July 1, 2018
By Ryan Porzl
For 22 years, a fixture of WWF/WWE has been "The World's Strongest Man" Mark Henry. Originally a powerlifter who made it to the 1992 and 1996 Olympics, Henry signed with the WWF in 1996 and shockingly has had a two decade tenure where he seemed like a failed experiment for most of his run before enjoying praise in his twilight years and has since earned a backstage position as well as an induction into the WWE Hall of Fame. For some strange reason, it seems like people have giving him more praise in recent years despite the limited success among other things. With his recent induction into the WWE Hall of Fame, it seems like people have continued to paint a rosy picture of his career. This article, I will pull back the curtain and remind people that while Henry is a likable guy who tried, his legacy is overrated and that he's been the biggest waste in WWE history given how little they got out of him despite the long tenure.
The best way to start is too look at Henry's 21 years in the ring from his debut in 1996 to his retirement in 2017 and how active he was or lack thereof. When you look at Henry's WWF/WWE run, he's missed nearly half of his run for a variety of reasons be it injuries, hiatuses, or being sent somewhere for training. Even though he competed for 21 years, it feels like he was MIA a lot of the time and WWE spent a lot of time paying him to sit at home. Here is a timeline of Henry's career and all the times he was out.
Jul to Nov 1996: Makes his debut and feuds with Jerry "The King" Lawler. Wrestles only four matches during this time all against Lawler in both WWF & USWA
Nov 1996 to Nov 1997: Suffers a leg injury. After recovering, Henry spends most of 1997 training.
Nov 1997 to Feb 1999: Returns to WWF, turns heel & joins the Nation of Domination, formed a team with D'Lo Brown, and began his Sexual Chocolate gimmick.
Feb to Apr 1999: Suffers a knee injury and is written off TV at In Your House XXVII: St. Valentine's Day Massacre in an angle with Owen Hart & Jeff Jarrett.
Apr 1999 to Apr 2000: Continues his Sexual Chocolate gimmick including relationship with Mae Young and holds the WWF European Championship.
Apr 2000 to Apr 2002: Sent to developmental territory Ohio Valley Wrestling for additional training and get in better shape. Took hiatus in 2001 to win the first annual Arnold Strongman Classic.
Apr to Oct 2002: Returns to the main roster when drafted as one of the top ten picks for the Smackdown brand. Reverts back to his "World's Strongest Man" gimmick where he does feats of strength and participates in a tournament to crown the first Smackdown Tag Team Champions teaming with Rikishi.
Oct 2002 to Aug 2003: Suffers a knee injury. Upon recovering, Henry works a few live events before being sent down to OVW for even more training.
Aug 2003 to Feb 2004: Returns to the RAW brand and joins Theodore Long's Thuggin' and Buggin' Enterprises. Feuds with Goldberg over the World Heavyweight Championship and has feuds with Shawn Michaels & Booker T.
Feb 2004 to Dec 2005: Tears his quadriceps muscle during a practice session in OVW. During recovery, Henry is used for public relations before being sent down to OVW yet again.
Dec 2005 to Jul 2006: Returns to the Smackdown brand to feud with Batista before Batista suffers an injury. Then feuds with Kurt Angle over the World Heavyweight Championship and The Undertaker. Briefly resumes feud with Batista upon his return before Henry gets hurt.
Jul 2006 to May 2007: Injured again as he tears his patella tendon off the bone and splits his patella completely in two.
May 2007 to June 2009: Returns to Smackdown where he feuds with Kane & The Undertaker. Gets drafted to ECW in 2008 where he holds the ECW Championship and is managed by Tony Atlas.
June 2009 to Apr 2011: Drafted to RAW where he forms several tag teams with Montel Vontavious Porter, Evan Borne, & Yoshi Tatsu.
Apr 2011 to Feb 2012: Drafted to Smackdown where he begins his "Hall of Pain" storyline which becomes the peak of his career. Wins the World Heavyweight Title and feuds with Randy Orton, Sheamus, Big Show, & Daniel Bryan.
Feb 2012: Hyper extends his knee.
Feb to Apr 2012: Gets a few WWE Championship opportunities over CM Punk and renews rivalry with Sheamus.
Apr 2012 to Feb 2013: Takes time off for career threatening surgery.
Feb to May 2013: Returns and has rivalries with Ryback & Sheamus
May to Jun 2013: Takes hiatus due to injuries and teases retirement
Jun 2013 to Aug 2013: Has his critically acclaimed fake retirement speech before beginning a feud with John Cena for the WWE Championship. Forms a team with Big Show to challenge The Shield for the WWE Tag Team Championship.
Sept to Nov 2013: Takes hiatus to lose weight
Nov 2013 to May 2014: Mostly works in the midcard, has a few confrontations with Brock Lesnar, and a few United States Title shots.
May 2014 to Aug 2014: Is absent again for unknown reasons
Aug 2014 to Nov 2014: Remains in the midcard and aligns with The Authority. Is part of Team Authority at the 2014 Survivor Series
Nov 2014 to Mar 2015: Undergoes surgery for an undisclosed injury
Mar 2015 to Apr 2016: Bounces around between heel and face while not doing anything notable other than the occasional title shot
May 2016 to July 2016: Inactive
Jul 2016 to Apr 2017: Finishes his career by only wrestling literally twelve matches between July 4, 2016 to April 2, 2017. By August, he's only working once a month while not wrestling at all in November 2016 & March 2017.
