What Could Have Been - TNA Wrestlers

[MisterRob]

The "Favourite TNA Originals" thread got me thinking about something. I don't watch TNA as a die-hard fan anymore, and I haven't over its entire history, but I have watched the company from the very beginning. I use to watch it back when it first began, and I remember being excited and watching it during its initial years on television. I've since lost faith in the product and over the last many years certainly don't get excited and have the same feeling I did when I was a fan back in the day, but my question is this:

If you go back to some of the wrestlers on the roster in those first years, and you see some of the names they had in TNA: who stands out for you as someone you enjoyed? Who had potential, someone you wish would have been far more successful for the company then they were?

Take 2002 for instance. What ever happened to guys like "Prime Time" Elix Skipper? Sony Siaki? or Apollo?
Why wasn't "Wildcat" Chris Harris more successful on his own? Or Low-ki?
Or what about a tag team like Christian York and Joey Matthews?

Take 2006 as another instance. Do you think Monty Brown should've been more successful in TNA?
What about Roderick Strong or Petey Williams? Why did Johnny Devine never reach his potential?

And whatever happened to Matt Bentley?

 

[Ovaltine]

Elix Skipper: Was an awesome in ring talent who should still be there. What probably hurt him was his inability to talk. However, he was an X division guy and those guys can get over without being able to talk. Blame TNA because after they signed a bunch of WWE curtain jerkers they didn't think the X division was worth anything anymore.


Sony Siaki: Ace in the hole or Ace-hole as fans at the TNA Asylum use to call him. TNA jobbed him out like crazy once they went to Fox Sports net. So, he signed a developmental deal with WWE. I think he was released and then he donated his kidney to save his brother. That kind act ended his wrestling career. So, the fact that he isn't there anymore really isn't TNA's fault. Still, I don't know why the hell they jobbed him to death for a year when at one point he was one of their biggest stars.

Apollo: He was another one who was jobbed to death once TNA started airing on FSN. As matter of fact around that time he was put into a tag team with Siaki and they were both jobbed out. He too left after about a year of almost constant jobbing and signed a WWE developmental deal. He ended up being a dead beat dad who didn't pay his child support and WWE dropped him from his developmental deal a short time thereafter.

Chris Harris: Let himself go. Did you see the shape he was in towards the end of his TNA run?! He left TNA and signed with WWE and debuted on their ECW brand and was still in awful shape. HE had two terrible matches and was released. He then showed up on an episode of TNA impact as Matt Hardy's tag team partner and he was still terribly out of shape. I really think the reason he didn't go on to anything big was due to his own personal problems. Whether it was drugs, depression or just plain laziness who knows, but it's pretty much his fault that his body and ring work went to hell. He had a website at one point and I did read one of his blogs about how hard it was to lose weight at his age... I am the same age as him and I can still fit into the same clothes I wore in 1994 (yea I have one pair of jeans from back then). So, it wasn't the age-he simply let himself go. His end in the business was his own fault.

Low-ki: From what I heard he is difficult. He is also a legend in Japan. So, I don't think he cares about being in TNA or WWE. His style lends itself to Japan and the early TNA X division. I think that he may have left because TNA was de-emphasizing the division.

Christian York and Joey Matthews: York is with TNA now and has a million dollar look, but sub par in ring ability. I don't know what happened to Matthews. Wasn't hi in WWE for awhile? I have no idea why they were on the first TNA PPV and then never seen again. You'd have to ask Jeff or Jerry Jarrett about that.

Monty Brown: Monty should have been NWA heavyweight champion. The guy was WAY over while he was in TNA. From what I read (a zillion years ago) on a wrestling website Monty was indeed promised a reign with the belt, but Jarrett kept booking himself to be NWA champion (7 times mind you!) Monty got fed up and signed with WWE. Where he was sent to ECW where was heavily protected. I don't think he ever lost a match. However, they made him change his name to that Marcus Cor Von crap! I have actully heard that he hated that name. It was odd that they changed his name giving his fame as a member of the NFL. Well, just as he was getting a push (he came out cutting a promo that he wanted to wrestle Bobby Lashley) his sister died and he had to leave WWE to take care of her two children. There were rumbelings that he was going to return a few years ago, but he is in his 40's now so I doubt if he will ever come back. He doesn't even wrestle on the independent scene. However, I understand that he makes a good living off of being a personal trainer. Which given his physique would make a lot of sense.

