WWE did pretty much everything they could to avoid Kaval getting over. During his NXT run everybody kept on reminding the audience that he is "tiny" and "little". Even his mentors Lei Cool kept on mocking him for that. After he won the competition instead of the guys WWE wanted to win, they almost immediatly put him in a losing streak while they kept on telling us in the comment that actual WWE is likely a bit too big for him. Basically he never had a chance to be successfull in WWE cause they just didn't allow it to happen.
Low Ki in WWE was never going to work. Dude’s an amazing worker, anyone who’s familiar with him knows that, but he’s a heat magnet everywhere he goes. The locker room was going to do away with him pretty quickly.
I think that was the point. I mean, with exception of Wade Barrett every winner of the NXT reality show was someone they were talking down throughout with Kaval, Kaitlyn, and Johnny Curtis.
I wouldn’t exactly call Paul London a WWE flop between his multiple cruiserweight title reigns and one of the longest tag title reigns in company history with London and Kendrick.
Loved Paul London growing up. If only he joined 5 years later :/ Brian Kendrick also I loved. Those two are the most underrated tag team in wrestling history. Their title reign on smackdown was awesome.
By the time Aries went to WWE he had already started having a reputation as not being willing to actually work anything that didn't purely benefit him in his eyes. Perfect support for that being a pretty spot on case of what derailed him in WWE is that he hasn't been signed long-term to any major promotion after being stuck with a reputation for "going into business for himself" whenever he wanted. Similar fates for Low Ki, Teddy Hart, Sabu, Sexy Star, and a few others.
I remembered being pumped to see Low Ki on WWE TV, knowing his work in “TNA” it’s sad to know that he some how failed. In a few years this list can be a re-do and Ricochet will be on it, which will be sad as well.
The sad thing is every major player in WWE... except Vince... seems to want to put over Ricochet. Everyone gets how amazing at wrestling he is... except Vince. It sucks
@@user-fe8gx3ie5v idk... I can only speculate. This is only a guess, but I feel like this is Vince thinking like a test of will. Like Cesaro was underused for years and now he's a legit main eventer. It shouldn't take this long though. Knowing what I've seen out of Vince it's probably a size thing.
@@LeadingIsAHardSkill I mean let's be honest though, Ricochet is good but he's just not main event material, give him a chance but he'll just never be a main event player, maybe tag team champion, lower card Intercontinental Champion yes, World Champion, hell to the naw.
@@nzuzovilakazi756 you know how I can tell you don't watch any other product than wwe? He was a legit main eventer in PWG, NJPW, Dragon Gate, NXT and Lucha Underground, not to mention everyone in AEW (Jericho, Omega, Rhodes, the bucks, and Tony Khan) all stating he would be a top star... But because Vince doesn't know how to book him I guess he's not a main eventer. Cool. Thanks for the lesson bro. I guess every other major promotion on earth is wrong. Have you called them?
thus being a flop. If in any other sport you sign a high priced free agent who then proceeds to keep getting injured and cant do what he is being paid for and then is released/let go, he is a flop.
I have a friend that did backyard wrestling back in the day that used to name drop wrestling Reckless Youth. I guess I owe him an apology for not giving him proper due.
He was perfect for that role, they didn’t need to build him as he was Chris Hero, they could just keep putting guys over by having them beat Ohno. It’s a role NXT os really missing now, with Garagano, Ciampa, Cole and even Balor as long term main eventers on the brand, they don’t have a midcard gatekeeper to establish new stars anymore. Breezeango do the tole pretty well in the tag team division though.
To this day I can’t fathom how Chris Hero wasn’t bigger than he was (pun aside) He was at like.. EVERY nxt house show, and this guy would have big man matches with a crazy level of athleticism.
I'll tell you why he wasn't bigger because NXT is a TV show and Kassius Ohno not whoever is CHris Hero is a character on a TV show who serve the role the writers of that TV show had for him. DO you watch Seinfeld and say oh gee why isn't Uncle Leo a star, why isn't he up there as the lead like Jerry. Answer because it's a TV show and Ohno played the part of a minor character not a lead role. WHy do you people keep forgetting wrestling is a TV show not a sport or anything else. It's a TV show plain and simple.
KENTA vs. Marafuji was the best match I ever saw live. And I've been to enough WrestleManias to count on 2 hands. His name is capitalized because Japanese people will use all caps when they use their first name (most people are identified by their last name).
@@mjstory1976 he shouldn’t need to, his work speaks for its self. I watch wrestling for the storys and the action not to salivate over some next mans abs
@@zakrowe1301 That's you. YOU watch for the stories, the action, well when you're turning on WWE you pretty much know what you're going to get. Just because Dusty Rhodes was a top draw 50 years ago doesn't mean he was the norm.
In an alternative universe, Chris Hero was in the Shield and became a big star in WWE. As for Roman Reigns, he was his own star and debuted in 2015 and gradually got pushed
@@user-fe8gx3ie5v Roman until recently yes wasn’t a great promo but I think that was more to do with the way WWE does promos, but from an interim standpoint Roman was having great matches in the first year after the shield broke up, and if I’m being honest since Covid hit Roman might be the best wrestling in the world right now which leads to my question why didn’t WWE make him a bad guy.
Christopher Daniels really has been everywhere. I met him - and AJ Styles! - at Anime North in Toronto one year. Yes, wrestlers booked to make an appearance at an anime convention. No, I don't know why either.
@@billyedgar5292 who said he needed to be part of The Shield? We could have easily had a Kings Of Wrestling run if Vince McMahon didn’t constantly shit on the tag division
Keep blaming WWE, why dont you blame the wrestlers themselves? New Day was booked badly and was given a stupid gimmick and yet they overcame it and got over themselves.
