Just about every wrestling fan in the world knows full well of Vince McMahon’s unwritten rule - if he didn’t create it he doesn’t want it on his TV. The more intellectual properties the WWE can copyright, the fewer superstars can take their creations elsewhere - especially since for the most part “their” creation is generally a collaboration between the WWE Creative Team and the superstar.
Related: Why Is WWE Continuing The Seth Rollins / Cody Rhodes Feud?
But there are actually a handful of superstars over the years that were able to take a character they used to get over elsewhere to the WWE. Considering that for a lot of these superstars they made their way to the WWE based on these characters, perhaps you might as well let them try to get them over with the WWE machine behind them.
10 Triple H Was A Blueblood In WCW & WWE
One of the few members of this list and beyond it that wasn’t over like gangbusters was actually Triple H. In WCW he had been Jean-Paul Levesque a French Aristocrat who was better than everyone and walked around with his abnormally large schnoz in the air looking down on the common folk. When he arrived in WWE, only a few tweaks were made to make JPL into HHH, a Connecticut aristocrat.
9 The Rockers Were High Energy High Flyers In AWA & WWE
Both Shawn Michaels and Marty Jannetty were treading water in the territories until they came together as yet another Rock And Roll Express redux. This version were The Midnight Rockers and used Judas Priest’s “After Midnight” as a theme song to go straight to the top of the AWA.
Related: A Look Back At The Rockers: The Original Tag Team Of Shawn Michaels & Marty Jannetty
When they arrived in WWE for their second stint (after being fired from their first one after a day), The Rockers ascended to new heights, using the same gimmick that for them to the top of the AWA.
8 Samoa Joe Is Mean Fighting Machine In ROH, Impact & WWE
For over twenty years, Samoa Joe has been The Samoan Submission Machine. Whenever he went, whatever promotion he headed to, Joe was a massive force able to tap out anyone at any point in time. He was also one of the first of this generation of stars to come to NXT and not have to be repackaged and renamed. Even though Vince McMahon clearly didn’t buy into the hype, he was able to at least retain his look and a version of his theme song.
7 Sting Was The Crow In WCW, Impact, WWE & AEW
Once he felt betrayed by his friends in WCW, The Stinger declared himself a free agent and retreated to the rafters and scaffoldings in WCW arenas around the world. He then became an avenging vigilante that we’d all come to love even more than “Surfer Sting.” “Crow Sting,” as fans eventually would call him has shown up in every major wrestling promotion for the past four decades, and The Stinger doesn’t seem to be slowing down at all and still finding higher scaffoldings to leap from into opponents alongside Darby Alin in AEW.
6 Raven Was A Grunge Icon In ROH, ECW, WCW & WWE
For years, Scott Levy had been perfecting the art of being a smarmy, cocky, weaselly type of heel as Scotty The Body or Johnny Polo or Johnny Flamingo. But the bird gimmick that Levy is most associated with is Raven.
Related: 10 Things You Forgot About The Raven / Diamond Dallas Page Rivalry
The morose and sullen grunge wrestler was tailor-made for ECW. After making his way through both ECW and WCW, he was able to head to WWE, where he became the winningest Hardcore Champion of all time.
5 The Dudley Boys Were Table Hungry Lunatics In ECW & WWE
When Big Daddy Dudley traversed the Kayfabe landscape, he would bed down a lady in every territory he even landed in. Each Dudley Boy born was stranger looking than the last, until ECW fans were introduced to Bubba Ray and Devon. The duo was able to carve a path for themselves throughout all of ECW on their way to the WWE. Other than the shift from tie-dye to camouflage, those damn Dudleys were able to take their gimmick to the WWE with them.
4 The Road Warriors Went To WWE, WCW & Everywhere Else As Bad Ass Bruisers
While you could repackage and rename plenty of the names on this list if you really had to, does any fan on the planet actually want to see The Road Warriors be anything but The Road Warriors?! Hawk and Animal changed the game for tag team wrestling. In a world where two smaller guys formed a technical unit, The Legion Of Doom were two hulking behemoths that could knock your head off and then smash it back on for fun.
3 Ric Flair Has Been Ric Flair For Decades Across Impact, WWE & WCW
Just like The Road Warriors, no one in their right mind wanted to see Ric Flair be anything but the styling and profiling Nature Boy! But clearly Jim Herd wasn’t in his right mind. After trying to get Flair to chop off his hair and be rebranded Spartacus, he opted to head to the WWE and do exactly what he had been doing for years - being The Man!
2 Cody Rhodes Is The American Nightmare In WWE, AEW, ROH & NJPW
It just six years the former Stardust was able to prove to Vince McMahon and the entire world that Cody Rhodes wasn’t only “Smoke And Mirrors.” In the time Rhodes spent away from the WWE, he became the NWA champion, helped to reinvigorate The Bullet Club, and start AEW.
Related: 10 Things WWE Wants You To Forget About Cody Rhodes
He has more than shown that the grandstanding Cody Rhodes has done as a character more than works and was the second-loudest ovation WrestleMania 38 heard and would have been the biggest has a certain Rattlesnake not come out of retirement.
1 Cactus Jack Spilled Blood Across WWE, WCW & IWA Japan
In a unique twist, Cactus Jack arrived to the WWE a little after Mick Foley did. After a little over a year working as Mankind, it was revealed to be just a persona for Mick Foley, with Dude Love and Cactus Jack being the others. The hardcore icon got to make his WWE debut in the most inventive ways and easily one of the most iconic Raws of all time - the first time Raw was at MSG.
