How About That Thing?

WWE’s Ruthless Aggression era, an era that went from 2002 to 2007, is known for a lot of things. In particular, it was the beginning of the trend where we pretend the Monday night show and the Thursday/Friday night show were two separate universes with their own separate rosters and title belts, with little if any overlap in the interim. The wrestlers themselves were a combination of cartoon characters like Hurricane Helmes and Mighty Molly: pro-wrestling superheroes, Simon Dean: pro-wrestling fitness instructor, and Christopher Noinski: Harvard graduate, as well as dead serious down to Earth type characters like Brock Lesnar: the next big thing in wrestling, or Scott Steiner. There were hold-overs from The Attitude Era like Chris Jericho, Billy Gunn, and Ron Simmons, who were basically just collecting paychecks and waiting for their contract to expire, or for that tire fire over in Total Nonstop Action to give them a call. There were Extreme Championship Wrestling reunion shows, and an attempt at reviving the ECW brand that ended up being so bad that it’s practically worth writing a whole separate article about. But most importantly of all, it was the era of WWE programming where WWE was unchallenged for the first time in ages.

And no, TNA doesn’t count. Seriously, how the fuck is that company still in business? Say whatever you want about AEW, but for all of THEIR faults, they’re still better than TNA will ever be. FIGHT ME, NERD!

WWE did some of their best work when they had a legit competitor sniping all their A-list talent that were still in their prime, and vise versa. With no rival to compete with, WWE programming became… Complacent at best, mediocre on average, and outright embarrassing at worst. True, The Attitude Era (1997-2001) had its share of blunders as well, upon retrospect, but you know what they say: “When you’re hot, you can do no wrong. When you’re cold, you can’t do anything right.” And WWE was getting colder and colder with every passing year.

That being said, The Ruthless Aggression era wasn’t even the worst era in WWE. It definitely had more misses than hits, if you ask me personally, but there was still good to be found here and there. And looking back on it, one of the potentially good things came in the form of this man.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is Gene Snitsky. When we first saw him in WWE, he was basically some rando pulled up from developmental whose only purpose for being there was to be Kane’s punching bag for the evening. And right about here, we have SOOOOOO much backstory to go over. So let me see if I can abridge it for the sake of staying on topic.

Basically, Kane had turned bad after losing his mask. At some point, he beat the shit out of Matt Hardy, abducted his girlfriend, Lita, and… Got her preggernant. If you know what I mean.

SIDE NOTE: yeah, can’t possibly imagine why Glenn Jacobs left this entire storyline out of his autobiography.

I forget the context for why Gene Snitsky was called in to face Kane that night, but either way, it was his debut match on WWE television. How many guys can say their first match on national television was during the A-show, against a well-established veteran like Kane? And to make matters even MORE surprising, HE WON!

Of course, in the process, he knocked Kane into Lita, knocked Lita off the ring apron, and caused Lita to miscarry, but aside from that, MAJOR WIN!

This development led to Snitsky being interviewed backstage, and insisting that it wasn’t his fault. And thus, a catchphrase was born. Admittedly, it was no “Austin 3:16 says I just whipped your ass!”, or “Do you smell what The Rock is cookin’?”, but considering what he had to work with the moment he showed up in WWE, it’s amazing he lasted as long as he did.

Seriously, this entire storyline with Kane, Lita, the pregnancy, and everything orbiting it was as uncomfortable as it gets. I talk a lot of shit about things you can’t get away with in 2026, but even by 2004-2005 standards, I’m amazed WWE was getting away with this.

And to make things even MORE baffling, Snitsky was THE BAD GUY NOW! Apparently, kidnapping a girl and forcing her to give birth to your demon spawn is bad, but accidentally causing her to miscarry the baby she didn’t even want in the first place? Apparently, that’s just diabolical! Even if it was an accident. BOO, I SAY! BOO!

However, for reasons that stand in defiance of logic and reason, it worked. Gene Snitsky became one of the biggest heels in the company. And Kane became a good guy. And all I can say on behalf of the entire fandom is “the 2000s were weird.”

Despite the fact both of these here cowboys in this shootout were wearing the wrong hats, the rivalry had some genuine heat behind it. Snitsky had pretty much nowhere to go but up, as far as I was concerned.

Unfortunately, once this bitter, morbid, idiotic rivalry ended… Well… Apparently, nobody really knew what to do with the guy.

He tagged with the likes of John Heidenrich in 2006, but nothing really came of it. Nor did a tag team with Tyson Tomco.

And then, for no explainable reason, he suddenly became Gene Snitsky: Foot Fetishist.

On one hand, I immediately took exception to this gimmick. Yes, I get it was 2006, and foot fetishism was considered creepy and gross by most of civilized humanity. Still, I couldn’t help but feel like this portrayal of foot guys was probably how gay people felt when they were portrayed on TV as glittery, girly, and lispy.

Surely, I don’t have to explain that not all foot guys are the kind of lonely perverts you see in the Instagram comment section of someone who didn’t crop their feet out of the bikini pic or whatever.

Not to mention that making your entire personality around “I like feet” is kind of difficult to incorporate into a wrestling persona. Sure, the writing staff came up with all sorts of wacky shenanigans for him to get mixed up in behind the scenes, but they were never funny. And only PARTLY because I myself happen to take offense. WWE has proven time and time again that they are absolutely terrible at comedy, and this was no exception.

On the other hand, he got to worship Lita’s feet. 2006-me, on top of still making peace with who I was and what body parts I enjoyed, also had a thing for Lita, and I was equal parts proud of and jealous of ole Snitsky at the same time.

As you might expect, Gene Snitsky: Foot Fetishist went nowhere. Snitsky himself disappeared from television… Until about 2008.

Snitsky reemerged from obscurity, dropping Gene from his name, and sporting a whole new look. Honestly… I’m mixed.

I always felt like the brownish-yellow teeth was a little too far. Shaving your head is fine, shaving your eyebrows… Well, I wouldn’t have gone that route, but I wasn’t Snitsky in 2008, so… Yeah. But the teeth? This was the thing that people tended to latch on to more than any other aspect of his new persona.

Then again… There really wasn’t much to his new persona. Once you saw your way past the obviously painted teeth, his persona could basically be boiled down to yet another “ME BIG!” character. And let’s face it, you were already spoiled for choice when it came to “ME BIG!”.

So how did Snitsky: The Yuck Mouth Monster’s second wind pan out? Well… Not great. We were all willing to give the guy bonus points for leaning in to the persona, and making the best of what ultimately ended up being yet another mediocre run… But nothing ever really came of it.

And that’d be the last time we ever saw Snitsky on WWE TV. Which is a real shame, honestly.

There were a lot of wrestlers in The Ruthless Aggression era that were saddled with awful gimmicks, or just weren’t given a proper chance to shine because they had the audacity to be shorter than six-foot-six. Snitsky, in particular, felt like potential gone to waste.

In an ideal world, Kane would’ve remained the bad guy, and Snitsky could’ve wound up as a sort of accidental hero figure, or even a sympathetic good guy. I mean yeah, the whole causing Lita to miscarry was never going to end positively, but trying to make Snitsky more sympathetic would’ve probably worked out a lot better, I think. They wouldn’t have saddled him with the whole foot fetishist persona, he wouldn’t have had to paint his teeth…

Of course, it’s easy to play armchair booker. And if my various promotions in Fire Pro Wrestling World’s Fire Promoter mode going bankrupt over and over again are any indication, I’m probably the last guy on Earth who should be booking talent. Still, though, Snitsky is one of my personal favorite “what could have been” stories.