Triple H: Abuse of Power and a Tarnished Legacy

When it comes to the man known as Triple H, there are two general opinions of this legendary superstar.

Hunter Hearst Helmsley is the guy who slept his way to the top of the WWE and used his pull backstage to lift Batista, Randy Orton, Sheamus and possibly Drew McIntyre to stardom. The same man who made sure he maintained the World Heavyweight Championship for the better part of five years.

And then there’s everyone else’s opinion of Triple H.

One half of Degeneration X, Triple is a respected veteran who has reigned as King 13 times, the man who has beaten everyone there is to beat.

Despite our personal opinions, we all must stop and take a look at the longstanding trend. Let’s consider each wrestler who has seemingly benefited from their association with Triple H.

Randy Orton

When Randy Orton first joined the WWE in the early 2000s, he was a relatively unknown character on Smackdown who jobbed to the likes of Batista and Brock Lesnar.  Somewhere along the way, Orton was transferred to the RAW brand and suffered an injury almost immediately.

Upon his return, he immediately joined the Evolution stable and was branded as the future by Triple H. He later adopted his Legend Killer gimmick and was seemingly pushed to the moon after a win over Shawn Michaels. Orton continued his hot streak and later defeated Rob Van Dam for the IC Championship.

He held onto the title for months before dropping it to Edge, but rebounded immediately. Orton went over seasoned veterans, Edge and Chris Jericho, in a battle royal to challenge the World Champion at SummerSlam. When the event arrived, Orton cleanly defeated Chris Benoit for the World Heavyweight title.

Benoit was near unbeatable before his loss to Orton and it was one of the rare occurrences where a heel cleanly defeated a major face.

See where I’m getting at?

Orton lost the World title to HHH and sank into obscurity and the mid card for almost four years. After a series of pushes, Orton finally got “over” with the crowd as a heel and is now a seven time World Champion. He’s currently the second biggest babyface behind John Cena.

Sheamus and Drew McIntyre

The Celtic Warrior debuted on ECW in 2009 and was immediately placed in feuds with Shelton Benjamin and Goldust. Sheamus continued an undefeated streak before losing a match to Goldust. After ending both feuds, Sheamus was mysteriously moved to RAW and received a monster push upon his arrival.

After destroying Jamie Noble, Sheamus entered the WWE title picture and won a Battle Royal to face John Cena at TLC. At the event, Sheamus shockingly won the WWE title after Cena fell off the top rope through a table.

On the other hand, Drew McIntyre was built up as Vince McMahon's Chosen One and the newcomer had already secured a victory over Intercontinental Champion, John Morrison. After an okay match, McIntyre won the IC Championship following a Future Shock.

McIntyre defeated Morrison, Kane, and a slew of others in matches following TLC and was obviously on a big push. The stories of Triple H being Sheamus’ workout buddy and his favoritism of Drew McIntyre poured fuel on the already simmering fire.

Currently, both have faded into obscurity but McIntyre looks to be on the rebound while I expect Sheamus to resume his push sometime this year.

Batista

Like Orton, the Animal was moved from Smackdown to RAW and began a monster push. Quickly siding with Triple H and Evolution, Batista scored wins over the likes of Kane and RVD early in his career.  Batista went down with an injury around the same time as Orton, but re-injured himself along the way.

Upon his return, his push resumed and he took out Bill Goldberg while beginning a feud with Shawn Michaels. He and Ric Flair were pushed to tag team success and went on to hold the World tag team titles on numerous occasions. After Orton’s exit from Evolution, Batista seemingly grew tired of HHH and Flair’s antics.

The Animal went on to beat numerous stars in the WWE, including Rhino, Chris Benoit, Y2J and Randy Orton himself on two occasions. The tension between the two rose each week and it finally exploded once Batista entered the 2005 Royal Rumble.

After eliminating John Cena, Batista’s push was seemingly set in stone. The question was who Batista would challenge at WrestleMania. After weeks of persuasion and mind games by Triple H, Batista overheard Triple H admitting to setting up a hit and run on him to frame JBL.

Batista left Evolution later in the evening and destroyed Flair and Triple H in the process. Batista defeated Triple H at WrestleMania and set his place at the top of the WWE.

While some may choose to ignore it, Batista was considered as big as John Cena at the time. Had it not been for his backstage woes, he may have been the face of the WWE. Batista left the WWE last year and was a six time World Champion at the time.

Despite those listed above, Triple H tends to bury the younger WWE Superstars. It’s a well-known fact that most of the younger stars resort to the Undertaker when it comes to Triple H. The Game is known to go off script and embarrass younger talent on the microphone.

Shelton Benjamin was subject to Triple H a year before his release and during his reign as U.S. Champion.  Mr. Kennedy has discussed Triple H’s lack of intent to help most talent while his boys are well taken care off.

Kennedy would go on to say that Undertaker was Triple H’s opposite and if he were to have a bad match, Underaker would inform him immediately afterwards.

So as WrestleMania 27 draws near and the Undertaker/Triple H II is oddly predictable and may end in his retirement, we have to respect what the Game has done for this business. But on the other hand, some of us can’t respect his actions and selfishness backstage.