WWE News: Big Show In Best Shape Of His Career Heading Into ‘WrestleMania 33’
Although the match that The Big Show will be having at WrestleMania 33 is not a blockbuster attraction, he is surely training as if it is the biggest match of his career. Recently, Big Show has been posting photos of his amazing physical transformation while getting into the best shape of his life.
Recently turning 45 years old, the multi-time WWE and WCW World Heavyweight Champion has not hidden the fact that he is on the verge of hanging up his boots. However, he has been training hard for his bout against Shaquille O’Neal on the biggest stage of the year.
Historically, Big Show has experienced a very subpar WrestleMania record, especially against celebrities. For some reason, WWE has made him the resident fall guy for outsiders.
At WrestleMania 21 Big Show faced Akebono in a sumo match. Somehow WWE thought that having an actual sumo match would draw interest to the spectators in Los Angeles, California, and the ones watching at home. However, it flopped, as Big Show lasted a little over one minute.
WhatCulture commented on the debacle that occurred in 2005.
“The abomination that was the Sumo match between Big Show and Akebono in 2005 at WrestleMania 21 belonged nowhere near the biggest show of the year. It was a flawed concept designed to put the world renowned, “celebrity” sumo wrestler in the spotlight. The only problem? No one cared. See, pro wrestling fans appreciate pro wrestling, not sumo. So the 15 minutes of television time that was used up for the entrances, ceremonial stuff and the match itself were wasted on an audience who did not want to see it.”
Shortly after, Big Show would go on to win the WWE Tag Team Championships with Kane. He would eventually become the ECW champion and a dominant heel while aligning with Paul Heyman. However, due to Big Show having weight issues, he departed from the main roster for a period of time. During this time, he got into much better shape, losing over 100 pounds, and returned to commence another celebrity feud with boxing star Floyd Mayweather.
As with Akebono, Big Show once again stepped out of his comfort zone to fight a boxer. Big Show even gave Mayweather the go-ahead to break his nose, according to The Sun. The reason behind this is due to his belief that the fans would get more emotionally invested as a result. Unfortunately, for Big Show, he suffered the same fate as he did with Akebono. At WrestleMania XXIV, he lost to Mayweather.
The feud between Shaq and The Big Show has been brewing for quite some time. In 2009, Shaq was the guest host of Raw and filled the role of outside referee during the tag team match between Jeri-Show and Cryme Tyme. Big Show called out Shaq, prompting him to come into the ring. After both men attempted to chokeslam each other, Cryme Tyme assisted in Shaq bulldozing Big Show out of the ring.
Last year, at WrestleMania 32, the two locked horns again during the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal.
The match between the Big Show and Shaquille O’Neal has been in the works for WrestleMania since their confrontation in 2016. WWE reported O’Neal calling out Big Show during his time at the gym to make it official. Since then, Big Show has been posting pictures of himself getting in tremendous shape in preparation for this showdown.
.@Shaq! Karaoke? Doughnuts? You better get serious. All roads lead to @WrestleMania. The only giant! pic.twitter.com/5uX4EUyXVF
— Paul Wight (@PaulWight) February 9, 2017
Most recently, Big Show posted a picture of him in perhaps the best shape of his career to further hype the face-off.
While there is has been very little hype recently for this match other than social media pictures and videos, the upcoming match between The Big Show and Shaq will add to the celebrity factor that comes with WrestleMania. While Big Show has quite an embarrassing record in his history against celebrities at WrestleMania, he hopes to turn that around come April 2 in Orlando.
[Featured Image By WWE]