WWE isn't a fit for everyone. Not a knock on the wrestler or the company, sometimes the fit just isn't right. Honestly, I'm stunned that Jon Moxley/Dean Ambrose lasted as long as he did in the company cause he really didn't fit at all, but he and the company made it work until it didn't.
He was able to make it work in a suitable For the WWE Universe way. Lio Rush while he was great on the Mic as a heel, he didn't fit there. He learned some stuff (as opposed to doing the silliness he did on the indies pre-WWE like No Selling big moves) & is applying it in MLW
Woah, hold on. I take umbrage with y'all trying to call KENTA an "indy sensation." The dude was a major part of Noah when the promotion was at its peak -- that is to say, in the mid-2000s when it was by far the biggest wrestling promotion in the world outside WWE.
@@jamgooandyou Yeahhh the only reason they were popular was because of their compilations on youtube. Not the fact they put lots of hard work and dedication into their craft to the point where WWE even started to notice them.
Being an indy sensation doesn't equal a star in WWE. Indy wrestlers don't have character, which means no good storylines put into their character. Relying too much on in-ring work limits you from being reliable on certain needs when it comes to booking something special.
@@jay38426 don’t have character? Colt Cabana made a career out of it Christopher Daniels was an amazing character as the fallen angel Low Ki was a prick Kenta was a prick who was a brick shithouse who would knock your block off eddie edwards was a good character in TNA chris hero was the wrestling genius and was awesome
I remember giving up on Solomon Crowe the second I realized he was seriously trying to get a Second Rope Diving Headbutt (From the center ropes, not even off the turnbuckle) as a finisher. At the time, I thought Mojo's terrible application of the Earthquake was bad, but that was the worst finisher I think I'd ever seen.
Reckless Youth is an accountant now? Could you imagine an angle where Mike “IRS” Rotunda persuades him to come out of retirement to join his new wrestling finance stable with CPA, D-Lo Brown, and Spike Dudley? Or more realistically, I’d love to see all five of them as on air stooges to a new “Million Dollar Man” type gimmick (not the original or his son, need someone in his prime), where the heel is so rich that he’s hired an entire stable of wrestling accountants and financiers to manage his millions, distract refs, deliver sneaky chair shots, bribe authority figures to change match stipulations, and do backstage comedy bits with the divas.
I remember Kaval had a match against Ziggler at Survivor Series, and Ziggler was bumping like crazy for Kaval's offense, and the crowd just was not reacting at all. He sucked so bad
Not at all but working in the WWE means you can move an audience by your overall presentation and mic skills. In other platforms you just have to wrestle without ticking off the other boxes
Damn... Being called The King of the Indy's, being signed by WWE, then creating a whole new promotion, and finally, becoming an accountant. What a journey
CHRIS HERO, wouldn’t have flopped had they not had a bias against his body type after his thyroid problems. The man can go with the best of them and hearing “chris is awesome” will forever bring a spring to my enthusiasm
You should do a video on underrated indie stars. Number one Matt Cross. Bunch of indie work, never got a proper push or a decent gimmick to do much with. Matt Cross is one of the most underrated wrestlers in the last 15-20 years.
You dont just wake up with a WWE contract and expect to get this big push. You actually have to have the in-ring skills, camera charisma and move the audience to back it up. Thats why I can see the likes of MJF flopping big time in the WWE. Samoa Joe comes to mind, not as a flop necessarily just a brawler and big body whose gimmick wears out quickly
WWE would prefer to feature rappers, actors or models, throwing money at their charisma on the mic and ability to draw more eyeballs than all of this list combined.
It's a good move too. Wrestlers who pick up bad habits learning how to get cheap pops from Indy crowds are rarely going to have any mainstream potential.
@@jbbrolic bingo. would guaranteed spend my wwe money on bad bunny, who brings in non fans and had lots of people talking about wrestlemania, over some indy fucks who are only known by 20,000 people.
At this point I hope NONE of the indie guys I like go to wwe- they’ve messed up situations where they could’ve been handed a golden asset and they just shit the bed.
How the fuck have they destroyed Balor and Ricochet you people just say anything especially Balor the dude had the title put on him immediately and went over Roman Reigns make it make sense
@@jayanthony2414 geee I don’t know ricochet has way more skill than Roman and ummm yeah balor went from being a top guy to a mid card title chaser wwe is fucking horrible
@@Taco187 🤦🏽 wtf was you thinking ffs you aren't even about to try and imply that Ricochet is better than Roman because he can do some flips have you lost your mind and Balor is were he is because thats his level honestly what is it that you people don't get
i disagree from a lot of these names , hero had some hard hitting great matches in nxt, kenta had some pretty memorable matches in 205/nxt as well if he didn't get hurt he would have gotten a bigger push. funny sami is using the crowe gimmick in impact in 2021, but he was acctually in line for a big push before he was released as he was actually supposed to be the leader of sanity.
A much better name for this list would be "Ten wrestlers that had pre-made fan interest, but WWE decided to pretend their 10+ years of wrestling didn't matter, since it didn't happen within a WWE ring."
"Indy sensation" and "flopped in the WWE" are synonymous. Indy fans are tight and dedicated. WWE fans are mainstream people and haters. Those are very different audiences. It's like comparing French art house fans to watchers of PG-13 Michael Bay movies.
Exactly,I grew a WWF fan but also along with ECW,WCW and NWA(90s-2000s version) but WWE went completely corporate and forgot about hardcore wrestling fans, that's why I turned to other promotions like ROH,AAA,NJPW,BEYOND,and plenty local and other indies. WWE full of nothing but keyboard warriors and trolls nowadays that drool over nxt but talk smack about the other promotions...smh
I think if they're good book them as if, I dunno they're good. Watching as a kid I thought kaval was rubbish because he never won... Sometimes is that simple
Chris Hero didn't flop in WWE. WWE flopped in Chris Hero. Same could be said for KENTA as well. (Which is why I'm glad Jay White resigned with NJPW. They would have fucked him up.)
