The 10 worst WWE superstars of 2017

When professional wrestling is at its best, it's very, very good. It's a unique spectacle and entertainment form that can't be found anywhere else. When it's bad, it's abysmal. Unfortunately, WWE is bipolar in that regard. We're just as likely, if not slightly more, to get complete trash rather than genuine entertainment.

These 10 superstars were often a part of that. Whether through bad booking or their own lack of talent, they consistently failed to entertain an audience. Seeing them on TV was painful and they need a new direction.

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#10 The Big Show

The ingredients of a dull, dull, summer.

Aside from his memorable matches with Braun Strowman, The Big Show's 2017 wasn't particularly notable in the ways he would want. When not feuding with the Monster Among Men, he was a forgettable part of WWE programming. The nadir came when he was stuck in a terrible feud with Big Cass throughout the summer, where he starred in many channel-changing matches and segments.

With his recent talks of joining the commentary team, his in-ring future is up in the air. It can't be said that WWE would lose a big asset if 2017 was indeed the Big Show's last campaign.

#9 Big Cass

Sadly, he has not been missed.

RAW was very hot over the summer, with Monday nights spearheaded by the main event scene starring Braun Strowman, Roman Reigns, Samoa Joe, and a semi-present Brock Lesnar. There was one part of the show that was the pits, though.

That was the feud between Enzo, Big Show, and Big Cass. Consistently channel-changing bile, it was dark, 50/50 tedium throughout, culminating in a terrible match at SummerSlam. Cass would tear his ACL the next night on RAW.

While Enzo would go on to reinvent himself as the top heel in the charisma-starved Cruiserweight division and thereby become the shark in a small pond, Big Cass' run was much gloomier. Without the personality of Enzo or the ring skills to make up for this deficiency, Big Cass dragged down everything he was a part of as a solo act.

Though I wish him the best, I, unfortunately, can't say that his return in 2018 is something I'm looking forward to.

#8 Baron Corbin

The wrong man won.

Nicknamed "Boring Corbin" by a cohort of fans, Baron Corbin didn't exactly do much to shake off the epithet. Widely regarded as the wrong choice to win the Money in the Bank contract, WWE higher-ups only seemed to get the message a while later, where he failed his cash-in against Jinder Mahal in the most embarrassing way possible. His subsequent loss to John Cena at SummerSlam signified to everyone that his main event push was over for the foreseeable future.

Corbin would go on to win the United States Championship in October, but his reign would only last two months, where he dropped the title to Dolph Ziggler of all people at Clash of Champions. It was a very forgettable title reign. A year from now, it's doubtful anyone remembers a thing about it.

This type of start-stop push has never helped anyone, and Baron Corbin was bland before that vicious cycle started. It's hard to see where he goes from here.

#7 Alexa Bliss

Little Miss Bliss has numerous terrible moments to her name in 2017. She's pushed to the moon but doesn't get a pass.

Imagine for a moment that a comic you liked to read suddenly got a new character. There was nothing inherently wrong with this character, but the narrative the comic was telling suddenly began to change as a result.

What started as an enthralling, layered story with an exposition of intriguing characters suddenly began to change and become one-dimensional, with everything revolving around the new character, resulting in numerous confusing plot holes, more than a few terrible volumes, and the subtraction of the traits that made all the other characters that you liked interesting.

This is the Alexa Bliss push in a nutshell. While the dynamic was in place on SmackDown, it accelerated to light speed on RAW. She's had an excellent year personally, but her gain has left the rest of the RAW women's division a ruin.

Alexa's arrival on Monday nights stopped the looming Sasha heel turn in its tracks. She would quickly go on to humiliate Bayley and end her brief run as a well-liked babyface. Alexa would then make Sasha look like a choke artist because, she, for some reason, needed to drop the title for a paltry eight days, would wind up hamstringing Nia Jax's momentum as well, and go on to have a trite feud with Mickie James.

The biggest problem with Alexa Bliss is that her talents have been misapplied in her push. Despite her excellent mic work, she has more than a few terrible segments to her name. The month-old stint of Mickie James being an "old lady" was eye-rolling on night one, and obviously, there was Bayley: This is Your Life. Frankly, very few of Alexa's segments or promos were genuinely entertaining.

Neither were most of Alexa's matches. She's average in the ring, and though she's improved, her offence is unconvincing. Seeing women like Charlotte sell for her for 70% of the match just feels wrong.

Hopefully, Alexa can continue to improve. She has the requisite skill set to be entertaining, but the execution needs to be better. Hopefully, that improved execution will begin with a fresh start for 2018 with Alexa dropping the title and letting Paige and Asuka rebuild the division as the New Year unfolds.

#6 Bayley

A rapid fall.

No woman in WWE has had a worse year than Bayley. 2017 started off with so much promise for her and ends with her barely being an afterthought. Aside from her great match with Charlotte in February, there's not much to brag about for Bayley's 2017.

Following her dismal Kendo Stick on a Pole match where she looked like an idiot, all of Bayley's buzz disappeared. She's since meandered anonymously. Even a return from injury didn't do much for her.

Bayley is a talented in-ring performer, but many others in her division are. Unlike Alexa Bliss, Bayley can't be relied on to carry a segment on the mic, especially with WWE's typically atrocious writing. Without good booking, her vulnerabilities are terribly exposed, and no one got a more terible booking in the women's division this year than her.

