#1. Beaver Cleavage
If it wasn’t bad that they renamed the wrestler originally known as Mosh to Beaver Cleavage, the gimmick began with a vignette showing him asking for some of his “Mother’s Milk” to put on his dry cereal. The uncomfortable innuendo only got worse, and it wasn’t long before Charles Warrington (the man portraying it) broke character and refused to do it any longer.
Bruce Prichard came up with part of the name as a joke with Charles behind the scenes, but it was Vince Russo who took it to another level. Cleavage got a singles victory over Christian on an episode of Raw before it was nixed forever. Mrs. Cleavage was played by Marianna Komlos, who sadly passed away to breast cancer five years later, in 2004.
#2 & 3. Col. DeBeers & David Schultz
Back in the day, it wasn’t against some heels to play the race card. Two of the most prominent figures who regularly talked down about African-Americans were Colonel DeBeers and David Schultz. DeBeers was a pro-apartheid white nationalist who refused to wrestle if the referee was black, and he’d share his disdain with the live audience in the ring.
David Schultz once told Mean Gene Okerlund that he would whip the WWF tag team champions, Rocky Johnson and Tony Atlas, like a bunch of dogs. Roddy Piper played along with this narrative, and they lost their tag team title match to the babyfaces. Had any of this behavior happened in the social media era, it would cancel everyone involved.
#4. ‘Mad Monk’ Friar Ferguson
Mike Shaw portrayed a character that was seemingly a Catholic monk. However, after one match on TV, the Catholic Church contacted the WWF because they felt the gimmick was offensive. It didn’t help that Shaw looked as if he dropped his crotch on to his opponent’s face to win the match. Depending on your tastes, Mike Shaw’s next gimmick, The Bastion Booger, could be considered even more offensive to the eyes.
#5. Jillian Hall’s Mole
I’m not sure what’s more offensive. Implying that The Boogeyman ripped off and eat Jillian Hall’s mole, or that WWE decided it was a good idea to have it on her face to begin with. I’ll let you be the judge.
#6. Muhammad Hassan
I recently wrote an article about Muhammad Hassan. I’d highly encourage you to check that out if you haven’t already: Muhammad Hassan: A Poorly Timed & Misunderstood Character
#7. Oklahoma
Near the end of the Attitude Era, WCW hired former WWF writers Ed Ferrara & Vince Russo. The two companies referenced each other many times, but one of the lamest and offensive gimmicks to come out of their war was Ed Ferrara’s interpretation of Jim Ross. Oklahoma was one of the worst characters of the time, and Vince Russo later apologized personally to JR for it. He says that he deeply respects Jim Ross, and it was more of a dig at Vince McMahon’s backstage impression of JR, than anything personal against the man himself.
#8. Orlando Jordan’s “Simply The Greatest”
It may go over better in today’s world, and even more so since The Velveteen Dream did something similar in NXT. After debuting in TNA Wrestling, they repackaged Orlando Jordan as an openly bisexual character. However, his entrance literally crossed the line for several viewers, and the gimmick didn’t last long after that.
I believe there are several reasons it didn’t land as well as it could have:
- It happened out of nowhere. The audience was unprepared, so when Orlando Jordan appeared, it left everyone questioning what was going on.
- Mike Tenay and Taz were equally surprised and borderline buried the entrance by saying it’s certainly “different”, and Orlando Jordan is “eccentric”. They mirrored what many fans in the audience and watching from home were thinking, instead of selling us on the new presentation.
- Orlando Jordan did not get the time to explain the new gimmick. Had he explained what this was and what we could come to expect, it would have gone over better. Instead, we got an overly sexualized entrance with no context.
- Orlando Jordan had worked for years as a lackey to John Bradshaw Layfield and as a singles wrestler in WWE. He had done nothing like this before, so it felt odd that he would suddenly appear like this.
Now, I’m all for being inclusive. I was ready to give it a chance. However, the gimmick was too on the nose. It was crossing the “too gay” line for many to accept. In contrast, AEW has many fans that know Anthony Bowens is gay, but he’s not flaunting that fact like it’s his entire identity.
TNA was trying to capitalize on Jordan being bisexual, which should never be the case. They seriously needed to build him up with more character traits before implementing sexuality onto a solid foundation the fans had grown to respect. Before this, while Jordan had done some decent work, he was very far from being over on his own.
