#3 The Rock
Today, he is the most electrifying man in sports entertainment. He is the People's Champion and has captured several championships, including the WWE Championship and Intercontinental Championship. However, with all this success, it is easy to forget where it started.
He debuted with WWE at the 1996 Survivor Series, under the name Rocky Maivia. The name was a hybrid of his father and maternal grandfather's names, not unlike Curtis Axel, whose in-ring name is also from his father and grandfather's names. The Rock's father is Rocky Johnson, and his grandfather was Peter Maivia.
Rocky Maivia brought immediate energy, with his brightly coloured attire and flashy athleticism. He was immediately called a ‘blue chipper,' a label given to talented young athletes with a great deal of upside, as in ‘blue chip prospect.' Looking back, there is no similarity between the Rocky Maivia character and who The Rock eventually became.
However, while Rocky Maivia may be a distant memory, the WWE debut of the performer, whose real name is Dwayne Johnson, was as part of a traditional four-on-four match-up. It was at Survivor Series that we first smelled what The Rock is cooking.
