Everyone goes into a romantic relationship with the understanding that it may end in heartbreak. When over 50% of marriages end in divorce, it hardly comes as a surprise to see a love crash and burn. But Bromances are a different story altogether. When two people become bros, they enter a sacred pact that is supposed to last a lifetime.
In the WWE bros can help each other soar to new heights. Whether in a tag team or just a group that wears matching shirts, bros stand side by side to watch each others back and fend off all enemies. That is why when the pact of a bromance is broken it can be absolutely devastating.
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During the height of his reign over the WWE, Stone Cold Steve Austin lived by three very simple letters – D.T.A. which meant Don’t Trust Anybody. Austin knew that in the WWE, opening your heart to friendship almost always ended in heartbreak. Unfortunately, not every superstar was wise enough to heed his warning.
Time and time again superstars would join forces to accomplish a bigger goal, but in a business where everyone is hunting for the same prize, relationships often get tossed aside for personal gain.
As we saw this year on RAW, Chris Jericho let himself get too close to a man who he thought was his best friend forever and it ended up getting him sent to the hospital. Kevin Owens’ betrayal was one of the most heart wrenching segments we’ve ever seen in the WWE, but it where does it rank on the all time list?
Scroll down to see the five most devastating bro breakups in WWE history.
5. Jeff and Matt Hardy
It’s one thing to be betrayed by a friend, but when your own brother domes you in the head with a chair, that’s messed up. Matt Hardy cost his brother and long time tag team partner, Jeff Hardy, the WWE Championship when he interferred in Jeff’s championship match against Edge. Just as it appeared Matt was there to help Jeff even the score, he viciously attacked him and left him ripe for Edge to score the victory. Perhaps this was the beginning of the DELETION of Matt Hardy’s soul. Luckily for us, the Hardy’s would eventually patch things up and become a hilariously strange and BROKEN tag team in Impact Wrestling.
4. Seth Rollins Turns On The Shield
The hardest part about The Shield breaking up was the realization that we wouldn’t get to see The Shield together anymore. The Shield had just destroyed Evolution the night before and claimed their throne as the greatest trio in the WWE. So with every treacherous Seth Rollins chair shot, we knew that life would never be the same. The Shield came into the WWE as brothers. Bros before
3. Hulk Hogan and Randy Savage
If you were anywhere between the ages of 5-15 during the late 1980s, the Mega Powers were likely the two most important people in your life not named mom or dad. And if, like me, your parents made it through the 80s as a unit, the separation of the Mega Powers was likely the hardest thing you ever went through as a child.
The actual “explosion” of the Mega Powers happened on an episode of The Main Event. Months of rising tensions between the two biggest stars in the company reached its boiling point following a heated tag team match against the Twin Towers (Akeem and the Big Boss Man). Macho Man had enough of Hulk Hogan being, well, Hulk Hogan around his lady and that infamous Savage jealousy finally erupted.
After an entire year of build up, the Mega Powers would go onto settle their differences at Wrestlemania 5 and we, the bastard children they left behind, would be forced to live the rest of our lives afraid to love or to ever be loved. Afraid to trust or ever be trusted. And forever afraid to combine our powers in any mega sorta way whatsoever with another human being.
2. Chris Jericho and Kevin Owens
The wounds of this Bro-Breakup are still a little too fresh to discuss. Like squeezing a lemon on a paper cut, just typing about the end of team JeriKO is giving me a painful burning sensation. We all knew they were heading for a Wrestlemania confrontation. We knew IT! But still, when Chris Jericho poured his heart out to Kevin in such an earnest way, it took us out of our comfortable kayfabe zone and led us to a place of sincere admiration for the wonderful year Owens and Jericho have had together.
Everything good must come to an end and so it was with JeriKO. Thanks to this bro-breakup we’ll never look at our own best friends the same AGAIN.
1. Marty Jannetty and Shawn Michaels
Still the OG of Bro-breakups, the infamous barber shop window incident of 1992 stands the test of time. Looking back, HBK’s all black attire should have been a dead giveaway, but as kids, we foolishly still believed that The Rockers could still play the same tune.
After months of build up it appeared Marty and Shawn were back on the same page when they were guests on Brutus Beefcake’s “The Barber Shop” talk show. They bro-hugged and Shawn triumphantly raised Marty’s hand. The Rockers were ready to keep rockin’. And that’s when Shawn Michaels officially turned into the Heartbreak Kid. Shawn hit Marty Jannetty with a superkick that, to this day, Marty says landed pretty damn flush on his chin. Then, adding insult and more injury to injury, Shawn would send Marty crashing through the barber shop window.
Jannetty would never fully recover. He would attempt a feud with HBK, but the fans just didn’t care. He would also attempt to recapture the Rocker magic as the New Rockers with Leif Cassady (Al Snow), but fans would care even less
To this day, I still get nervous anytime I walk by a barbershop.