I wouldn't have had Christopher Daniels on this list. His stint was well before he became an Indy superstar and made a name for himself, and seemed to never look back after. Everyone else on the list was already a name on the indies before there WWE stint. Kazarian would've been a better choice since he already was established when he went to WWE.... but then again he also admitted he was far to immature and stubborn at the time he as signed.
I wouldn't put Daniels or American Wolves on this list. Daniels was more a failure to launch. Wolves weren't signed and only worked a single match in NXT. This list should've included Deonna Purrazzo. She's an indy sensation, wrestled for ROH and had a stint in Stardom in Japan. After a good run in the Mae Young Classic they proceeded to do absolutely nothing with her and jobbed her out each time she was on NXT.
The problem with the Indies is that the fan base is typically ones that wish to see a good match in the ring, and don't care about storylines. What you realize is that Indy fans are usually no more than a couple thousand deep at an Indy show, and usually a few hundred. So fans that don't care about storylines and just want good in ring action, are a minority of the overall pro wrestling fan base. No matter how huge someone is on the Indy circuit, they simply aren't HUGE. Then they go to WWE and most have zero charisma in a world where storylines put asses in seats, and creating a believable character to sell storylines is everything. And if they didn't draw 25,000 fans at any point on the Indy circuit, they need to have a special something to draw 25,000 fans to WWE events. Then at WM, on a normal year, they are looking for 70,000 asses in seats. That's why so many Indy performers flop in the big time. The Indy circuit is an entirely different beast, is in no way aligned with the big time in terms of what draws, and it's not a huge money maker on what it does draw.
and that's what internet marks don't get. WWE is whole different world than Indies. Plus not only you gotta be able to move the needle & sell Merch, you gotta be a size of what Vince or Trips likes, See Daniel Bryan, they were not gonna push him because he's small despite being over. Not to mention WWE is able to basically pull the puppet strings on the fans at a whim, like Elimination Chamber when it was Bryan & Santino in the end & the crowd was behind Santino who was a Comedy guy, or "Kofimania" where out of nowhere they push Kofi & put the SD Title on him then he gets squashed by brock & now he's back to being in a tag team on RAW & nobody is clamoring for him to challenge Lashley. Or when Bryan won the title at Mania & then had it stripped from him late that spring, He was out of the picture & nobody talked about him & then he came back the fans tried to get Bryan Back into the picture at the Rumble, WWE was like "Fuck you, I won't do what you tell me" had him lose to Roman & then fans just accepted that he would just be an IC Champ at Mania
I agree with some of that but alot of it is also Vince stripping so much away because he is stuck in the 80s,you cant tell me someone like Reigns or the Miz deserve title runs over like Richochet,Stylez did the best,Balor is doing well but guys like Bobby Roode,definitely could and should be main event. I get why reigns and Charlotte are pushed solely cuz of their family names but it's so much talent that has been needlessly buried. But I totally understand your point,and agree that you gotta be able to put butts in seats on big stagee
all they had to do with Cabana is let him wrestle with the Matt Classic gimmick, and he could easily establish himself as a solid upper midcarder until he can find a gimmick that would keep him up at the top and not get murdered by WWE booking
UGHH !!! LOW KI is one of my faves ! I dont care what anyone says ! His matches with AJ in early ROH and even TNA were gold !!! Not to mention his stuff in Japan ! LOVE this dude !
It's crazy how easy it is to get booted out of an WWE offer over one slip up, just shows why so many people in the indies grow a hatred over Triple H and Vince McMahon
He wasn't handled poorly he had pretty good run In WWE he was great for the Cruiserweight divison, in him and Brian Kendrick and Ashley were great when they were the tag champs on Smackdown.
Chris Hero was actually getting a push in NXT, but he had thyroid issues and WWE wanted him to train a specific way, and he didn’t want to. So he came back round.
Im not sure "flopped" is an accurate label as Wwe has shown time and time again theyre creative team/vince have no idea what fans want and constantly misuse its talent. Look at nxt stars and how they were treated after they got called up. How do you fail with so much talent? Every tag team from nxt. The revival, american alpha, gargano and ciampa, authors of pain, viking raiders, sanity. Talents like aries, neville, samoa joe, nakamura, roode, finn balor, black, almas, ricochet, rusev, cesaro, sammy zayn, kenta and much more. Theres a reason alot of fans view nxt as the better brand in wwe.
KENTA chose that name and font because in Noah his home promotion one of the top stars there was Kenta Kobashi. Check him out, he was amazing. KENTA's real name is Kenta Kobayashi and picked the all caps spelling to avoid confusing the fans.
Damn. I know almost all of these guys personally. Cabana is not only a great performer, but he's a genuinely nice/good guy. That makes the lack of opportunity he was given even more vexing. I was literally within earshot when Johnny Laurenitis gave him the offer.
You know some directors, actors, writers, musicians and so fourth were indie darlings then signed onto one a Disney, Warner, Universal or likes to do nothing because they just were not ready or honestly not as good as that seemed to be compared to new collegues. For most part this list is full of potential but injury, attitude, stubbornness, big head or immaturity hindered them.
Low Ki was just an idiot and I'm glad he didn't get over. He's too reckless in the ring, and doesn't know how to follow orders. The fact that he knocked a guy out and then proceeded to drag him around the ring so he could "hit his spots" to me just means that he should have been blacklisted from the very start. It's almost a pissing contest between him and Teddy Hart to see who can get blacklisted in more promotions.
I'll never understand why Colt Cabana was completely jobbed out and then quickly fired by WWE. As the video so eloquently puts it, he had everything the company usually wants: he wasn't small, he had tons of charisma and personality, he was an entertainer, etc. What was that all about ?
