WWE: Big Show is Crushing ‘Please Retire’ Chants in Style

The days of Big Show receiving “please retire” chants are long gone.

From 2013 to 2016, the presence of Big Show on WWE TV incited boos, groaning, and worst of all, the “please retire” chants he’d receive from the crowd. He had lingered around the WWE’s upper mid-card for most of this time, which had arguments ranging from his in-ring work being slow, or he was taking a spot away from someone else.

Typically, Superstars shake off things like this from the crowd. While Show himself has never said these chants have rattled him, John Cena recently told TMZ that the chants “hit [Big Show] close” and that he’s out to prove something at WrestleMania 33.

Cena is referring to the eye-popping transformation of the World’s Largest Athlete, who is below 400 pounds. This video from December 2015 will show just how big he used to be:

Only 14 months later, he now has abs and may be in the best shape of his long wrestling career:

The work ethic to get to this point is incredible. We don’t know how often Big Show has been training to get like this, but it looks like months of nonstop work to prolong his career and prove everyone wrong. Based on what happened on Monday’s episode of Raw, he may have just done that.

Must Read: WrestleMania 33 Card Projections 7.0; Post-Elimination Chamber

For about seven days, WWE had hyped up Show vs. Braun Strowman. These two had a brawl during the 2017 Royal Rumble match, leading to Strowman eliminating the former World Heavyweight champion. WWE waited three weeks to have this one-on-one created, but based on what was seen, the wait was worth it.

From their previous encounter at the Royal Rumble, the Staples Center fans were clearly excited with their “this is awesome” chants just as the bell rang for the match. When would you have expected to hear something like that in anything Big Show did in 2017, or even again? Keep in mind that this bout main evented Raw too.

This 10-plus minute match received about 12 minutes and gave Show perhaps his best performance in nearly two years. He made Strowman look like a star, which seemed like the obvious goal here. From kicking out of both the chokeslam and KO punch, both of which had been protected well, it made the Monster Among Men look indestructible.

Show isn’t going to be main eventing Raw every week and probably won’t play a major role for the rest of his WWE career, but if he can look as good as he did on Monday night, there’s little reason not to keep him around. It’s not always going to be against the future top big men like Strowman, as WWE can put him into tag matches, and even have him work undercard feuds for pay-per-views. The brand split has thinned out the bottom of Raw’s roster, leading to some unappealing matches being made for the Sunday specials. Maybe we see Show sneak onto something like Fastlane or a post-WrestleMania show and become a bigger part of these events.

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The only disparaging part of this is the match with Shaquille O’Neal that no longer looks like it will happen. We haven’t seen WWE build this celebrity bout on TV, only with these two trading social media barbs. This has stopped over the past few weeks and was followed up by Cageside Seats’ rumor roundup, noting the idea of Show vs. Shaq happening in going away.

For all that the long-time WWE star has done to get ready for this match, only to see it not happen, would be disappointing. The reason for this didn’t get revealed, but as soon as two weeks ago, the Wrestling Observer reported this match being set for WrestleMania 33. They had built this as far back as WrestleMania 32 in April 2016.

If this match doesn’t happen, then don’t be surprised to see Show placed in the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal for the fourth straight year. With Strowman also not having a singles matchup in the cards at the Show of Shows, maybe these two square up again.

Next: 20 Early Predictions for WrestleMania 33

Even with the potentially negative development, the work Big Show has done to shed the “please retire” chants, culminating with his match on Raw, has been incredible. At 45-years-old, he’s found a way to transform himself and may have extended his in-ring career with WWE.