The formula for a wrestling match typically includes a nice guy taking a serious beating from a heel wrestler, only for them to miraculously come back after taking a fair amount of punishment. While this doesn’t always result in the good guy winning, it does get the audience on their feet. No wrestler was more successful in making a comeback than hulk hoganwhose outsized version of not selling his opponent’s offense had fans going wild.
While the theatrics of pointing and waving a finger at an opponent is what made Hogan successful, other wrestlers have employed similar tactics. Whether they rely on audience power or their own gut strength, making a big comeback in a match after facing the odds creates incredible drama during a wrestling match. Combined with them, it includes not selling a beatdown, and it’s a surefire way to get the fans behind them.
10 Hulk Hogan vs. Undertaker
By the time The Undertaker won his first WWE Championship, he had only been in WWE for a year, but his engaging character had made him a force to be reckoned with. At Survivor Series 1991, he faced Hulk Hogan in a championship match after interference from Ric Flair.
While The Undertaker’s victory may have been tainted, Hogan still gave him a run for his money. After hitting the first Tombstone Piledriver of the night, Hogan surprisingly kicked out and proceeded to execute a huge comeback against Deadman before finally getting dropped.
9 Triple H against the last warrior
Back in 1996, Triple H was a much different wrestler than fans knew him to be during the closing stages of his career. As an uptight blue blood, Hunter Hearst Helmsley entered WWE on an undefeated streak while trying to educate wrestling fans on how to present himself with dignity and seemed poised for great things along the way.
At WrestleMania 12, Helmsley faced his biggest challenge to date: the return of the Ultimate Warrior. After a four-year absence from WWE, Warrior returned against the rising star. In the opening moments, it looked like the younger wrestler would pick up an easy win against the pedigreed aging star. However, Warrior rallied and used his trademark offense to win in less than two minutes.
8 Kenta Kobashi’s fighting spirit
While some big name North American wrestlers created well known comeback sequences in their careers that were very successful, it almost became a formulaic part of their match. For example, most wrestling fans recognize when John Cena is about to use his fatal moves towards the end of their matches.
However, few fighters can match the raw emotion of Kenta Kobashi’s fighting spirit when he returns. Taking advantage of the crowd’s hype and delving deep inside him, Kobashi was able to fight his way back from many difficult situations during his career of his own free will.
7 Hook Vs Bear Bronson
Despite only making a handful of matches in his professional career, Hook showed incredible promise early on. With his cool demeanor and explosive offense, Hook was a top prospect as soon as his first game aired in 2021 with a very bright future.
Regardless of what Hook’s future looked like at the time, his second match made headlines for controversial reasons. During Hook’s match against Bear Bronson, he was hit with a devastating piledriver that would have floored any opponent for a reasonable amount of time. However, Hook recovered from the maneuver and quickly mounted more offense and finished the match decisively.
6 Tatanka war dance
From 1991 to 1993, Tatanka went on a solid undefeated streak that began with his WWE debut. As a solid midcard talent, Tatanka quickly and decisively defeated all opponents on the way up the mountain.
While Tatanka’s winning streak was nothing of substance, he still gained a lot of popularity along the way. When he looked like he was collapsing during a fight, he would begin to complete a ceremonial war dance to gain strength, which would allow him to regain his strength and start pummeling his opponents, no matter how much punishment he had just received. . He got.
5 Tazz vs. Jerry Lawler
As a former ECW World Heavyweight Champion, Tazz came to WWE in the year 2000 with much fanfare and high expectations. Unfortunately, due to mounting injuries and unclear creativity, Tazz’s WWE career was not very successful, with many pointing to his first big fight with the company as part of the reason for this.
When Tazz began feuding with part-time wrestler Jerry Lawler, there were few fans clamoring for the matchup. However, ECW-era shades of Tazz appeared during his match at SummerSlam 2000. After receiving one of Lawler’s patented piledrivers, Tazz didn’t sell the move and began attacking, quickly rousing the crowd.
4 Braun Strowman vs. Brock Lesnar
While Brock Lesnar is well known for displaying his superhuman abilities during matches, no one has ever seen Braun Strowman do anything similar. While Strowman has displayed many feats of strength in his career, it wasn’t until he met the Beast that he faced real adversity.
In true Brock Lesnar style, he tried to end his Universal Championship match at No Mercy 2017 very quickly with a succession of German suplexes on the Monster of Men. Unexpectedly, Strowman was unaffected by the moves and quickly appeared to land his own power shot to show Lesnar just how tough he was.
3 Masato Tanaka Vs Mike Awesome
ECW’s wrestling style had never really been shown on WWE programming until the inaugural ECW One Night Stand reunion show in 2005. After a night of crazy matches featuring wrestlers loyal to ECW, few WWE fans they knew what to expect from Mike Awesome and Fight Masato Tanaka, but ECW fans knew exactly what was coming.
After a hard-hitting match full of strikes and tables, steel chairs were thrown into the mix. After Mike Awesome hit Tanaka with three chilling chair shots to the head, most fans thought the match was over. However, Tanaka dug deep and screamed wildly and pulled off some great moves of his own, which quickly introduced fans to what Masato Tanaka is all about.
2 Bray Wyatt vs. Seth Rollins
While the Hell in a Cell match between “The Fiend” Bray Wyatt and Seth Rollins is often cited as one of the most disappointing matches in recent history, there’s no denying that it did a good job of establishing The Fiend’s character. for the public. The match may not have delivered a decisive victory to the audience, but it was clear that The Fiend was a monster.
Seth Rollins tried to show that The Fiend didn’t intimidate him during the first few minutes of the match by rapidly performing his trademark frog-splashing and stomping moves against the monster. However, before he could get a pinfall, The Fiend sat down without batting an eye and began taking the action directly to Rollins, leaving everyone wondering where he gets the strength from him.
1 Hulk Hogan vs. the rock
Throughout the 1980s and 1990s in WWE, few wrestlers were able to wow audiences like Hulk Hogan did. During his reign as the face of WWE, Hogan delighted audiences with his matches in which he pulled off a seemingly impossible comeback with the help of the cheering Hulkamaniacs.
As 2002 rolled around, some were unsure how fans would react to Hogan’s return to WWE. However, WrestleMania 18 shut down any criticism when the entire crowd went on a rampage over him “hulking” against The Rock, proving that Hulkamania remained alive and well among WWE fans all those years later.