You wouldn’t think that wrestlers care about losing all that much considering that - cover your ears, kids - wrestling is scripted, but that’s far from the truth. In fact, there have been times when it feels like wrestlers care more about their wins and losses than fans do. To be fair, there are very good reasons why that is the case. Some don’t want to lose out on opportunities a win might offer. Others just think the booking they have to suffer through is awful. A few just don’t like the person they have to lose to.

Most of the time, the performers who are asked to lose do so without incident. Every now and then, though, you hear about a WWE wrestler who straight up decides that they are not going to lose the match that night. Such a move basically forces the company to let them get their way - with some very notable exceptions - which is why this move is only performed by star wrestlers in certain situations who recognize that they can get away with the most unprofessional decision of them all. These are 20 times a WWE star refused to lose a match.

20 Hulk Hogan Refuses to Let Mr. Perfect Win the Royal Rumble

This Hulk Hogan story tends to get ignored in comparison to other instances of Hulk Hogan refusing to lose (more on that later), but it’s pretty no less painful. It seems that WWE decided in early 1990 that Mr. Perfect was going to be their next big heel. As such, they wanted him to win the Royal Rumble and cement his status as such.

According to a very popular theory, those plans were changed when Hulk Hogan convinced Vince McMahon to change his plans on the day of the Royal Rumble itself.

Mind you, Hulk Hogan was WWE Champion at this time and had nothing to gain from winning the Rumble. Considering that eventual WWE Champion The Ultimate Warrior eventually suffered from a lack of solidified heel opponents to work with, we bet WWE wishes they had this one back.

19 Stone Cold Doesn’t Want to Lose to Lesnar on Raw

While Stone Cold Steve Austin is usually thought of a guy who did what’s best for business, he did occasionally refuse to do the job. The most famous instance of Austin refusing to lose is undoubtedly the time in 2002 when he refused to lose to Lesnar on an episode of Raw.

To be clear, Austin had no problem losing to Lesnar. He just didn’t want to waste the moment on an unpublicized Raw match.

However, WWE refused to change their minds, and Austin decided to walk out of the company rather than lose the match. Austin later noted that he thought he was in the right regarding his decision not to lose, but felt that he shouldn’t have walked out of the company over the incident.

18 Honky Tonk Man Won’t Drop the IC Title to Randy Savage

Honky Tonk Man’s rise to fame in WWE in one of the strangest stories in the history of the company. He was essentially given the Intercontinental Championship because WWE needed Ricky Steamboat to lose to a heel. He was then supposed to drop it to Jake Roberts, but Roberts failed a drug test. As such, he was allowed to keep the belt for a record long run.

Some say that Honky's IC title run only happened because he flat out refused to lose to Macho Man Randy Savage.

Some say it’s because he was greedy, but Honky Tonk claims that he just didn’t feel the move was right and that Macho Man was better suited for the WWE Championship. Of course, he also recognized that losing at that time would have drastically impacted his non-contracted WWE deal.

17 John Cena Doesn’t Let The Nexus Go Over

John Cena has actually been pretty good in recent years when it comes to losing to the guys that WWE asks him to lose to. However, there was a time when Cena had a bit of a reputation for pulling his weight backstage. While some of those reports are unverified, this one is too popular to ignore. When The Nexus infamously tore apart the set of Raw and established themselves as a top heel faction, WWE immediately recognized what they had on their hands. In fact, they planned to let Nexus beat Cena’s team at SummerSlam 2010. However, it seems that John Cena may have decided to step in an put a stop to the company’s plans. He apparently felt that the storyline had run its course. Once the event was over, Cena admitted he made the wrong decision, and was criticized heavily by veterans Edge and Chris Jericho for not taking their advice prior to the match.

16 Alundra Blayze Doesn’t Want to Lose to Anyone

Getting a champion to drop a belt can be tricky. The belt may be a prop, but it usually comes with more money and more storyline opportunities. On a few rare occasions, champions decided to leave the company rather than lose their title. This is a twist on such an incident.

When Alundra Blayze decided to leave after winning the WWE Women’s Championship for the third time, Vince McMahon asked her to vacate the belt.

However, Alundra saw no reason to just surrender the belt she held or arrange to lose it in some final match. Instead, she took it to WCW with her and infamously threw it in the trash upon her debut. Blayze was blacklisted for years over the incident, but WWE eventually forgave her.

15 Bruno Sammartino Also Doesn’t Want to Lose to Anyone

Bruno Sammartino is a true wrestling legend. He was WWE’s golden boy at a time when every region had their own champion. He was strong, good in the ring, truly tough, and the length of his title reigns dwarf the competition. Of course, that’s probably because Sammartino didn’t like losing to anyone.

In recent years, Sammartino has admitted that he had a real problem with promoters asking him to lose.