I'm convinced when Christopher Daniels is 140 years old he will still be in better shape than me
He will probably still be doing moonsaults when he's 80. Lol
He will definitely be thinner 🤭
Maybe it's called the Best Moonsault Ever because it has age reducing powers?
@@dustinsteele3069 could be. And let's not forget he is the fallen angel. So he might already be 400yeaes old
It makes sense. I’m convinced that he’s actually some sort of Eldritch being.
I mean, I could be wrong here, but I thought I heard that Chris actually wanted that role of getting younger talent over...
Im pretty sure he did in his 2nd NXT run. First run im not so sure lol
The 2nd time around it was about the money .he did send Aliss out of nxt
No that's correct he did
Hero probably just wanted a paycheck.
I'm glad he left NXT in 2013 cuz he did have some amazing matches after that in the indies
WWE did pretty much everything they could to avoid Kaval getting over. During his NXT run everybody kept on reminding the audience that he is "tiny" and "little". Even his mentors Lei Cool kept on mocking him for that. After he won the competition instead of the guys WWE wanted to win, they almost immediatly put him in a losing streak while they kept on telling us in the comment that actual WWE is likely a bit too big for him. Basically he never had a chance to be successfull in WWE cause they just didn't allow it to happen.
He’s a little man who takes himself too seriously
@@SaudiGod Doesnt mean hes not good
Let's be real Low Ki would have shafted himself in WWE eventually anyway. He likely would have thrived in current NXT though
Low Ki in WWE was never going to work. Dude’s an amazing worker, anyone who’s familiar with him knows that, but he’s a heat magnet everywhere he goes. The locker room was going to do away with him pretty quickly.
I think that was the point. I mean, with exception of Wade Barrett every winner of the NXT reality show was someone they were talking down throughout with Kaval, Kaitlyn, and Johnny Curtis.
now do the opposite one, 10 WWE Superstars that flopped in Indies
Is that a thing? Guys like Enzo maybe? Or am I misunderstanding? I'm here for it
Still waiting for Ryback to debut in *looks at poll results* Retire
There's those like Adam Rose & Simon Gotch to be scoffed at
Damien Sandow immediately comes to mind
@@DerpityDerpz1 Sandow was good in NWA Powerrr
Well like Cornette has said over and over Austin Aries always finds away to dumb himself out of the wrestling business
I agree. I don't agree with everything Cornette says, but Aries while always being a top-notch worker, he's also always been a top-notch asshole
I... agree. huh?
Les not forget, Eddie Edwards is a 2x TNA IMPACT Champion on top of his success as a Tag Team champion w/ Davey Richards
and one of the best indy performers
Also, only foreigner to win NOAH's GHC Title
@@malcocanedo9061 yes
Who?!
Indie Edwards
Paul London seems like he was trying to get himself fired at some point
I wouldn’t exactly call Paul London a WWE flop between his multiple cruiserweight title reigns and one of the longest tag title reigns in company history with London and Kendrick.
Loved Paul London growing up. If only he joined 5 years later :/ Brian Kendrick also I loved. Those two are the most underrated tag team in wrestling history. Their title reign on smackdown was awesome.
Still smh at their treatment.
Mikey Dangerously same :/
Career ending injury and cruiserweight moves banned screwed Paul London in WWE..
Same her mate, same here.
Lol I like how there were no official pics of Reckless Youth in WWE lol.
There probably was, just not publicly available.
Maaan he was a biiiig Indy name late 90s.
Kinda sad, he was really good in ring too
By the time Aries went to WWE he had already started having a reputation as not being willing to actually work anything that didn't purely benefit him in his eyes. Perfect support for that being a pretty spot on case of what derailed him in WWE is that he hasn't been signed long-term to any major promotion after being stuck with a reputation for "going into business for himself" whenever he wanted. Similar fates for Low Ki, Teddy Hart, Sabu, Sexy Star, and a few others.
I remembered being pumped to see Low Ki on WWE TV, knowing his work in “TNA” it’s sad to know that he some how failed. In a few years this list can be a re-do and Ricochet will be on it, which will be sad as well.
The sad thing is every major player in WWE... except Vince... seems to want to put over Ricochet. Everyone gets how amazing at wrestling he is... except Vince. It sucks
@@user-fe8gx3ie5v From my understanding FOX wants him on Smackdown but WWE refuses to move him.
It sucks.
@@user-fe8gx3ie5v idk... I can only speculate. This is only a guess, but I feel like this is Vince thinking like a test of will. Like Cesaro was underused for years and now he's a legit main eventer. It shouldn't take this long though. Knowing what I've seen out of Vince it's probably a size thing.
@@LeadingIsAHardSkill I mean let's be honest though, Ricochet is good but he's just not main event material, give him a chance but he'll just never be a main event player, maybe tag team champion, lower card Intercontinental Champion yes, World Champion, hell to the naw.
@@nzuzovilakazi756 you know how I can tell you don't watch any other product than wwe?
He was a legit main eventer in PWG, NJPW, Dragon Gate, NXT and Lucha Underground, not to mention everyone in AEW (Jericho, Omega, Rhodes, the bucks, and Tony Khan) all stating he would be a top star... But because Vince doesn't know how to book him I guess he's not a main eventer. Cool. Thanks for the lesson bro. I guess every other major promotion on earth is wrong. Have you called them?
Kenta wasn't really a WWE flop. He's been injured most of his career in WWE just like Chelsea Green career
thus being a flop. If in any other sport you sign a high priced free agent who then proceeds to keep getting injured and cant do what he is being paid for and then is released/let go, he is a flop.
@@BatFan1 Yup capitalism, you are only as good as you are useful otherwise you get discarded. Communists will use you and discard you anyways 🙆
He's been more successful in his native country but, on the other hand, he has still been injury prone.
I have a friend that did backyard wrestling back in the day that used to name drop wrestling Reckless Youth.
I guess I owe him an apology for not giving him proper due.