Apr 2017 to present: Retires after participating in the Andre the Giant memorial battle royal at the pre show of Wrestlemania 33. Has since taken on a producers role, was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame, and made a one-off at the Greatest Royal Rumble event in April 2018
So as you can see, Henry missed a lot of time for one reason or another. If I counted right, Henry ultimately missed a combined 9 years out his 21 in WWE. That's nearly half of his tenure. It's crazy to think that WWE retained a guy for two decades despite multiple layoffs including three serious injuries that kept him out for nearly a year each. Then, there's the years where he was taken off TV and sent somewhere for training. It's so strange to think that Henry could accumulate so many injuries and not just any injuries but very serious ones along with constant trips down to developmental yet still keep his job. It's well documented that it doesn't take much for Vince to write someone off as "injury prone" and then not take the risk of pushing them yet he didn't seem to be fazed with all of Henry's injuries and was still occasionally trying to get him over and not just as any wrestler but a main eventer who challenged for World Titles and main evented major Pay-Per-Views. Not to mention, WWE is like anything athletic with a minor league in that you usually get one shot in the minors and once you make it to the majors, you either succeed or you're out. Yet for some reason, Henry was allowed multiple trips down and WWE continued to employ him instead of view him as a lost cause. While Henry was justified in his 1997 training and even his first OVW run as he was very inexperienced, his later stuff was ridiculous. There was no excuse for Henry to have three more trips down to OVW after his first run ended in 2002 and it's insane that the guy was still training and working out there on and off all the way to December 2005, nearly four years after his first run ended and nine years after he signed with the WWE. Usually wrestlers have long been shown the door if they were in Henry's position. Regardless of whether you like Henry or not, you have to ask how poor one must be to get these opportunities and have to keep being sent down time and time again.
Yet another issue is the fact that let's say for the sake of argument that the Hall of Pain stuff and the fake retirement speech was great. The problem is that at the very most, that's 2 years out of 21. Out of 21 years, only 2 were great. There's really no words to say about that. How poor does someone have to be to work in the same place for 21 years and only 2 of those years could be considered good or 1 out of every 10 years? What's even sadder is if you really wanted to be specific, it's not even 2 years as Henry's 2011 Hall of Pain stuff began in April when he turned heel and was drafted to the Smackdown brand & then ended when he lost the World Heavyweight Championship to Daniel Bryan at the TLC: Tables, Ladders, & Chairs event that December so that was 8 months. Meanwhile, the fake retirement and John Cena feud was two months at most which means Henry's big moments only were 10 months. Another issue is that The Hall of Pain stuff was in 2011 which was 15 years into Henry's career. So it took Henry 15 years before he finally caught on. It's insane to think he was given this long to catch on when most don't last a fraction of that time. Even in regular jobs, employees aren't given 15 months let alone 15 years to get good at their job.
Finally, when you look at Henry's legacy, what does he really have to show after 21 years outside of the Hall of Pain stuff and the fake retirement speech? You would think he'd have some classic matches or promos under his belt but he doesn't. Even in 21 years, I don't think anyone could have a top five Mark Henry match or promo list. While it is true super heavyweights aren't always known for having classic matches, you'd think Henry would've had something, anything after being put in the ring with guys like The Rock to Shawn Michaels to Booker T to Kurt Angle to The Undertaker but outside of Survivor Series elimination matches or Royal Rumble matches, there's nothing. Not only that but he also came off lackluster even for Super Heavyweight standards. There are the super heavyweight types like Vader and The Undertaker who had plenty of classics and then there are super heavyweights like Yokozuna, Kane, Big Show, & King Mabel who showed excellent agility for their sizes and pulled off stuff you wouldn't see from guys who are 6'4 to 7'0 tall and 300 to 500 pounds. Henry wasn't even one of those super heavyweights who showed good agility and didn't do moves you wouldn't expect from a 400 pound wrestler. Even the fake retirement speech from 2013 seemed like a one hit wonder type thing as Henry never came close to hitting it out of the park before or ever again after that. Even worse is outside of those two good moments, Henry's most well known moments are bad. His lowlights include his Sexual Chocolate run which was one of the worst and cringeworthy things in the history of WWE's Attitude Era as it included Henry fondling a tranvestite, claiming to be a sex addict who had sex with his sister, and being in a relationship with the near 80 year old Mae Young which featured Henry impregnating her and Young giving birth to a hand. The Sexual Chocolate stuff was so bad that there's an urban legend that it was made because WWE desperately wanted out of the multi-million dollar deal they had with Henry so they created this gimmick to humiliate him so bad, he would quit. Then there was his main event at Royal Rumble 2006 where he was put with Kurt Angle and the match was such a bomb that fans were leaving as the match happened all the while Angle had one of the worst matches in his career. You know you're a poor wrestler when you not only have a bad match with Angle but drag him down. Then there were the times over the years especially towards the end where he wandered aimlessly constantly switching between babyface and heel to the point where both Lex Luger & The Big Show's heads would spin. There were all the tag teams he was thrown in that never got over and the main event feuds with Goldberg, Booker T, & The Undertaker which didn't catch on nor did his ECW Title reign.
You can like Mark Henry all your want or not like him but don't mistake his career as being great when it wasn't or that he's a worthy Hall of Famer when his induction is up there with Koko B. Ware and Hillbilly Jim which sets the bar of what qualifies to be one closer to sea level. Perhaps the best way to sum up Mark Henry's career and people celebrating it is the scene in the HBO made for TV movie "The Late Shift" when it's revealed Jay Leno will continue to host The Tonight Show right as David Letterman announces he's going to CBS and Leno tells the press "What were celebrating is I haven't been fired". Mark Henry might as well have said that in his Hall of Fame speech.
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