#9. Saba Simba
While this gimmick saved Tony Atlas’ career, I find it so hilarious because of Roddy Piper’s reaction to Saba Simba’s debut. It’s so incredibly stereotypical that I had to include it.
#10. Seven
According to research, it was said that Dustin Rhodes came up with the Seven character, although it was originally stated that his father did before parting from WCW. Vince Russo adopted, and was willing to continue with it, but Turner Broadcasting’s standards and practices wouldn’t allow them to keep on airing the (probably not intentional) creepy vignettes with Seven standing outside a child’s window. Dustin says that it was Russo who ended the character, but Russo denies that and says it was the network executives.
So, when it came time to debut the character, Russo decided that Dustin Rhodes would cut a shoot promo as himself and kill it off right away. Rhodes completely ripped the gimmick apart on live television. A mix of Uncle Fester and The Undertaker, the concept of Seven, could have been interesting had they implemented it differently. If it wasn’t offensive to wrestling fans, it certainly was to television executives.
#11. Sgt. Slaughter Betrays America
During the height of tension between the United States and Iraq in 1990, Sgt. Slaughter returned to the WWF as an Iraqi sympathizer. He’d talk about how great Saddam Hussein is, and how weak America’s military is. The heat he got was so massive that going about his daily life, he needed personal security and to wear a bulletproof vest, after getting many death threats.
The gimmick reached its peak at WrestleMania VII, when Hulk Hogan stood up for America by defeating the evil regime to win the WWF Championship. The feud continued all the way to SummerSlam, when Sgt. Slaughter, General Adnan, and Colonel Mustafa were defeated by Hulk Hogan and The Ultimate Warrior. Few can say they got this much heat as a heel in the history of WWE.
#12. The Mexicools
While it translated little back then, the presentation of The Mexicools stable was pretty disrespectful to Mexicans. Over the decades, WWE has been full of stereotypical gimmicks, but I included this specifically because of how talented Juventud Guerrera, Psicosis, and Super Crazy are. Luckily, they didn’t do the same thing with Legado Del Fantasma. Jim Ross had the following to say about The Mexicools gimmick:
“Well, it’s just distasteful, you wouldn’t do that today. We shouldn’t have done it then. It was distasteful…You get a very highly skilled group of guys in the ring. But they can’t communicate as well as you’d want with the majority of your audience. In other words, I’m saying they don’t speak adequate English to verbally convey their messages. Look, I didn’t dislike the Mexicools… they’re lawn people. It’s so caustic in my view because people are gonna look at the glass half full in a situation like that. It was cheap heat at best, cheap heat at best.”
#13. The Stormtrooper
Umm… yeah. This guy wears a swastika on his attire and hails from Germany. He’s a Nazi. There’s nothing subtle about this. One look at this guy is enough to know that having him on television isn’t smart.
#14. Tim White
For anyone who has battled severe depression, this may not be a gimmick you want to watch. Former wrestling referee Tim White began by attempting suicide with a gun in his bar by shooting himself (off-screen).
This led to an entire series of at least 16 segments titled “A Day In Your Life”. They featured Tim White doing his best to kill himself while interviewer Josh Mathews did what he could to help. Why? I don’t know. It was probably Vince McMahon’s personal weekly entertainment. I cannot find the original segment, but there is a playlist on YouTube showing the rest. I wouldn’t recommend it. RIP Tim White.
#15. Zeb Colter
In a time when WWE cut back considerably on its controversial content for PG programming, Dutch Mantel returned to WWE under the new name of Zeb Colter. The character referred to the Tea Party movement and its agenda of anti-illegal immigrant beliefs. It quickly garnered mainstream attention, as right-wing commentator Glenn Beck noted WWE was mocking and trying to “demonize” the Tea Party. It forced WWE to make a statement about this, saying that he was portraying a character and any political views made by it, does not represent WWE’s views. Zeb Colter & Jack Swagger broke character to invite Glenn Beck on to the show, but he declined.
They did this to generate heat to help gain fan support for Alberto Del Rio, who was the baby face they were feuding with. Jack Swagger & Cesaro (who is Swiss) were later called “The Real Americans”, which again tied into the Tea Party beliefs. The point of the gimmick was that Colter would eventually share stronger opinions and garner even more heat, but WWE didn’t go all out with it. Dutch Mantel explains the idea behind the character in the video below.
I hope you have enjoyed this list of offensive wrestling gimmicks. There are so many more I could have shared, so please feel free to list those in the comments. Thanks for reading!