Fun Fact: CM Punk asked for Chris Hero to be the 3rd member of the shield, he was vetoed & given Reigns instead
EVERYONE ALREADY KNOWS THAT AND DOESN'T CARE!!!!
WWE would've been so different
Thank god they went with Reigns
@@xxtravdamanxx your parents must hate u
I’m glad that got vetoed.
I wouldn't consider Hero a flop. His NXT career as a gatekeeper to put over new talent was great, always had amazing matches.
He was perfect for that role, they didn’t need to build him as he was Chris Hero, they could just keep putting guys over by having them beat Ohno.
It’s a role NXT os really missing now, with Garagano, Ciampa, Cole and even Balor as long term main eventers on the brand, they don’t have a midcard gatekeeper to establish new stars anymore. Breezeango do the tole pretty well in the tag team division though.
True but choosing him to be that person is a crime.
@@oibruvinnit9029 EXACTLY
I see what you're saying but this is Chris Hero we're talking about. They could've done something with him besides being a gatekeeper
He jobbed to Riddle in seconds. Won nothing. No titles. No note worthy victories. Nothing. Flop.
Kenta was paper thin. Dude kept getting injured by sneezing. Cant blame WWE for that. They tried so hard to put him over only for him to fall apart.
To this day I can’t fathom how Chris Hero wasn’t bigger than he was (pun aside)
He was at like.. EVERY nxt house show, and this guy would have big man matches with a crazy level of athleticism.
He put work in
because he has possibly 1 of the worst and least marketable looks around tbh.
Honestly he needed to lose weight. Either you're a huge guy or a fit guy - it's hard to play between
I'll tell you why he wasn't bigger because NXT is a TV show and Kassius Ohno not whoever is CHris Hero is a character on a TV show who serve the role the writers of that TV show had for him.
DO you watch Seinfeld and say oh gee why isn't Uncle Leo a star, why isn't he up there as the lead like Jerry. Answer because it's a TV show and Ohno played the part of a minor character not a lead role. WHy do you people keep forgetting wrestling is a TV show not a sport or anything else. It's a TV show plain and simple.
@@jakefrazer4780 you proved some points but I'm going to have to give you a thumbs down on that one I don't relate Seinfeld to wrestling
KENTA vs. Marafuji was the best match I ever saw live. And I've been to enough WrestleManias to count on 2 hands.
His name is capitalized because Japanese people will use all caps when they use their first name (most people are identified by their last name).
I didn't know that. Thanks.
Kassius ohno deserved much better
If it was up to me I’d have put him & Cesaro back together and put them as the centrepiece of the tag division
Maybe he should of tried harder to lose that big beer belly
@@mjstory1976 he can’t really thyroid issues
@@mjstory1976 he shouldn’t need to, his work speaks for its self. I watch wrestling for the storys and the action not to salivate over some next mans abs
@@zakrowe1301 That's you. YOU watch for the stories, the action, well when you're turning on WWE you pretty much know what you're going to get. Just because Dusty Rhodes was a top draw 50 years ago doesn't mean he was the norm.
In an alternative universe, Chris Hero was in the Shield and became a big star in WWE. As for Roman Reigns, he was his own star and debuted in 2015 and gradually got pushed
Honestly Roman was the better choice for The Shield.
Roman fit the shield perfectly
@@user-fe8gx3ie5v you do realise the booking was the thing that made Roman bad right, because from a in ring standpoint Roman actually really good.
@@user-fe8gx3ie5v Roman until recently yes wasn’t a great promo but I think that was more to do with the way WWE does promos, but from an interim standpoint Roman was having great matches in the first year after the shield broke up, and if I’m being honest since Covid hit Roman might be the best wrestling in the world right now which leads to my question why didn’t WWE make him a bad guy.
@@user-fe8gx3ie5v He actually reminds me of Austin and The Rock.
Christopher Daniels really has been everywhere. I met him - and AJ Styles! - at Anime North in Toronto one year. Yes, wrestlers booked to make an appearance at an anime convention. No, I don't know why either.
I just personally assume most pop culture conventions can have any pop culture celebrities.
WWE dropped the ball on Chris Hero.
Not really, can you imagine how much worse of a fit he would have been in the Shield compared to Reigns
@@billyedgar5292 who said he needed to be part of The Shield? We could have easily had a Kings Of Wrestling run if Vince McMahon didn’t constantly shit on the tag division
Keep blaming WWE, why dont you blame the wrestlers themselves? New Day was booked badly and was given a stupid gimmick and yet they overcame it and got over themselves.
Imagine blaming WWE for not pushing a guy close to 40 with a beer belly
@@superrobz The Bar Happened
Apparently Chris Hero was more than happy with putting over up and comers
If Paul London wrestled now, he could be a big deal in NXT. London was about 5-6 years ahead of his time.
same with jack evans but evans still wrestles
WWE isn't a fit for everyone. Not a knock on the wrestler or the company, sometimes the fit just isn't right. Honestly, I'm stunned that Jon Moxley/Dean Ambrose lasted as long as he did in the company cause he really didn't fit at all, but he and the company made it work until it didn't.
Yea some people aren’t made for different companies, like CM Punk would not of worked well in Japan because of their style.
He was able to make it work in a suitable For the WWE Universe way. Lio Rush while he was great on the Mic as a heel, he didn't fit there. He learned some stuff (as opposed to doing the silliness he did on the indies pre-WWE like No Selling big moves) & is applying it in MLW
@@davidsavage3120 I dont think punk would work out in japan. They’re probably too stiff for him
@@zakrowe1301 true. That’s what I meant lol edited my comment thank you.
Woah, hold on. I take umbrage with y'all trying to call KENTA an "indy sensation." The dude was a major part of Noah when the promotion was at its peak -- that is to say, in the mid-2000s when it was by far the biggest wrestling promotion in the world outside WWE.