In his mind, if a wrestler couldn’t beat him in real life, they had no business beating him in the ring. That’s an admirably old-school style of logic, but it did lead to lots of awkward situations in which Sammartino left promoters with relatively few options after he decided to just keep on being champion.

14 Stone Cold Doesn’t Want to Lose to Chyna or Triple H

Yup, it’s Stone Cold Steve Austin again. This time, we go back to 1999 when Stone Cold was as popular as ever and Triple H was on the rise as a singles superstar. WWE decided that it was time to strike while the iron was hot and have Stone Cold drop the belt to Triple H at SummerSlam 1999. However, Austin felt that Triple H wasn’t quite over enough to justify the title change. It’s also rumored that WWE wanted Stone Cold to drop the belt to Chyna because of the publicity it would attract. As you might imagine, Austin wasn’t fond of that idea either. As an alternative to this mess, WWE decided to book Mankind into a triple threat match with Austin and Triple H. Mankind won and Triple H beat him for the title the next night.

13 Bob Backlund Won’t Lose to Hulk Hogan Because Hogan Can’t Wrestle

Here’s another case of a wrestler that requested to drop his belt to a transitional champion. See, WWE recognized that Hulk Hogan was going to be their next big star. The only problem was that Bob Backlund was currently holding the title.

Backlund, who was a legitimately talented amateur wrestler, refused to drop the belt to a guy like Hogan who had very little “real” wrestling talent to speak of.

Vince McMahon decided that Backlund should instead drop the belt to The Iron Sheik. Not only was Sheik a heel, but he was also a talented amateur wrestler. Even though that wasn’t WWE’s first plan, it actually turned out to be the far better option. Fans hated Iron Sheik and were glad to see Hogan crush him for the title.

12 Roddy Piper Saw No Reason For Hulk Hogan to Beat Him Cleanly

Not many people had the luxury of refusing to lose to Hulk Hogan. It was considered an honor just to be booked against the guy during his prime. Roddy Piper was different, though. Piper made a name for himself outside of WWE and came into the company as a star in his own right. He was also an old-school guy who felt that losing would seriously damage the value of his character. Put it all together, and you’ve got a guy that saw no value in losing to Hulk Hogan cleanly and figured he was a big enough name to say “no” when they asked him to. He was right. This is the reason why we never got an extended Piper vs. Hogan feud, but Piper also didn’t have to lose clean to Hogan.

11 Triple H Pushes Rob Van Dam Further and Further Down the Card

Rob Van Dam was one of those ECW guys who probably could have jumped to WCW or WWE whenever he wanted. Actually, that was the entire basis of his character. He constantly said he was too good for ECW and teased going to another company.

When RVD actually appeared in WWE in 2001, many felt he was due for a big push. However, that was before he ran into Triple H.

See, at that time, Triple was in the midst of his infamous “Reign of Terror.” This was the 2-3 year period when Triple H just refused to lose to pretty much everyone. A guy as popular as RVD probably would have been a good candidate to beat him during this time, but Triple H never found a reason to let RVD get the win.

10 The Shield Doesn’t Think John Cena Can Beat Them

It’s been said time and time again, but The Shield really were one of the best things that WWE’s creative team have ever come up with. They were a trio of exciting young stars who tore through the roster at a time when most people thought veterans ruled the company. WWE’s writers did a good job of ensuring that the trio always looked strong, but also felt that they should probably lose to a team led by the company’s top singles star, John Cena.

The members of The Shield balked at this and said that it made no sense for them not be booked as an unstoppable unit for as long as possible. Remarkably, Vince and the other writers agreed and allowed the squad to beat Cena.

9 Shawn Michaels Ruins Vader’s WWE Push

If you’ve only ever watched WWE, then you probably don’t understand why Vader is thought of as one of the best big man workers of all-time. Well, most of Vader’s acclaim can be traced back to his time in WCW and Japan when Vader tore through some of the top wrestlers in the world. In WWE, though, he ran into a Shawn Michaels-sized wall.

WWE intended to book Vader as a true monster, but Shawn was at that point of his career when he didn’t really want to lose to anyone.

He was especially adamant that Vader not be the guy to beat him. In the end, Shawn got his way and Vader suffered through a stalled start that he never really recovered from during his time in WWE.

8 Rey Mysterio Doesn’t Let Dolph Ziggler Win the Intercontinental Championship

Not every instance of a star refusing to lose is necessarily due to greed or stupidity. Actually, for a guy like Rey Mysterio to refuse to do a job, he’s got to be presented with a scenario that just doesn’t make sense. That’s exactly what happened in 2009 when Mysterio was asked to lose to a young Dolph Ziggler. While Mysterio recognized that Ziggler was on the rise and a very talented superstar, Rey also realized that he was in the midst of a hot feud with Chris Jericho. Not wanting to drop the IC Championship to Ziggler when he and Jericho had raised its value so high, he called an audible and asked to hold onto the championship just a little while longer.