Roderick Strong: Was working for TNA and ROH at the same time. There was a major snow storm that was going to hit the Mid Atlantic area and all TNA/ROH stars were told to stay in Florida for the TNA PPV on Sunday and not attend the ROH show that was on either Friday or Saturday night. well, he opted to go to the ROH show and then fly down to Orlando the next day. Well, his loyalty to ROH cost him his job with TNA even though he made it to that Sunday's PPV on time. Austin Aries (Then Austin Starr) did the same thing and lost his job over it too.


Petey Williams: Apparently creative had nothing for him and they let him go. Who was booking during that time period you ask?... Vince Russo.

Johnny Devine: I don't remember anything that was really memorable out of Devine... I know he was in Paparazzi Productions as their camera man, but aside from that I can't remember anything about the guy aside from he was in the BFG 2007 Kevin Nash X Division Battle Royal (which was awesome!) that Austin Starr won.

Matt Bentley: Matt formed a band who won a contest in Florida and he quit wrestling to concentrate on that full time. No, I am not making that up.

 

[Papa Pillman]

You bring up some good names.

TNA dropped the ball with a lot of X-Division talent over the years.

Now admittedly some guys, like Bentley or Devine for example, I was never that high on and I don't think the company missed out too much.

But a couple of the others were definite mistakes. Letting Petey go still doesn't make sense, but neither did using him as a mini-Steiner clone. The guy was over and the company should have kept him around. Roderick Strong is another good name to bring up. TNA let him walk without seeing the potential he had to be an elite worker, infact they made the same mistake on Aries, but luckily remedied the situation a few years later.

Some guys you can't blame TNA for. The Chris Harris's and Monty Brown's of the world thought the grass would be greener up North on the bigger stage, without realizing how much of a wall they would have to climb due to having the "TNA-stigma". Hell even "WWE guys" like Christian and Killings really had a tough climb back up the card after their return to the WWE due to having been with TNA.

Low-Ki is another guy you can't blame any company for cutting ties with. Although he one of my favorite workers in the ring, outside the ring he is a bridge-burner with a notorious backstage attitude, making having him rostered for an extended time a tricky proposition for any company. His Triple-X buddy Skipper was another solid hand, but the guy was just old. Despite his acrobatics, he was beyond his physical prime by the heart of his TNA run. When he left TNA he was on the wrong side of 40.

Also the Rob Feinstein situation really hurt TNA. At the point that the Feinstein controversy occured TNA and ROH were sharing a large portion of their rosters, and TNA mandating that none of its wrestlers could work ROH any longer caused guys to pick a side, and some of them identified themselves more with ROH and left TNA as a result. Most notably was CM Punk. TNA's handling of the Feinstein situation caused Punk to hold a grudge against TNA that he still holds to this day. While it mostly worked out in TNA's favor as guys like Styles and Daniels remained as TNA workers, and while it all eventually blew over and some guys began working both companies again, it would have been interesting to have seen what would have happened if the Rob Feinstein mess never occurred and Punk continued working TNA shows.

I do think even more recently TNA still dropped the ball on X-division guys like Shelley and Lethal who were highly identifiable with the company and its history, and should have been retained.

Another guy who comes to mind who wasn't mentioned is TJ Perkins who they had around for world X-cups as PUMA when he was very young, and they could have made a lot out of him, and they still may go the Aries route with him and bring him back for another shot.

On that note, I also think TNA dropped the ball on its working agreement with NJPW and could have gotten more out of their talent than they did. They haven't gotten nearly as much as they should have gotten out of their working agreement with AAA either.

