10 Wrestlers You Never Knew Were Dead 1

1. Mike Awesome

Michael Alfonso first rose to prominence in the early ’90s, competing in FMW Japan as The Gladiator. He achieved success as a Tag Team Champion and a Brass Knuckles Heavyweight Champion among others. At one point, he held three titles at once, before losing them as part of his storied feud with Masato Tanaka. The two would continue their feud in America while competing for ECW, where he began to appear as Mike Awesome. He would go on to win the ECW Tag Team titles with Raven as well the ECW World Heavyweight Title twice.
It was here when it got controversial. Followed monetary disputes with Paul Heyman, Mike Awesome breached his ECW contract and went to work for WCW while he was still ECW champion. All kinds of legal hell forbade Awesome from appearing on WCW programming with the ECW title. Eventually, a compromise was reached, where he (a WCW employee) appeared at an ECW event to wrestle Tazz (a WWF employee at the time) for the ECW title. Tazz won, and then dropped the belt a week later. Awesome continued to appear for WCW, undergoing terrible gimmick (the Fat Chick Thrilla) after terrible gimmick (That ’70s Guy) in the name of entertainment. When WCW was bought out, he appeared briefly as part of the Invasion storyline before being released in 2002. He made one final appearance as part of the ECW reunion show One Night Stand in 2005, earning some small redemption in a match against longtime foe Tanaka.
It was during that match that Joey Styles, still bitter about Awesome walking out on ECW, made a crack about how its a shame that Awesome didn’t take his own life after performing a suicide dive out of the ring. Time has proven this to be an unfortunate choice of words, as Awesome was found hanging from the ceiling of his home in Tampa, Florida less than two years later.
An obituary for wrestlers who may have gone unnoticed. Thank you all for the entertainment you gave us. Feel free to leave your thoughts in the comments below!