10 indie sensations that WWE had no idea how to use, but were so greedy that they just snatched them up anyway.
Much better and more accurate title.
Or the mainstream fans just didn't get said "indie" wrestlers that was only liked because wrestling fans had binged watch 240p handy cam UA-cam clips
@@jamgooandyou Yeahhh the only reason they were popular was because of their compilations on youtube. Not the fact they put lots of hard work and dedication into their craft to the point where WWE even started to notice them.
Being an indy sensation doesn't equal a star in WWE. Indy wrestlers don't have character, which means no good storylines put into their character. Relying too much on in-ring work limits you from being reliable on certain needs when it comes to booking something special.
@@jay38426 don’t have character? Colt Cabana made a career out of it Christopher Daniels was an amazing character as the fallen angel Low Ki was a prick Kenta was a prick who was a brick shithouse who would knock your block off eddie edwards was a good character in TNA chris hero was the wrestling genius and was awesome
I remember giving up on Solomon Crowe the second I realized he was seriously trying to get a Second Rope Diving Headbutt (From the center ropes, not even off the turnbuckle) as a finisher. At the time, I thought Mojo's terrible application of the Earthquake was bad, but that was the worst finisher I think I'd ever seen.
I thought I was the only one who remembered this. Lol, yeah. That was ass.
Reckless Youth is an accountant now? Could you imagine an angle where Mike “IRS” Rotunda persuades him to come out of retirement to join his new wrestling finance stable with CPA, D-Lo Brown, and Spike Dudley? Or more realistically, I’d love to see all five of them as on air stooges to a new “Million Dollar Man” type gimmick (not the original or his son, need someone in his prime), where the heel is so rich that he’s hired an entire stable of wrestling accountants and financiers to manage his millions, distract refs, deliver sneaky chair shots, bribe authority figures to change match stipulations, and do backstage comedy bits with the divas.
I think this list needs to be totally redone for 2022.
I remember Kaval had a match against Ziggler at Survivor Series, and Ziggler was bumping like crazy for Kaval's offense, and the crowd just was not reacting at all. He sucked so bad
and Kaval Broke Dolph's nose during the match
You don't have to work for WWE to be a successful pro wrestler. Brands like AEW and IMPACT are proving that
Not at all but working in the WWE means you can move an audience by your overall presentation and mic skills. In other platforms you just have to wrestle without ticking off the other boxes
Damn... Being called The King of the Indy's, being signed by WWE, then creating a whole new promotion, and finally, becoming an accountant. What a journey
CHRIS HERO, wouldn’t have flopped had they not had a bias against his body type after his thyroid problems. The man can go with the best of them and hearing “chris is awesome” will forever bring a spring to my enthusiasm
What type of thyroid problem did he have I had hypopathiroid gained weight and got kidney stones
@@paulcarpenter7844 I never really read into the major details but he can’t keep weight off anymore and it really hasn’t negatively affected his work
I am friends with Reckless Youth AKA Tom Carter on Facebook and he did ask for his own Release
Chris Hero's biggest problem was always being so out of shape. He had a horrific physique during his second run in NXT
He moves better than most of the people on the roster. He isn't "out of shape" he's just big.
@@angelking3708 Yeah, he wasn't out of shape. Not to mention he has a thyroid problem that makes it harder to lose weight
It didn't seem to affect the likes of Kevin Owens too much
@@hammyjammies Yeah and how many tickets is he selling? Casual fans probably change the channel as soon as they see him
@@PrinceJoshTheGreat Bruh, Owens is one of the few indy guys who got over with the casuals as soon as he debuted on the main roster.
You should do a video on underrated indie stars. Number one Matt Cross. Bunch of indie work, never got a proper push or a decent gimmick to do much with. Matt Cross is one of the most underrated wrestlers in the last 15-20 years.
You dont just wake up with a WWE contract and expect to get this big push. You actually have to have the in-ring skills, camera charisma and move the audience to back it up. Thats why I can see the likes of MJF flopping big time in the WWE. Samoa Joe comes to mind, not as a flop necessarily just a brawler and big body whose gimmick wears out quickly
Lol no one ever called Paul London the next hbk. That's absurd.
I was at the NXT House Show in Fresno when Aries broke his orbital. That kick from Nakamura was brutal.
KENTA should absolutely not be on this list. NOAH was the biggest promotion in Japan until Misawa died, hardly an "indie."
I thought for sure Ethan Carter 3rd would be in the top 5. I thought he would have been a top star in WWE with his in ring abilities and mic skills
Ethan Carter always sucked
WWE would prefer to feature rappers, actors or models, throwing money at their charisma on the mic and ability to draw more eyeballs than all of this list combined.
It's a good move too. Wrestlers who pick up bad habits learning how to get cheap pops from Indy crowds are rarely going to have any mainstream potential.
Yes and it works cause typically the crowd sides with those characters
It's all about the look. Not the talent.
@@jbbrolic bingo. would guaranteed spend my wwe money on bad bunny, who brings in non fans and had lots of people talking about wrestlemania, over some indy fucks who are only known by 20,000 people.
I actually trained at a Philadelphia gym that Reckless Youth frequented. Nice guy, very humble, and always told hilarious stories!
Ricochet should be number one. He was ridiculously over in the indie scene and is basically a glorified jobber in wwe
I remember Reckless Youth's name making the rounds on wrestling message boards back in the day. I had no idea he was ever signed to WWF.
Kinda surprised Mystico wasn’t on the list. He was one of the best Lucha libre stars ever
he wasn't the Indy star but more a Mexican sensation.
Autocorrect gotcha
@@GrownUpKid94 damn
@@phillip22722 Yeah, you are right on that
They didn’t bungle him...dude injured himself just walking out to the ring half the time.
"AKA - how horrible WWE booking ruins careers"
You people are relentless 🤦🏽
Not heard the name Reckless Youth for a long time!