But we could do this forever. Despite a serious lack of developed mid-card divisions, TNA does still have a very strong and deep roster of talent currently, many of whom(as the thread you spoke of pointed out) like AJ, Joe, Daniels, Abyss, Roode, Storm, Kaz, etc. have been around the company since the early days and owe much their success in the business to TNA and vice-versa.

 

[GameOver]

Elix Skipper: Was an awesome in ring talent who should still be there. What probably hurt him was his inability to talk. However, he was an X division guy and those guys can get over without being able to talk. Blame TNA because after they signed a bunch of WWE curtain jerkers they didn't think the X division was worth anything anymore.


Sony Siaki: Ace in the hole or Ace-hole as fans at the TNA Asylum use to call him. TNA jobbed him out like crazy once they went to Fox Sports net. So, he signed a developmental deal with WWE. I think he was released and then he donated his kidney to save his brother. That kind act ended his wrestling career. So, the fact that he isn't there anymore really isn't TNA's fault. Still, I don't know why the hell they jobbed him to death for a year when at one point he was one of their biggest stars.

Apollo: He was another one who was jobbed to death once TNA started airing on FSN. As matter of fact around that time he was put into a tag team with Siaki and they were both jobbed out. He too left after about a year of almost constant jobbing and signed a WWE developmental deal. He ended up being a dead beat dad who didn't pay his child support and WWE dropped him from his developmental deal a short time thereafter.

Chris Harris: Let himself go. Did you see the shape he was in towards the end of his TNA run?! He left TNA and signed with WWE and debuted on their ECW brand and was still in awful shape. HE had two terrible matches and was released. He then showed up on an episode of TNA impact as Matt Hardy's tag team partner and he was still terribly out of shape. I really think the reason he didn't go on to anything big was due to his own personal problems. Whether it was drugs, depression or just plain laziness who knows, but it's pretty much his fault that his body and ring work went to hell. He had a website at one point and I did read one of his blogs about how hard it was to lose weight at his age... I am the same age as him and I can still fit into the same clothes I wore in 1994 (yea I have one pair of jeans from back then). So, it wasn't the age-he simply let himself go. His end in the business was his own fault.

Low-ki: From what I heard he is difficult. He is also a legend in Japan. So, I don't think he cares about being in TNA or WWE. His style lends itself to Japan and the early TNA X division. I think that he may have left because TNA was de-emphasizing the division.

Christian York and Joey Matthews: York is with TNA now and has a million dollar look, but sub par in ring ability. I don't know what happened to Matthews. Wasn't hi in WWE for awhile? I have no idea why they were on the first TNA PPV and then never seen again. You'd have to ask Jeff or Jerry Jarrett about that.

Monty Brown: Monty should have been NWA heavyweight champion. The guy was WAY over while he was in TNA. From what I read (a zillion years ago) on a wrestling website Monty was indeed promised a reign with the belt, but Jarrett kept booking himself to be NWA champion (7 times mind you!) Monty got fed up and signed with WWE. Where he was sent to ECW where was heavily protected. I don't think he ever lost a match. However, they made him change his name to that Marcus Cor Von crap! I have actully heard that he hated that name. It was odd that they changed his name giving his fame as a member of the NFL. Well, just as he was getting a push (he came out cutting a promo that he wanted to wrestle Bobby Lashley) his sister died and he had to leave WWE to take care of her two children. There were rumbelings that he was going to return a few years ago, but he is in his 40's now so I doubt if he will ever come back. He doesn't even wrestle on the independent scene. However, I understand that he makes a good living off of being a personal trainer. Which given his physique would make a lot of sense.

Roderick Strong: Was working for TNA and ROH at the same time. There was a major snow storm that was going to hit the Mid Atlantic area and all TNA/ROH stars were told to stay in Florida for the TNA PPV on Sunday and not attend the ROH show that was on either Friday or Saturday night. well, he opted to go to the ROH show and then fly down to Orlando the next day. Well, his loyalty to ROH cost him his job with TNA even though he made it to that Sunday's PPV on time. Austin Aries (Then Austin Starr) did the same thing and lost his job over it too.


