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Recently, WWE conducted a live event in Knoxville City which had a peculiar end, to say the least.
At the end of the show, the interim face of the company, Seth Rollins invited his friend and colleague, Kane who also happens to be the mayor of Knox County, to come out for a $100,000 check presentation to Knoxville Public Safety Foundation.
This was surreal as Glenn Jacobs, for the first time in his 22 years of playing the twisted, demonic Kane, came out completely out of character at a WWE show to Kane's music (although, an older version) and went on with the presentation.
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This is peculiar as Kane is one of the most mystically protected characters with supernatural powers who is not expected to bring in his real life in his character work.
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Many speculated that this was indicative of Glenn Jacobs finally taking the call to hang up his wrestling boots after more than a quarter of a century of entertaining us.
Kane was always destined for a special place in the WWE Hall of Fame and the company has finally taken a call to induct the Big Red Machine into the 2021 WWE Hall of Fame.
Kane has always gone about doing his business in the ring with finesse but when we talk about all-time greats, he's not the first one on any fan's list.
Here are six reasons why the big red machine should be considered one of the greatest WWE Superstars of all time.
#6 Incredible Longevity
Glenn Jacobs has played different characters, namely Isaac Yankem DDS and Fake Diesel, long before Kane was conceptualized. The man has been in WWE since 1995 which makes it 23 plus years as a WWE Superstar.
The only wrestlers to eclipse this astonishing feat are his own kayfabe brother, The Undertaker with 28 years and Triple H with 23 years as well, but a few months more than Jacobs.
Ever since he became Kane in 1997, he has performed at a certain high level and has always been amongst the top few superstars.
Also, unlike Triple H and Undertaker, who became part-timers in 2010 and 2012 respectively, Jacobs was almost a full-time wrestler up until as late as 2016.
In that year, he competed in about a 100 televised and non-televised matches. This point has been elaborated later.
Kane has been a part of many dangerous match setups in the WWE over the years. Ranging from Inferno Matches to Street Fights and Hell in a Cell Bouts to Casket Matches, the big red machine has been a part of some of the most legendary feuds.
The fact that depsite putting his body on the line multiple times, Kane has managed to outlive his peers in the ring.
#5 Astonishing Set of Records and Ostensible Success as a WWE Superstar
We all know about Kane's Royal Rumble records for the most cumulative eliminations in 43 (44, if we count the elimination he made as Yankem) and his record for most Royal Rumble Match appearances in 17 (19 if we consider his appearances a Yankem and Diesel. However, there are a plethora of other records that the Devil's Favorite Demon holds.
As on 25th January 2018, he has competed in an astonishing 1763 matches, the most by any WWE/WWF superstar in history!
In fact, it is the highest total of matches for any non-Japanese wrestler. The closest to his gargantuan total is the Big Show with 1632 matches.
Also, talking of level of matches, Kane also holds the same record for most pay-per-view matches in WWE history with 175 followed by the Undertaker at 174.
This makes him one of the most prolific performers in WWE history. He also has the most WWE Raw appearances with 434 and the second-most number of WWE Smackdown appearances with 301.
Other records of his include being the first man to win all three of the WWE/F, World Heavyweight and ECW Championships, and the first man to cash in Money in the Bank on the very same night, which is still a record for fastest cash in.
All this has cemented his place in WWE history and the company would be unimaginable without him.
Over his two-decade-plus WWE career, he has won a championship on 18 different occasions. He is a two-time world champion, having won the WWF Championship from Stone Cold Steve Austin in 1998 and the World Heavyweight Championship from Rey Mysterio in 2010.
He is also a former ECW Champion, two-time Intercontinental Champion, Hardcore Champion, and an incredible twelve-time tag team Champion.
His total of 18 title belts makes him one of the most accomplished WWE superstars ever. Kane's character has also been much more than just championships.
There have been countless moments of devastation and sometimes humor which we all cherish over the years have more often than not involved Kane.
#4 A Very Good Wrestler for a Man his Size
When it comes to wrestling skills, many like to write off Kane as another average wrestler. However, it is unfair to use the same measuring stick while comparing the wrestling skills of someone like Kenny Omega and Big Show simply because of their sharp size contrast. Every kind of wrestler has a different role which is indispensable to the product.
Kane has almost always wrestled as a monster and has been very good at it. He is one of the best 'hot tag' wrestlers in history; ideal for cleaning house.
Kane, despite being built as a seven foot tall 323-pound monster, performed a flying clothesline from the top rope in almost every match he was a part of up until 2016!
Going back to his prime, Kane would perform leaps over the top rope and even once performed a flying clothesline off the top of a steel cage. That is splendid athleticism for a man his size.
Also, talking of strength, Kane is known to be one of the functionally strongest and most stable wrestlers.
This has been acknowledged by legends such as Big Show, the Undertaker, and even Stone Cold Steve Austin. It is said that a wrestler wrestling Kane is assured of his safety as he is known to have one of the safest pairs of hands and feet in the business.
And Kane, despite his continuous schedule with WWE has managed to almost never get seriously injured in his career. All this speaks volumes of how efficient Kane has been as a wrestler.
#3 Extraordinary Perseverance and Astonishing Versatility
Kane personifies the word perseverance. When we talk about Kane we remember the lackluster storylines he was made to endure.
Over his two-decade-plus career, he has been a part of some of the company's worst angles. Things only got worse with his repackaging as fake Diesel and thankfully WWE came up with an incredible Kane gimmick for him.
Even as the iconic Kane, bad storylines have not eluded him.