Me too, it was nice to get his name back in my mind.
I was trading tapes back in the day and Reckless Youth popped up quite often ! I loved his Super 8 work along with his ROH suff as Tom Carter
Great video these are my favorite kind of videos
London is 100% not a flop.
True. He was never one of the company's biggest stars, but he won the Tag Team and Cruiserweight Championships, and he appeared on TV regularly.
At this point I hope NONE of the indie guys I like go to wwe- they’ve messed up situations where they could’ve been handed a golden asset and they just shit the bed.
Wouldve loved to see Nigel McGuinness in NXT or NXT UK as a wrestler
Wwe is known for destroying indi talent with huge names outside of wwe, let's not forget finn balor, nakamura, ricochet the list goes on
How the fuck have they destroyed Balor and Ricochet you people just say anything especially Balor the dude had the title put on him immediately and went over Roman Reigns make it make sense
@@jayanthony2414 geee I don’t know ricochet has way more skill than Roman and ummm yeah balor went from being a top guy to a mid card title chaser wwe is fucking horrible
@@Taco187 🤦🏽 wtf was you thinking ffs you aren't even about to try and imply that Ricochet is better than Roman because he can do some flips have you lost your mind and Balor is were he is because thats his level honestly what is it that you people don't get
i disagree from a lot of these names , hero had some hard hitting great matches in nxt, kenta had some pretty memorable matches in 205/nxt as well if he didn't get hurt he would have gotten a bigger push. funny sami is using the crowe gimmick in impact in 2021, but he was acctually in line for a big push before he was released as he was actually supposed to be the leader of sanity.
Reckless Youth asked for his release. He had a good paying accounting job before going down the developmental.
A much better name for this list would be "Ten wrestlers that had pre-made fan interest, but WWE decided to pretend their 10+ years of wrestling didn't matter, since it didn't happen within a WWE ring."
Muuuuuch better title.
More like 10 wrestlers that had a Minor Hardcore fanbase and couldn't make a connection with the mainstream causal viewers.
Keith Lee should definitely be on this list now
Not everyone can be a top WWE star.... Anyone can be top indy star but it's not easy to be a top star in a global program ❤️
"Indy sensation" and "flopped in the WWE" are synonymous. Indy fans are tight and dedicated. WWE fans are mainstream people and haters. Those are very different audiences. It's like comparing French art house fans to watchers of PG-13 Michael Bay movies.
Exactly,I grew a WWF fan but also along with ECW,WCW and NWA(90s-2000s version) but WWE went completely corporate and forgot about hardcore wrestling fans, that's why I turned to other promotions like ROH,AAA,NJPW,BEYOND,and plenty local and other indies. WWE full of nothing but keyboard warriors and trolls nowadays that drool over nxt but talk smack about the other promotions...smh
So true, casuals don’t have a higher appreciation for wrestling and therefore are only left to follow the hype of what wwe tells them to like
Gatekeeping much?
I think if they're good book them as if, I dunno they're good. Watching as a kid I thought kaval was rubbish because he never won... Sometimes is that simple
Exactly!
The American Wolves would have been great in NXT. I've always liked their work. TNA's gain i suppose.
Chris Hero didn't flop in WWE. WWE flopped in Chris Hero. Same could be said for KENTA as well.
(Which is why I'm glad Jay White resigned with NJPW. They would have fucked him up.)
Injuries didn't help KENTA that's for sure.
Beer Belly Hero should of lost a little weight.
That's his fault
@@Cboz1978 KENTA was small, couldn't promo, and couldn't stay healthy
@@insightworld422 Yeah that was my point.
Shows Richochet... Doesn't /SAY/ Richochet... I see you Cultaholic. I miss Prince Puma too.
London was longest WWE tag team champion until New Day
@@user-fe8gx3ie5v WWE Tag Team Championship, as in the titles that were on SmackDown during the first brand split
No they had the World Tag Team Championship that has been retired for many years
Reckless Youth was awesome. I saw him many times in ECWA.
How about a top ten wrestling books ?
Mankind, a lion's tale etc
I wouldn't have had Christopher Daniels on this list. His stint was well before he became an Indy superstar and made a name for himself, and seemed to never look back after. Everyone else on the list was already a name on the indies before there WWE stint.
Kazarian would've been a better choice since he already was established when he went to WWE.... but then again he also admitted he was far to immature and stubborn at the time he as signed.
I still dont 'get' Colt Cobana - it just seems silly to me
Same
There's nothing to get. He's garbage.
@@chintoki i think he's great
Paul London and Brian Kendrick were one of the highlights of 2006-2007 WWE. I wouldn't say he was a flop.
I wouldn't put Daniels or American Wolves on this list. Daniels was more a failure to launch. Wolves weren't signed and only worked a single match in NXT. This list should've included Deonna Purrazzo. She's an indy sensation, wrestled for ROH and had a stint in Stardom in Japan. After a good run in the Mae Young Classic they proceeded to do absolutely nothing with her and jobbed her out each time she was on NXT.
jobbed out on RAW To Nia week after week
The problem with the Indies is that the fan base is typically ones that wish to see a good match in the ring, and don't care about storylines. What you realize is that Indy fans are usually no more than a couple thousand deep at an Indy show, and usually a few hundred. So fans that don't care about storylines and just want good in ring action, are a minority of the overall pro wrestling fan base. No matter how huge someone is on the Indy circuit, they simply aren't HUGE. Then they go to WWE and most have zero charisma in a world where storylines put asses in seats, and creating a believable character to sell storylines is everything. And if they didn't draw 25,000 fans at any point on the Indy circuit, they need to have a special something to draw 25,000 fans to WWE events. Then at WM, on a normal year, they are looking for 70,000 asses in seats. That's why so many Indy performers flop in the big time. The Indy circuit is an entirely different beast, is in no way aligned with the big time in terms of what draws, and it's not a huge money maker on what it does draw.