Petey Williams: Apparently creative had nothing for him and they let him go. Who was booking during that time period you ask?... Vince Russo.

Johnny Devine: I don't remember anything that was really memorable out of Devine... I know he was in Paparazzi Productions as their camera man, but aside from that I can't remember anything about the guy aside from he was in the BFG 2007 Kevin Nash X Division Battle Royal (which was awesome!) that Austin Starr won.

Matt Bentley: Matt formed a band who won a contest in Florida and he quit wrestling to concentrate on that full time. No, I am not making that up.

Of all of those the only ones that caught my eye were Petey Williams he was on fire then they let him go cause they were lazy, and Chris Harris but only cause of America's Most Wanted without that he sucked. The rest were just more of the same in the XDivision
but what about the man of a few impresonations, Black Machismo, admittedly he wasn't the best as a over bearing personality and looked like a goof but when they finally pushed him and he did the Macho man impersonation to a tea and even Ric Flair that was his time to shine and what did they do? well he left and went to ROH.

 

[MisterRob]

You bring up some good names.

TNA dropped the ball with a lot of X-Division talent over the years.

Now admittedly some guys, like Bentley or Devine for example, I was never that high on and I don't think the company missed out too much.

I personally always thought Johnny Devine had a lot of potential. He had a great look, he was great in the ring, and he even had charisma that was never fully exposed and used. I think his injuries, especially the stabbing incident, and the time away from TNA really hindered him when he did come back and was unable to grab any balls to run with.

But a couple of the others were definite mistakes. Letting Petey go still doesn't make sense, but neither did using him as a mini-Steiner clone. The guy was over and the company should have kept him around. Roderick Strong is another good name to bring up. TNA let him walk without seeing the potential he had to be an elite worker, infact they made the same mistake on Aries, but luckily remedied the situation a few years later.

I completely agree with you here. One of my favourite aspects of TNA once upon a time was Team Canada, and I absolutely loved Petey Williams during that time period. I think Williams has a ton of potential and TNA really dropped the ball in not keeping him around and really using him right now. If nothing else the X Division could really use being centered around him, just as it was Aries in the past. And from there I think Williams could go on to bigger things, much like Aries did.

Roderick Strong is a solid performer and definitely a good wrestler, although he is horrid in terms of personality and ability on the mic. But, that can easily be worked around, considering his ability in the ring as a solid hand on the roster.

Also the Rob Feinstein situation really hurt TNA. At the point that the Feinstein controversy occured TNA and ROH were sharing a large portion of their rosters, and TNA mandating that none of its wrestlers could work ROH any longer caused guys to pick a side, and some of them identified themselves more with ROH and left TNA as a result. Most notably was CM Punk. TNA's handling of the Feinstein situation caused Punk to hold a grudge against TNA that he still holds to this day. While it mostly worked out in TNA's favor as guys like Styles and Daniels remained as TNA workers, and while it all eventually blew over and some guys began working both companies again, it would have been interesting to have seen what would have happened if the Rob Feinstein mess never occurred and Punk continued working TNA shows.

This is very true, and I think this definitely had a huge impact on both companies. It's always funny to me that people, specifically TNA fans, use CM Punk as a wrestler who "didn't make it" in TNA, when that's not even close to being the truth. He would've made it in TNA just as easily as he has in ROH and WWE, he just never remained with the company because of TNA's control issues. And I think that was a HUGE loss for TNA at the time.

On that note, I also think TNA dropped the ball on its working agreement with NJPW and could have gotten more out of their talent than they did. They haven't gotten nearly as much as they should have gotten out of their working agreement with AAA either.

It's amazing to me how little it seems TNA is doing with AAA, and it doesn't even seem like any working agreement is in existence between these two promotions. I would love to have seen more from this relationship, and inter-promotional angles come into play from it.

Of all of those the only ones that caught my eye were Petey Williams he was on fire then they let him go cause they were lazy, and Chris Harris but only cause of America's Most Wanted without that he sucked. The rest were just more of the same in the XDivision
but what about the man of a few impresonations, Black Machismo, admittedly he wasn't the best as a over bearing personality and looked like a goof but when they finally pushed him and he did the Macho man impersonation to a tea and even Ric Flair that was his time to shine and what did they do? well he left and went to ROH.

