The big triumphant return to the ring, after months or even years of time away… it’s a moment that gets remembered for ages to come. A monumental occasion, a turning point moment that defines the next step of a performer’s career. That… is not what this article is about. Here, I’ll document just a taste, five of the most obscure, forgotten WWE return runs for former stars.
Rather than try and rank them I’ll sort them by recency, with the most recent being last, and the oldest being first. I think it makes for a pretty unique list, so let’s get into it!
5. Ultimate Warrior in 1996
Funnily, a lot of people do frequently bring up Warrior squashing Hunter Hearst Helmsley, the now famous Triple H, and even no selling his finisher on the grandest stage of them all, WrestleMania XII. But I’m not sure it sets in to them that this took place in 1996. And absolutely nobody talks about it in the context of it being his big return for what was meant to be a real run.
Eight days after putting away the American Blueblood, Warrior made his Monday Night Raw debut where he was confronted by Goldust – a surreal combination of gimmicks if ever there were any! Bizarrely, he all but broke character when Goldust flirted with him, dropping the Warrior snarl to speak in his usual voice and put him down with the thinly-vieled homophobia that was the standard of the day. This led to him challenging Dustie for the IC title at In Your House 7: Good Friends, Better Enemies, a match that he won by count out. The two would later meet in a rematch in the ’96 King of the Ring, which ended in double count out, leading to neither man advancing. At the KOTR event itself, Warrior defeated Jerry Lawler. A day later, he would beat Owen Hart by DQ in what ended up being his final televised match for the WWF/WWE.
He was originally scheduled to be a part of In Your House 9: International Incident, where he would’ve teamed with Shawn Michaels and Ahmed Johnson. But a dispute involving him missing house show dates due to mourning the loss of his father saw him suspended and later fired, and he was replaced with Sycho Sid instead.
Ranging from Mania on March 31st to his suspension on July 8th, that’s less than a four month run, coming out to… 99 days! Wow that’d really bother me, a day shy of 100?! Unbelievable.
4. Curt Hennig in 2002
Like the Warrior example, a fair few people actually do remember Hennig’s return in the 2002 Royal Rumble match. It was among the many fun moments of one of the better and more storied Rumbles. And Curt’s impressive performance and fairly lengthy stay did not go unnoticed.
However, comparatively few would be able to tell you that this was the start of an actual WWE return run. Hennig impressed enough to earn a shot at a comeback, and on paper making your return right in time for WrestleMania sounds like a treat. However, it’s clear this was a last minute addition, as their plans for WrestleMania 18 were already set and they had nothing to do with Mr. Perfect. As such, he just kinda floated along on the Raw roster.
Over the next five-ish months, he would wrestle on Raw a grand total of eight times. He won exactly one of those matches, pinning Scotty 2 Hotty in a tag match. One might optimistically think that perhaps a real shot would come post-Mania, where his appearances did pick up. However, before that could really come to fruition, a bizarre night occurred; the storied Plane Ride From Hell. This booze-addled flight saw Curt try to tussle with Brock Lesnar, and also included Ric Flair flashing flight attendants.
This became a big enough story that someone had to take the fall for it, and Mr. Perfect was the least significant party for WWE at that point, so he ended up being the one canned. His final match ended up being a loss to Matt Hardy on Sunday Night Heat.
From the Rumble on January 20th to the official firing on May 7th, Perfect’s 2002 return lasted for a little less than five months, coming out to 107 days.
3. Tatanka in 2006
Tatanka was pushed hard in the early-to-mid 90s, actually having one of the more prominent undefeated streaks in WWE history for a while. It took about two years for someone to pin Tatanka, when Ludvig Borga pulled it off on an episode of Superstars. And he was a well-liked, if totally generic stereotypical character, the kind that was common in the era. Still, he was never a big star, and a decade out from the end of his initial run, nobody was expecting – or calling for – a comeback.
