WWE Missed Opportunities: Looking Back at the Career of Chris Masters

When Chris Masters made his WWE debut in 2005, it was almost immediately clear that he had the potential to go very far in the business.

Masters had a great physique as well as an arrogant personality that immediately clashed with most fans, drawing some very good heat. He looked like the type of guy who Vince McMahon loves.

Masters used a maneuver similar to Ivan Putski's old Polish Hammer. It was an impressive-looking blow, and it showed how Masters could become a serious future star.

Soon after his debut, Masters started up the "Master Lock Challenge," inviting anyone to come out and try to win some money by breaking his signature full nelson.

These challenges helped Masters go over as one of the biggest heels on the roster, and soon he had his first big match at the Unforgiven pay-per-view in September 2005.

His opponent would be Shawn Michaels.

This was Masters' big opportunity. Just months after appearing on television, he was already in a marquee match against one of the greatest performers of all-time.

The match went nearly 17 minutes, and Masters pushed Michaels to the brink of defeat, but he fell just short. Who knows exactly what a victory for Masters would have done, but it would have been huge for his career.

While Masters was able to maintain a key role on WWE Raw, he never seemed to reach the height that he was at prior to his match with Michaels. 

He was able to earn a spot in the Elimination Chamber match at the New Year's Revolution pay-per-view in January 2006. But with the WWE Championship on the line, Masters couldn't be considered a true threat to win the match.

The one thing he still had going for himself was his Master Lock hold. That was until the March 19 episode of Raw in 2007.

Bobby Lashley became the first man to officially break the hold—though they allowed one of the soldiers at the Tribute to the Troops event to be recognized as the first man to do it when he escaped the hold after some help from JBL.

After that, it seemed like Masters was lost. It seemed like the company no longer had a direction for him, and he was placed in several meaningless matches following that point.

In November 2007, Masters was suspended for 60 days for violating the company's substance abuse policy for a second time. It didn't even wait the 60 days. Less than a week later, he was released from his WWE contract.

It was a stunning end for Masters, but he would get a second chance with WWE in the summer of 2009.

Would Masters be able to rekindle his once promising WWE career? How would he portray himself following an absence of nearly two years?

In 2009, Masters returned on the July 27 episode of Raw as an opponent of Montel Vontavious Porter.

Though it was nice to see Masters back, it was clear that the crowd that night either had no idea who he was or just didn't care that he was back. Masters was also considerably smaller in terms of his muscular appearance than when he last appeared in WWE.

The match between the two men ended in a double count-out. The two had a rematch the following week, which Porter was able to win by pinfall.

Just like that, Masters had already suffered his first defeat since returning. In his first run with the company, he went months without a loss.

Masters never got off the starting block during his second run with the company. It almost seemed like it was scared to put him in the limelight because of his past infractions.

If that were the case, why did it ever bring him back?

WWE decided to try Masters out as a face and, despite a few wins on the show Superstars and a ridiculous pec-dancing gimmick, he was never given another big push.

Just two years after being re-signed, WWE made the decision to let Masters go again.

Masters is only 31 years old. He could still be a big piece of the WWE roster, but his career sadly went in a different direction.

He still competes on the independent circuit and has won eight championships in his career. Were his failures in WWE his own fault, or did WWE miss the boat on this guy?

Despite a once promising career and an impressive start with WWE, Masters never won a single championship with the company.