To me, Jay Lethal was a big loss for TNA, and I still don't understand the reasoning behind it at all. Lethal was a great in ring performer, and he proved during his Black Machismo time, and his feud with Ric Flair, etc, that he has an abundance of charisma and can entertain. After that time being "pushed", I don't understand why they'd let him go.

Jay Lethal could certainly add a lot to the horrible X Division right now. This would have been the perfect time, instead of throwing the title on Rob Van Dam for a meaningless and forgettable reign, to have given Lethal the opportunity to be the centerpiece of the X Division, carry the title, and have feuds to help develop himself and other talents like Kenny King, etc. Bring back Sonjay Dutt (who even has history with Lethal), and Petey Williams, and you have a far superior division and far more entertaining potential then the lackluster state its in right now.

TNA baffles me.

 

[Judah's Lion]

TNA is certainly not unique to this kind of discussion. WWF/E and WCW both blew some big opportunities with superstars that leave us fans constantly asking "what if?" or in this case "what could have been?" type questions.

of the names already listed, i'd definitely have to agree with Jay Lethal and Petey Williams. they were both hugely over, and if i remember correctly, they were both let go at the peaks of their rises. just oddly terrible timing, in my opinion.

there are two names i haven't seen mentioned yet that i think could have done and been much more than what really happened: Desmonde Wolfe and D'Angelo Dinero. i'm not saying both could have become all time greats in the history of professional wrestling, but i bet few could deny their potential.

might get some major hate for this, but Bobby Lashley also sticks out to me. he did so little with TNA. he was pushed so hard and so fast in WWE that for him to be in TNA could have been massive. but nothing came from Lashley in TNA at all. but that's a tricky name cuz if he was pushed big in TNA, the whole "TNA only pushes WWE rejects" outrage would have started for the umpteenth time, so maybe TNA did right with him. maybe? jury's still out on him.

but for sure Lethal, Williams, Dinero and Wolfe belong on this "what could have been" list.

 

[Coldstream]

Desmond Wolfe is a good choice for recent misses. He was getting a push but health issues pretty much shelved that.

I think Roxxi could have been much more for the Knockouts division than she was used for, especially that Hair Match she was in, with resulting "Fire Russo" chants. Cheerleader Melissa/Raisha Saeed was wasted as Awesome Kong's manager too.

As for originals/early TNA talents? I was always a mark for the New Church, and would like to have seen Malice make a longer run with the company. Was their first monster heel vs Shamrock and then left too quickly.

Finally, how could TNA have missed on The Johnsons? Wait...no...nevermind.

 

[Hollywood Naitch]

You bring up some interesting names!

I thought Sonny Siaki was great in the early days of TNA, didn't he end up signing a developmental deal with WWE? Now you mention it, I do remember reading something about him donating a kidney or something like that. That would explain the end of his career, but its a shame we never got to see what he could have achieved, he had alot of potential.

The Petey Williams situation puzzles me. I know the Mini Steiner clone gimmick wasn't the greatest, but Petey was one of the top X-Division wrestlers and even now people want to see him back in TNA. He has appeared at their One Night Only PPV's, so I hope they end up bringing him back as a full time member of the roster, he would be a great addition to the X-Division right now.

The York and Matthews tag team were a favourite of mine back in the day. Joey ended up in WWE as Joey MERCURY of the MNM tag team, so he did achieve alot. However, he has serious drug problems (on CM Punk's DVD Joey says Punk is his best friend and paid off his house for him when he was in bad times). I think he works in developmental now. Christian York is back in TNA now, but looks totally different. He is roided out of his mind these days and while still good, is alot slower and doesnt fly as much as when he was smaller.

Elix Skipper was another great athlete but awful on the mic. Again, I think TNA could have done more with him. His hurrancanrana off the cage is still one of the most spectacular moves I have ever seen. That should have catapulted him to the next level but it never did, shame.