The story involving Lita and Snitsky was hardly any better. Apart from this, Kane has been involved in several badly received rivalry's such as the Embrace the Hate rivalry with John Cena and his rivalry with Big Daddy V.
But what is remarkable is that even after enduring all this, Kane managed to come out of it, stay relevant and still be over with the fans each and every time.
Even today he is cheered as a baby face. Compare this to other wrestlers whose careers never recovered after one horrible storyline, most notably Mohammad Hassan.
It's not just bad bookings which have hung around with Kane, but a lot of undue criticism as well. He seems to be the favorite punching bag for wrestling critics online.
Kane being booked for defeat by Finn Balor at a time when WWE was hyping Kane up just to feed him to Braun Strowman and emphasizing the need for Demon King Finn Balor in the Bray Wyatt storyline was somehow his fault.
His place in the Triple Threat for the Universal Championship at Royal Rumble in 2018, albeit only to take the fall, also led to a lot of criticism for the man.
This is just the tip of the iceberg for the amount of undue criticism and lack of respect Kane gets.
Irrespective of all this, Kane never complains about it and remains unfazed and unaffected and does his work as well as he can. He is also one of the very few WWE superstars to have never bad mouthed the company.
A lot of this can be owed to his remarkable versatility and ability to change with time. He has been in the main event several times and has also been the opening match on many occasions.
Whether WWE needs a monster heel main eventer, a monstrous tag team, a funny tag team, a babyface, upper mid-carder babyface big guy or a corporate figure, Kane has always been the go-to guy.
He has had incredible variety in his tag team partners as well. They include a wide range of wrestlers such as Rob Van Dam, Daniel Bryan, Mankind, X Pac, The Hurricane, The Big Show and obviously the Undertaker.
Nobody in the nineties would have imagined that Kane would be the comedy guy on the show or would turn into a suit-wearing authority figure, but Glenn Jacobs the fearless experimenter did it all successfully.
What's astonishing is that he always managed to stay true to the origins of his character despite its numerous incarnations and even today Kane can morph into the monster he is known to be when required.
#2 A Gem of A Person in Real Life
Kane's WWE.com bio describes him as a monstrous abomination from our childhood's worst nightmares.
However, the real-life Glenn Jacobs could not have been more different. He is known to be one of the most humble, laid back, easy to befriend and also one of the most well-read individuals the business has ever seen.
He is one of the most respected veterans in the locker room. Even high profile wrestlers who leave the WWE and bad mouth the company and its people have only good things to say about this man.
CM Punk said he loved working with Kane and the matches were quite easy. Ryback hailed him as a very respected figure in the locker room and said that Kane would give him useful investment advice.
Cody Rhodes also once said that he would like to model his backstage attitude after Kane, whether it's Vince McMahon himself or a random fan on the street, all should be treated respectfully.
Even outside wrestling, Glenn Jacobs regularly indulges in a plethora of humanitarian activities. He is the chief donor of Knox County Children's Hospital and pays regular visits to the place.
He and his wife also operate a trust known as Kane's Crusaders, which aims to enhance the lives of sick children in Knox County.
Apart from the humanitarian he is, Glenn Jacobs is also a very knowledgeable person who can speak relevant content on a variety of civil and political topics.
He identifies himself as a libertarian and used to spread his views in a blog called 'the adventures of citizen X'.
Despite being a professional wrestler and carrying the stereotypes that came with it, Kane was successful in his hard-running campaign to convince people who elected him as mayor of Knox County. The huge positive reaction he got at the recent Knoxville live event proves how good a mayor he is.
His personal life is also as quiet as it gets. Despite being a high profile celebrity wrestler, Kane has been happily married for almost 23 years now.
A gentle giant outside the wrestling industry and a force to be reckoned with when inside the ring.
#1 A True Professional
It would not be wrong to call Glenn Jacobs the greatest glorified jobber of all time. This is to be perceived in a positive sense though.
Kane, despite being one of the best thought of characters in history, was never supposed to be ' the guy' or anything remotely close to it.
Right from day one, he has been used to put the top stars over. This is something he has always selflessly obliged to do and in my opinion is the best in the world at it. Despite this, he has never faded out into irrelevance.
He has always reinvented himself to stay relevant in different eras of the company. Even today, a victory over Kane means a lot, which is a testament to his success.
He has helped create generations of stars; starting from The Rock to Triple H and John Cena.
Even something as recent as the S.H.I.E.L.D owes a lot of the phenomenal success it had to Kane, who did perhaps more than anybody to put the faction members over.
Even wrestlers who did not become top stars such as The Great Khali, Snitsky and many others who came and went were selflessly put over by Kane.
Now, an argument can be made that Kane was simply doing his job to earn a living but what is remarkable is that he has managed to maintain a certain level even after putting so many people over.
Others of his type start of as monster heels and are soon reduced to comedy acts and fall to the undercard and then let go off.
However, Kane has never lost his relevance. Yes, he is and should not be the unstoppable monster he once was, but he still holds enough credibility to the main event, a WWE pay-per-view and several Raw and Smackdown shows in even 2018.
The only complaint rational fans would have from Kane's legendary career is that he should have been more selfish and demanding.
Despite his undeniable talents, endurance and professionalism, he has never been in the main event of WrestleMania or won a Royal Rumble match.
Kane has also mentored some of the wrestlers during his tenure with the WWE, and guys like Braun Strowman do credit him for the help The Big Red Machine has provided over the years.
This, however, speaks volumes of the man's selflessness and sheer will to help others. He has indeed been the backbone of the WWE.
Even in the absolute twilight of his career, he remains to be an indispensable asset to WWE and we should all be grateful to him for giving us years of entertainment.