A serious rebuild will need to be in order to recover Bayley's ability to entertain next year. An eventual move to Tuesday nights might do her some good.

#5 Shinsuke Nakamura

Starting off cold.

Shinsuke Nakamura's durability has proven itself. He remains amazingly over as 2017 concludes, despite a year that was notable only in how disappointing it was for him.

Arriving with much fanfare, Shinsuke Nakamura was quickly inserted in go-nowhere feuds with Dolph Ziggler and Baron Corbin. Following these, any remaining excitement was extinguished when Nakamura was sacrificed to Jinder Mahal's disastrous main event push.

Through it all, he proved that he can't always be relied on to put on good matches, his aura diminished. He was also often put in promos despite his being at times difficult to comprehend. Thankfully, these segments diminished as the year neared its end.

Shinsuke Nakamura and his fans must be casting hopeful eyes to 2018, believing that better things are on the horizon. If there were a Slammy for "Most Disappointing Superstar," Shinsuke Nakamura would take it.

#4 Jason Jordan

The next generation of not so great.

Take a superstar and insert him into an illegitimate child story in 2017. Pay no attention to his lack of charisma or mic skills to get a heavily handicapped storyline over, either. Also make sure he's black, so that Kurt Angle, the "father" in the story, can be the butt of a joke.

It's all a perfect example of how out of touch Vince McMahon can be, and unfortunately, Jason Jordan was the victim of his perennially poor creative instincts. The angle of Jason Jordan being Kurt Angle's illegitimate son was dead on arrival. Jordan would soon become an object of universal derision and end 2017 as the most hated man on the WWE roster.

Thankfully, creative started seeing the writing on the wall near Survivor Series, and a slow-burn heel turn is in the works. Taking the heat and making him as annoying as possible, Jason Jordan has the potential to be one of 2018's breakouts as one of the hottest heels in the company.

Yet, that probably wasn't the plan at the beginning, and it's been a dreadful experience watching him get to this point.

#3 Randy Orton

Randy Orton's 2017 was a true house of horrors.

Randy Orton might just be the happiest man on the WWE roster to see 2017 go. It's been the worst year of his illustrious career.

He began the year with a dreadful feud with Bray Wyatt and seamlessly transitioned into another one which saw him on the losing end to Jinder Mahal. Of the 10 worst matches of 2017, Randy Orton featured in three of them, and all of those three were in the top five.

Randy Orton existed on SmackDown as something of a zombie this year. Routinely phoning in performances, it often looked like he didn't care, though that's easy to understand given how bad his booking has been. Unfortunately, far more entertaining superstars like Rusev got caught in his crosshairs to make up for his cataclysmic first half of the year.

It didn't help that Randy Orton was a babyface in 2017 when he's far more natural as a heel. I'm sure he'd love to turn in 2018.

#2 Bray Wyatt

Dumpster fire.

Even by his standards, Bray Wyatt was horrible in 2017, and keep in mind that this was the year that saw him win his first WWE Championship and headline WrestleMania for the blue brand. The match was a disaster, with the LED creepy crawlies being lambasted by everyone who saw it.

He would go on to follow that performance with the abortion called the House of Horrors Match. His victory didn't do him much, as he would go on to have a forgettable, rambling feud with Seth Rollins and then follow up the act with one of the worst feuds of the year with Finn Balor.

Surpassing his own standards for terrible once again, that was when we saw the reveal of Sister Abigail as a split personality of Bray dressed in drag and even WWE's propaganda machine couldn't hide the laughs from the crowd. A viral infection intervened and WWE has attempted to erase the segment from memory, but something that stupid isn't easy to forget.

If WWE wonders why even its own fans admit to watching it more as a guilty pleasure than something to brag about, their higher-ups need to look no further than Bray Wyatt.

#1 Jinder Mahal

The universe trolled.

Years from now, when wrestling fans are asked to name the worst thing about WWE in 2017, the decision to put the WWE Championship on Jinder Mahal will be what they remember first. Other terrible decisions stand out now because of recency bias, but this is going to be the one that stands the test of time.

Done as part of a play to increase business in India, Jinder Mahal went from perennial jobber to world champion in a month. It was sloppily done, with no build or any kind of payoff. With no reason to get invested in him, fans regarded the decision as a gigantic troll rather than a legitimate title reign, and that feeling held throughout.

It didn't help that Jinder Mahal's abilities were far beneath his push. He was a jobber for a reason, and by being pushed as champion, he brought the title down with him. Contributing to Randy Orton's terrible year and damaging Shinsuke Nakamura, Jinder Mahal's title reign was a dark, torturous experience, filled to the brim with abysmal matches and segments, including the infamous Mr Miyagi dig at Nakamura.

Finally, when no one was enthusiastic about the scheduled Jinder Mahal vs. Brock Lesnar match at Survivor Series and with still no evidence that the needle was moved on the Indian market, the long overdue pulling of the plug happened on November 7th, with AJ Styles liberating the championship. It was a very good birthday present for this fan.

With his subsequent loss to Triple H in India and tapout at Clash of Champions in his rematch, we can all breathe a sigh of relief and safely declare Jinder's main event push over.

No upside. Six months down the drain. Jinder Mahal and his torturous title reign will live long infamy. His peak was SmackDown's deepest, darkest, valley.