and that's what internet marks don't get. WWE is whole different world than Indies. Plus not only you gotta be able to move the needle & sell Merch, you gotta be a size of what Vince or Trips likes, See Daniel Bryan, they were not gonna push him because he's small despite being over. Not to mention WWE is able to basically pull the puppet strings on the fans at a whim, like Elimination Chamber when it was Bryan & Santino in the end & the crowd was behind Santino who was a Comedy guy, or "Kofimania" where out of nowhere they push Kofi & put the SD Title on him then he gets squashed by brock & now he's back to being in a tag team on RAW & nobody is clamoring for him to challenge Lashley. Or when Bryan won the title at Mania & then had it stripped from him late that spring, He was out of the picture & nobody talked about him & then he came back the fans tried to get Bryan Back into the picture at the Rumble, WWE was like "Fuck you, I won't do what you tell me" had him lose to Roman & then fans just accepted that he would just be an IC Champ at Mania
I agree with some of that but alot of it is also Vince stripping so much away because he is stuck in the 80s,you cant tell me someone like Reigns or the Miz deserve title runs over like Richochet,Stylez did the best,Balor is doing well but guys like Bobby Roode,definitely could and should be main event. I get why reigns and Charlotte are pushed solely cuz of their family names but it's so much talent that has been needlessly buried. But I totally understand your point,and agree that you gotta be able to put butts in seats on big stagee
all they had to do with Cabana is let him wrestle with the Matt Classic gimmick, and he could easily establish himself as a solid upper midcarder until he can find a gimmick that would keep him up at the top and not get murdered by WWE booking
London and Kendrick are to this day one of my favorite tag teams since the turn of the 2000s
I don’t like that is flopped in wwe better to say wwe failed them
UGHH !!! LOW KI is one of my faves ! I dont care what anyone says ! His matches with AJ in early ROH and even TNA were gold !!! Not to mention his stuff in Japan ! LOVE this dude !
"Warrior."
Would love to see Okada on Raw or SD
I'm amazed Trips hasn't signed him especially with talk of creating NXT Japan brand which obviously is on pause because of the Pandemic
interesting out of any way to get into WWE having actual experience as a wrestler seems to be the worst….
KENTA in all capitals indicates to Japanese Fans that he is a HEEL.
It's crazy how easy it is to get booted out of an WWE offer over one slip up, just shows why so many people in the indies grow a hatred over Triple H and Vince McMahon
Chris Hero should be one of the best on WWE right now. Too bad his role on the company was to be a doorkeeper to new stars on NXT.
A lot of that is on him. Have you seen him recently?
He was a bland tubby.
@@chintoki bland? have you seen him prior to wwe?
I remember London smiling like an idiot and it made me laugh a lot during that "serious" scene
Didnt Chris Hero have thyroid issues that caused his weight gain?
London wasn't a flop, just handled poorly by WWE.
He wasn't handled poorly he had pretty good run In WWE he was great for the Cruiserweight divison, in him and Brian Kendrick and Ashley were great when they were the tag champs on Smackdown.
Chris Hero was actually getting a push in NXT, but he had thyroid issues and WWE wanted him to train a specific way, and he didn’t want to. So he came back round.
Not everyone is cut out for the big time
Exactly! Everyone can't be WWE champ either.
I think '10 Indie Sensations That Weren't Allowed To Flourish In WWE' is a better and more accurate title.
Im not sure "flopped" is an accurate label as Wwe has shown time and time again theyre creative team/vince have no idea what fans want and constantly misuse its talent. Look at nxt stars and how they were treated after they got called up. How do you fail with so much talent? Every tag team from nxt. The revival, american alpha, gargano and ciampa, authors of pain, viking raiders, sanity. Talents like aries, neville, samoa joe, nakamura, roode, finn balor, black, almas, ricochet, rusev, cesaro, sammy zayn, kenta and much more. Theres a reason alot of fans view nxt as the better brand in wwe.
Perfect summation
Chris Hero is still one of my favorite indy guys ever.
Ah, lets not forget this is the "everyone deserves everything" generation. Everyone can't win in a sport predicated on someone wins and someone loses.
LOL right
KENTA chose that name and font because in Noah his home promotion one of the top stars there was Kenta Kobashi. Check him out, he was amazing. KENTA's real name is Kenta Kobayashi and picked the all caps spelling to avoid confusing the fans.
Kassius Ohno was the original NXT KO When Kevin Owens debut He left came back and jobbed to every debuting star For shame NXT
Damn. I know almost all of these guys personally. Cabana is not only a great performer, but he's a genuinely nice/good guy. That makes the lack of opportunity he was given even more vexing. I was literally within earshot when Johnny Laurenitis gave him the offer.
No. WWE wrecked them.. that is why they "flopped".
You know some directors, actors, writers, musicians and so fourth were indie darlings then signed onto one a Disney, Warner, Universal or likes to do nothing because they just were not ready or honestly not as good as that seemed to be compared to new collegues. For most part this list is full of potential but injury, attitude, stubbornness, big head or immaturity hindered them.
Low Ki was just an idiot and I'm glad he didn't get over. He's too reckless in the ring, and doesn't know how to follow orders. The fact that he knocked a guy out and then proceeded to drag him around the ring so he could "hit his spots" to me just means that he should have been blacklisted from the very start.
It's almost a pissing contest between him and Teddy Hart to see who can get blacklisted in more promotions.
I'll never understand why Colt Cabana was completely jobbed out and then quickly fired by WWE. As the video so eloquently puts it, he had everything the company usually wants: he wasn't small, he had tons of charisma and personality, he was an entertainer, etc. What was that all about ?
Was he late to shows? Did he make excuses to be jobbed out? Ect ect Those are the things you dont hear
Paul London won titles tho