And who thought Husky Harris would hit the top before he became Bray Wyatt?

Show business is rough, and rarely fair. How many folks have dedicated their lives to achieving fame in the entertainment industry as actors, singers, etc.... only to find that despite mountains of talent, they can't get a break because no one will look at them? Maybe an actress with the ability to win an Academy Award is out there filling time as a waitress while she waits for a Hollywood agent to discover how great she is. Perhaps she spends the rest of her life that way, and we never get to see her on the silver screen. Maybe the next Robin Williams of comedy is looking to break into the business, but he can't get beyond unpaid appearances on an improvisation stage because no one sees enough in him to invest time and money.....or, more realistically, to even take a look.

In pro wrestling, we all have our personal favorites; most of them are people at the top of the chain. It's easy to root for a Daniel Bryan or Randy Orton because WWE management has decided to keep them in our line of sight at all times. Even second-tier folks like Cody Rhodes who, despite the best efforts of the Creative people in WWE, can rise only so high and no higher; yet, the poor souls in the locker room waiting anxiously for their chance probably wonder why Cody is given chance after chance while they languish in the back, drawing a paycheck while begging management to give them a push.....even tossing their original ideas at Creative and trying to convince them why they would be the best performer to play it.

And, face it, even these folks are more fortunate than the performers who spend years in the indies, trying to make it to WWE.....and never do. It's a tough business......show business always is.

In another section of this forum, one poster makes a case for Alex Riley, whom he feels would be a main event performer if allowed to. I can understand the sentiment; my pick was Drew McIntyre who, for 4 years after his initial push, probably hoped against hope someone would give him another program to run with. They experimented with a "gay" gimmick for Drew in a few house shows, then had him splitting off from 3MB and wrestling singles matches, presumably with the idea of eventually giving him something new. Instead, he's been future endeavored and we may never know what he might have done with a second chance.

But if you knock this notion, saying that guys like McIntyre, JTG, Trent Barretta and Vladimir Koslov would never have amounted to anything, no matter what type of innovative program might have been written for them, I counter by pointing to William Rotunda, aka Alex Rotundo, aka Husky Harris......aka Bray Wyatt.

Isn't he the poster child for what can happen when the right program is developed for the right performer? Okay, you can tell me he was the greatest thing going as Husky Harris ......but WWE management apparently didn't think so, right? They tried him in a few scenarios, then sent him down to wherever ineffective performers get sent to. It took quite a while for him to get back to the big time, didn't it? Personally, I had forgotten about him. Back then, we might have pointed to him as one of the also-rans who'll never make it big. Yet, look at him now.

We can say the same thing about guys like Curtis Axel who was in Never Never Land for a long damn time, until Creative found a new direction for him to run, one that culminated with him getting wins over people like John Cena and Triple H............and what about Paul Levesque, himself? Early in his career as a blueblood who wore a jacket that made him look like a circus ringmaster, and saw him being embarrassed by the likes of Henry O. Godwinn in an Arkansas Hog Pen match (which he won & then was made to look foolish), not to mention being destroyed in 30 seconds by a returning Ultimate Warrior, Levesque was allowed to pitch his own character idea and wound up as Triple H.....talk about a success story featuring an also-ran who rose to the top of the charts.

Maybe the title of this topic should have been: "It's the Program, Stupid!" but it's a tribute to the guys and gals in the back who don't make it big despite having as much talent as ones who do.....but never catch the wave that brings them the glory.

Have you got a performer who fits this bill......either backstage at WWE or somewhere else who dreams of stardom and probably curses the higher-ups who won't give them a chance.....even as they kiss their posteriors while they wait?

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