How many guys have become legit main event faces without first being a super popular heel?
 

Talking last 15 years or so. Obviously the early 90s had different rules about getting over.

Can think of Jeff Hardy and Rey Rey. Any others?

Bret Hart?

I dunno about Batista. He got a massive pop when he won the Rumble.

Goldberg

<code><marquee direction="LEFT" scrollamount="30" width="100%">ULTIMATE WARRIOR!</marquee>

</code><code><marquee direction="RIGHT" scrollamount="30" width="100%">RAAAAAAAAAARRGGGGH!!!!</marquee>
</code>

Not counting his WCW run . . . Jericho, he was pretty much always a fan favorite.

Hogan. His heel run with the WWF when he started out didn't amount to much.

Kofi hasn't worked as a heel yet, and he started to get a push (although short lived).

CM Punk was a face all the way up to his first championship (although he was a heel in other organizations). Even when he was with the New Breed on WWECW he was still a face.

Thats all I can think of.

Bobby Lashley

I don't feel like Punk was a legit main eventer at that time, though. It's about on par with Swagger being a "legit main eventer".

Only ones i can think of is Ultimate Warrior and Goldberg.

Would we say Cena?

I mean he had a fued with Lesnar as a heel but soon went back to midcard. He was never in a "top spot" as a heel before he turned, won the US Title at Mania 20 before up to the ME as a face.

Jericho was a heel for probably his first 2-3 months in the company, and he never became a "legit main event face" until maybe 2006/07. And prior to that, he did several runs as a super popular heel.

- Goldberg (definitely, no question about it)

- Rob Van Dam (at least in the WWE - he came in as part of a heel faction in the Alliance, but he never DID anything that was really very heelish and within a couple of weeks was majorly over as a face... never played a heel in the WWE.)

- Rey Mysterio (as discussed previously)

- Bobby Lashley is arguable... he only really main evented one PPV with Cena and I don't think he was with the company long enough to be considered a "legit" main event face.

- Jeff Hardy (was a tweener for a very short amount of time in 2002 and when he debuted, but other than that, never played a heel - certainly not a "super popular" heel)

I think Bobby Lashley and Jeff Hardy are both good cases. Lashley was being pushed as Superman. If he didn't leave the company, he'd have been treated as a top star.

Ultimate Warrior?

Jericho and Cena are two terrible answers to this thread. Jericho would have never have even been popular without his WCW heel run, AND he was a super popular heel when he debuted in the WWF. Basic Thuganomics put Cena on the map.