7 Sable Refuses to Lose to Luna Twice in Two Years

By all accounts, Sable was a downright awful person to work with back in the day. Right from the start, Sable had a pretty high opinion of herself and her worth to the company. When fans started cheering for her more and more, that sense of self-worth only increased. However, even the best and most popular champions need rivals.

WWE decided that it would be best if Sable drop the belt to Luna and finally have a real feud with someone. Sable did not feel that way.

In fact, it’s been said that she openly mocked Luna when Sable got her way and denied Luna the chance to win the belt. Apparently, Sable actually refused to lose to Luna in both 1998 and 1999.

6 Hulk Hogan Wins the Belt So He Can Lose to Bret Hart...Then Refuses to Lose to Bret Hart

Of the many, many instances of Hulk Hogan refusing to lose to an opponent, this might just be the strangest and most damaging. When the steroid trials began in the early ‘90s, WWE realized they needed to move away from the muscular stars they had pushed in the past.

They figured that a guy like Bret Hart was a fantastic option for a smaller champion. In order to establish him as a real champion, they wanted Hart to beat Hogan.

Hogan didn’t see things that way. Even though he convinced WWE to let him beat Yokozuna so that he could later drop the belt to Hart, Hogan ended up walking away from the company before ever giving WWE the chance to book that match. In the end, everyone came away from this looking bad.

5 Chyna Vacates The Belt Instead of Losing to Lita

Here’s a little Chyna double-header for you. This may sound strange, but Chyna didn’t actually win the Women’s Championship until 2001. Until then, she mostly competed against male wrestlers. Now, it might have made sense for Chyna to enjoy a long title reign, but WWE felt that they needed to put over other female wrestlers for Chyna to work with. As such, they asked her to drop the belt to Lita. Chyna - who it must be said had a bit of an ego problem back in the day - didn’t wish to lose to Lita and flat-out refused to do so. Remarkably, WWE let her beat Lita at a PPV and then had her vacate the belt. Why? Well, it was honestly the least awkward option available.

4 Jeff Jarrett Asks for $300,000 to Lose to Chyna

You might be thinking to yourself “Wait, didn’t Jeff Jarrett lose to Chyna?” He did, but this is still considered to be one of the most infamous instances of a wrestler refusing to job in wrestling history. See, Jarrett was tired of WWE making him work a woman beater gimmick and decided to jump to WCW. The problem was that Jarrett happened to be the Intercontinental Champion at that time.

Realizing the power he wielded, Jarrett only agreed to drop the belt to Chyna if WWE paid him an astonishing $300,000 ransom.

Of course, Jarrett says that he actually received WWE stock and the negotiations were friendly. That doesn’t quite explain why Jarrett was essentially Vince McMahon’s public enemy number one for years, though.

3 Triple H Cuts Offensive Promos on Booker T then Refuses to Lose to Him

Of all the people that Triple H refused to lose to during his reign of terror, Booker T probably suffered the worst. Let’s go back to 2003 when Triple H was in the midst of his dominant reign and Booker T was finally getting the main event opportunity that many felt he deserved as one of WCW’s top stars. Well, Triple H agreed to work with Booker T - how noble - but there were some catches. First off, Triple H decided to really double down on the racist promos that he’d use to build up the match. While that might have been forgivable if Triple H had actually lost to Booker T as WWE asked him to do, Triple H’s decision to beat Booker T pretty cleanly at WrestleMania felt like a real slap in the face.

2 Shawn Michaels Prefers to “Lose His Smile” Rather Than Lose to Bret Hart

Shawn Michaels infamous attitude problems prevented many rising stars from getting the opportunities they deserved during Michaels’ title reign. It also presented some established stars from getting the opportunities that they were promised.

Following the epic match between Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels at WrestleMania XII, WWE planned to have Michaels return the favor by losing to Bret Hart at WrestleMania 13.

The only trouble was that Shawn wasn’t exactly fond of Bret. Obviously, that’s putting it nicely, but we’ll get to that in a bit. Rather than lose the title to Bret at WrestleMania like any other sane person would have done, he decided to just act like he was leaving WWE all-together and vacate the belt. This was the source of the infamous “lost my smile” promo.

1 Montreal

This is without a doubt the most infamous example of a wrestler refusing to do a job in history. Actually, there are so many stories about what went down here that it’s a little difficult to say for sure whether or not Hart actually refused to lose to Shawn Michaels. However, the Vince McMahon version of this story suggests that Hart indicated that he had no real interest in dropping the belt to Shawn Michaels in Canada. Instead, he offered to drop the belt some other time and in some other place before he formally joined WCW. Vince didn’t believe him when he promised to do so and decided to call the Survivor Series match between the two when Shawn had Bret in a sharpshooter. This event is widely considered to be arguably the most important in wrestling history.