After a one-off appearance in August of 2005 and a few house show matches at the tail end of that year, Tatanka would make his full-time return, starting with the 2006 Royal Rumble, similar to Mr. Perfect before him. He then entered a makeshift pairing with Matt Hardy to feud with MNM for a time and once that program was done, it seemed he had very little to do. Still he was protected well on his rare appearances. Over the summer however he began, ironically, a lengthy losing streak to setup a heel turn, in which he became vindictive against America for it’s treatment of Native Americans.
This pretty much died a death, but he did ultimately stick around much longer than anyone else on this list, even if he never really managed to do anything all that memorable in his time there. He requested his release in January of ’07, and was granted it. Funnily, they had him break his losing streak on his way out, defeating Jimmy Wang Yang in his last match of the run.
The ’06 Rumble took place on January 29th, 2006 and he was released on January 19th of the following year. This comes out to 355 days… you’d really think with a run that was practically a year long, more people would recall it, but it just honestly wasn’t that noteworthy.
2. D’Lo Brown in 2008
Oh yeah, we’re getting real obscure now… I was there for this one. D’Lo Brown, the former Eurocontinental Champion himself, made a return to WWE basically out of nowhere in the summer of 2008, defeating then IC Champ Santino Marella. That seems like it should be a pretty good start… but it was the only televised win he’d ever have that year.
In fact, it was the first of only five televised matches D’Lo Brown ended up having in this run. He feuded briefly with Marella, teaming with Kelly Kelly in a losing effort to Glamarella before challenging for the IC title only to lose by DQ. Ultimately Santino would defeat him two weeks later to put the feud to bed. D’Lo would then disappear for a while before being squashed by Mike Knox that November.
And there it was, I’ve just listed everything that happened in this entire run. Randomly I found myself watching every match D’Lo had in his 2008 return earlier this year. It was a curious way to spend 15 minutes. This is not an exaggeration. According to the times on cagematch.net, D’Lo wrestled for a combined 7 minutes and 13 seconds on TV in 2008. Suffice to say, not a ton of screentime there.
D’Lo’s signing was officially announced on June 5th of 2008. After months of not showing up on Raw, D’Lo was released for budgetary reasons on January 9th of 2009. So, seven months, or 218 days… with, again, 7:13 to show for it.
1. The Spirit Squad AND The Headbangers in 2016
Whoooaaa, a two-fer! Yes, I’m cheating a bit here and counting these two tandems in one entry. That might seem off, but I think it only makes sense, considering they came back at the exact same time for the exact same reason; a vein attempt to add depth to SmackDown’s tag division after the 2016 WWE Draft. They both definitely belong on this list, but the story is just too similar for them to have different spots.
Headbangers came in first, just appearing out of the ether in August to be part of the WWE SmackDown Tag Team Title tournament, where they dropped out in the first round in a loss to eventual winners Heath Slater & Rhyno. They disappeared for a bit before being squashed by the Usos in November.
Spirit Squad were brought back in October to back up the Miz in his feud against Dolph Ziggler, berating him for his past, acknowledging his history as a cheerleader for the first time. But that didn’t last long and they were losing to up-and-coming teams soon after.
As a perpetual advocate for the growth of tag team wrestling, the idea of bringing back these old hands to act as enhancements for the younger, fresher teams made plenty of sense to me, random though it may have appeared. But ultimately it wasn’t meant to be. The Spirit Squad’s fifth match in 2016 was the same as the Head Banger’s third, and it was the last for each; a ridiculous 16 man tag match, which basically featured the entire division. The two tandems, appropriately, were on the same side in this, and it happened to be the losing side.
It doesn’t appear either team were actually under contract here, just being repeatedly brought back for a series of one-offs. So we can safely start with the Headbanger’s initial match back on August 30th and conclude with both teams’ last match on November 15th. This comes out to 77 days.
And thus concludes the only WWE list on the entire internet which could possibly begin with the Ultimate Warrior and end with the Spirit Squad.