him.

[BomberPat]

27 minutes ago, westlondonmist said:

British Bulldog in his 97-98 run. Came along, got injured fairly early, came back then almost got paralysed because WCW put a fucking trapdoor in the ring that wasn't safe to land on. I get the impression they didn't put a marker so people could avoid it. 

Maddest part was that it was a PPV with a War Games match, meaning there were two rings. There was no need for anyone to bump on the ring with the trapdoor.

[Gus Mears]

The line that Superstar Graham was a decade too soon is completely accurate, the bloke pissed charisma in the 70's. Doubly unlucky that his title reign fell at the end of Snr's reign, so we got years of Boring Bob Backlund with the belt instead of coked up Superstar cutting promos about how he trains by swimming across the Atlantic Ocean.

[Infinity Land]

Undeniable he's had an amazing career. There's at least two, maybe three, situations that could have changed things for Finn Balor/Prince Devitt. 

1. Starts Bullet Club but leaves before NJPW really hit its boom period. Same show he finished up was when AJ Styles debuted. Bullet Club and NJPW would go from strength to strength so Devitt's departure wasn't felt as much as it could have. Quite a what if to see what he could have done as part of the mid-2010s Heavyweight scene. 
2. Drafted to Raw and wins the first Universal Championship. Only to be injured and have to vacate. 
3. Back to NXT during the "Wednesday Night Wars". Don't know what would have happened on the main roster during the lockdown era. Maybe he would have been part of Vince's cuts if he'd been around. Just always felt like a backwards step. 

 

[RedTwoster]

Mustafa Ali must look at the Elimination Chamber that resulted in Kofi-mania, thinking ‘what if?’ given that Kofi replaced him in the match. Maybe he was never set to get the same level of shine that Kingston did, but who knows?

Adam Cole is another shout - every time things seem to be on the up for him in AEW, he suffers another injury. He seems like such a lovely guy too, if you listen to his podcast or watch his Twitch streams. I can’t help but feel sorry for him.

Jason Jordan is also extremely unfortunate - suffering a career-ending injury during the push of his life, as ‘Kurt Angle’s son’. He was starting to get really over too, and was playing the part well. He was easy to dislike, and there was more than a hint of what Dominik Mysterio would become in how he was portrayed. He seemed to be heading along the right track.