Shane McMahon and the Most Shocking Returns to Raw in WWE History

When Shane McMahon bounced down the entrance ramp in his oversized red sneakers on Monday's WWE Raw, Stephanie McMahon's expression mirrored the audience's. Her jaw fell. She turned to her father in stunned disbelief.

Shane-O-Mac's appearance on Raw was simply one of the most shocking moments in the show's history.

The Rock, Ric Flair and Brock Lesnar have surprised the audience with their own unexpected returns. Shane's moment is right up there with those in terms of shock value. Like Lesnar and The Rock, it seemed that he had moved on from WWE forever.

Ranking the most unexpected Raw returns ever requires one to consider a number of factors.

The length of time between a performer's last appearance adds to the surprise. How much one could have expected him or her to arrive is important. Whether there were rumors about the return affect its place on the list, too. The volume level of the pop that a returning wrestler received is also an indicator of just how blown away the audience was. 

Showing up out of nowhere a la Shane-O-Mac trumps a return from injury. Seth Rollins coming back in a few months may be a surprise, but if Goldberg were to show up some Monday night, it would be absolutely mind-blowing.

All that helps us place Shane's comeback in a greater historical context.

Honorable Mention

• Triple H (2002)
• Chris Jericho (2007)
• The Rock (2014)

A torn quad kept The Game off TV for months. The Invasion storyline came and went without him. And then at Madison Square Garden in early 2002, Triple H marched back into the ring on Raw.

Fans roared for the unannounced arrival. It was unexpected since it wasn't clear how long he'd be out. But the audience knew to expect him back at some point, as opposed to wrestlers who had left the company before showing up on Raw again.

The level of surprise one had about Jericho's 2007 return varied. WWE had been showing an encrypted message onscreen in the weeks leading up to his comeback. Some fans had to have deciphered the code or at least made an educated guess that this was about Jericho.

Y2J had been gone for two years when he came back, with fans unsure if he was done with wrestling. That made his showing up an eye-opening surprise, unless one had pieced together the hints from the code.

The Rock has come back out of the blue twice after his WrestleMania 27 stint. They were less shocking than his 2011 return because he hadn't been gone as long and felt more like a part of the WWE circus again.

The night he showed up to announce that he would host WrestleMania, though, came after many assumed he had forever traded wrestling for Hollywood.

7. Dudley Boyz (2015)

The Dudley Boyz showing up on Raw last year felt like a break in the time-space continuum. Here was a duo whose best days came in the early 2000s showing up to take out today's hottest tag team act—The New Day.

The camo-wearing bruisers hadn't been around in ages. They had been competing for TNA for a decade at this point. To see them in WWE again was surreal.

Rumblings about Bubba Ray and D-Von Dudley's contracts with TNA expiring lessened the power of this surprise, though. Fans who kept abreast of WWE rumors and news had already began to wonder if at least Bubba Ray was on his way back.

6. Brock Lesnar (2012)

It felt like Brock Lesnar was forever done with WWE when he left.

Fans had booed him on his way out in 2004. The powerhouse tried to get a spot on an NFL team before moving on to the UFC. Every chapter in the rest of the story felt like it would be of the post-WWE variety.

That was until he showed up on Raw the night after WrestleMania 28 and clobbered John Cena. 

The audience exploded upon seeing Lesnar emerge from the curtains. A megastar was really back with the company some eight years later.

Clearly, though, rumors had spread that he might in fact re-sign with WWE. Note all the Lesnar signs in the crowd when he showed up. That has to slide this moment down on the list.

5. Ric Flair (2001)

With Vince McMahon ready to crown the turncoat Kurt Angle his new champion, Ric Flair interrupted, strutting down to the ring in a shocking return.

Flair hadn't been on Raw since the show's earliest days, battling the likes of El Matador and Mr. Perfect in 1993. Since then, he had been a prominent figure at WCW until that company went out of business in 2001.

That's when Flair showed up again on Raw as co-owner of WWE. 

The distance between his appearances and the fact that some surely assumed he was done with the business after WCW folded made this moment a hell of a surprise. Still, it's not as if he had been apart from the business as long as Jake Roberts had when he returned or Shane McMahon when he rearranged the WrestleMania 32 card with his arrival.

4. Shawn Michaels (2002)

After a back injury pulled Shawn Michaels from the ring in 1998, one assumed he was done for good.

He had cracked his spine against a coffin in a match with Undertaker. And after gutting it out against Steve Austin at WrestleMania XIV, he looked to be done as a wrestler. He showed up in various other roles, as well as focused on training new wrestlers.

Then Kevin Nash announced that The Heartbreak Kid was back as the newest member of the New World Order. 

Michaels' short stay in the group makes this a moment fans don't remember as much as they would otherwise, but it was certainly a major surprise. Also, this occurred before the Internet was as dominant force as it is today. Rumors on the Web didn't spoil this for us. 

3. Shane McMahon (2016)

No rumors ruined Shane McMahon's re-emergence on Raw. WWE somehow kept it secret that one of the company's most popular performers from the Attitude Era was stepping back on stage.

Shane-O-Mac had left WWE to fully immerse himself into the business. After his 2010 exit, it seemed as if he was done forever. It would be Stephanie McMahon who would continue the family enterprise, while Shane would instead choose the corporate world.

But, when WrestleMania season filled with major injuries, and Shane sauntered back into the spotlight.

The reaction was massive. Richard Morgan of the New York Post wrote, "Prodigal sons rarely receive the raucous homecoming that Shane McMahon got on his return Monday night." That speaks to just how much the audience appreciates him, but it also illustrates how big of a shock it was to see Shane back on Raw.

2. Jake Roberts (2014)

On Old School Raw each year, WWE welcomes names from the past. Most of the time, they are guys who fans see every few years in this kind of nostalgia-fulfilling role, from Sgt. Slaughter to Bob Backlund.

Jake Roberts, though, was not part of that group. His battles with drugs and alcohol made him undesirable to WWE. They threatened to take his life early.

The Snake was more likely to show up on the news than on Raw, a show he hadn't competed on since 1996.

But a recovery from addiction and a return to a healthier life, as detailed in the documentary The Resurrection of Jake the Snake, allowed him to have this moment. It allowed him to be at a place in his life where WWE would invite him to come back to TV, use him in a segment involving CM Punk and The Shield and show off to the world just how much better off Roberts was at this point.

Matt Fowler of IGN called it "a truly exceptional surprise." 

The appearance didn't have a major impact on WWE's storylines, but it's undeniably one of the biggest surprises in Raw history. A man left for dead came shuffling in that night, a grin on his face and a snake on his shoulder.

1. The Rock (2011)

Here and there, fans saw flashes of The Rock after he left WWE in 2003.

The Brahma Bull appeared in a pre-recorded message on SmackDown in 2009. He showed up to the 2008 Hall of Fame ceremony to induct his father. In 2007, he was on Raw via taped promo.

But ahead of WrestleMania 27, he showed up in the flesh, shocking the fans in attendance. What ensued was electric. David Bixenspan of Cageside Seats wrote that it was "the biggest pop" he had heard in his life.

A part of that reaction was that had it been seven years since The Rock had made his way to a WWE ring. A part of it was that The Rock's success making movies made it seem as if he had moved on. The wrestling part of his life was not over, though.

In the biggest surprise return that Raw has seen to date, The Great One arrived to once again entertain fans on Monday night.