Several Top WWE Stars Name The Worst Bumps They Have Taken
It’s a painful job being WWE Superstar and some of the biggest names in the company are recalling the most painful bumps they’ve ever taken.
When it comes to competing in a WWE ring on a regular basis, it’s not an easy job. You are basically trusting the people you are in the ring with to take care of you…while they slam you on your back onto a hard surface. Sometimes those bumps take place outside of the ring too.
While critics of professional wrestling might mock the “fake” nature of the results of a match, there’s no way of minimizing how real the bumps are and how many wrestlers sustain significant injuries that will stick with them the rest of their lives.
To help promote today’s WWE Money in the Bank Premium Live Event that will see many wrestlers take bumps onto ladders and other painful objects, ESPN spoke to some of WWE’s biggest stars to recall the most painful bumps they have ever taken.
Braun Strowman, who is a former WWE Universal Champion, recalled taking a triple powerbomb that caused him a lot of pain.
“One of the worst bumps I ever took was when I got triple powerbombed by Bobby Lashley, Drew McIntyre and Baron Corbin in 2019. They were standing on top of the steel steps, and they powerbombed me through two tables. For some odd reason, that bump was just awful.”
“I think it was just because there was so much weight in the ring that it was already collapsed or compressed, so there was no give in it. And then them putting me just through the tables, I remember hitting the mat, and it felt like I hit concrete. It just stopped and knocked the breath out of me and everything. I was rolling around like a fish gasping for water.”
Current Undisputed WWE Tag Team Champion Kevin Owens thought of the big man Strowman when recalling a painful bump on the steel ramp.
“The chokeslam from Braun Strowman onto the steel ramp at SummerSlam 2018. I felt a ringing in my body for about four months after. I don’t know if anything was structurally wrong, but not long after, I took six months off. I don’t know if that was related, but it didn’t help. I felt that for a long time.”
Bayley, the former Raw & Women’s Smackdown Champion, picked her match against Bianca Belair at Crown Jewel 2022 for her worst bump moment.
“One of the worst ones I took was in Saudi Arabia last year when I had my Last Woman Standing match with Bianca Belair for the Raw Women’s Title. And it was just a suplex onto the ramp, the ramp that you walked down at the entrance. And that was one of the worst feelings I’ve ever had in wrestling. It just knocked the wind out of me. I don’t know what kind of ramp that was. I don’t know if I wasn’t ready for it or what, but it knocked the wind out of me. That was bad. I was not expecting that.”
“My lower back felt like it just crumbled, from my tailbone and halfway up my back. It was one of those where you could feel it in your thighs. It shifted down to my thighs. It felt like it shattered and I was thrown into a cement wall. It kind of lingered a little bit. I was limping slightly after that, but even Bianca said the same thing. I think she took a belly-to-belly suplex on the ramp and she’s like, “I don’t know what that was.” She was like, “I saw my soul leave my body.””
Best of luck to the WWE superstars competing in the Money in the Bank Ladder Matches and let’s hope they avoid taking the worst bumps of their careers.