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Jun 17, 2023

5 Impact Wrestling Performers Who Weighed Over 300 Pounds (& 5 Who Surprisingly Didn't)

Impact Wrestling has been home to some real heavyweights, with them weighing over 300 pounds, and other big men that surprisingly didn't. WWE is commonly referred to as 'The Land of the Giants', but

Impact Wrestling has been home to some real heavyweights, with them weighing over 300 pounds, and other big men that surprisingly didn't.

WWE is commonly referred to as 'The Land of the Giants', but this is true, too, in Impact Wrestling. Despite being primarily known for its high-flying X-Division, a horde of big, beefy individuals have come through the floodgates throughout the group's storied history, many of whom became stalwarts of the promotion for prolonged periods of time, holding championships, main eventing pay-per-views, and, for some, entering the Impact Hall of Fame.

RELATED: Every Inductee Of The Impact Wrestling Hall Of Fame, Ranked

Surprisingly, though, not all of them surpassed the 300-pound mark. Many, in fact, were under the category by a good forty pounds, such as former Impact World Champions Brian Cage and Bobby Lashley - and they're far from the only Herculean Impact alumni under the mark.

A notorious high-flyer whose Six Star Frog Splash is a better Frog Splash execution than even the Five Star Frog Splash, Willie Mack burst into Impact Wrestling in 2018 with every bit of energy as peak-Dusty Rhodes. He was immediately certified as a popular babyface within the X-Division who, in spite of his favored daredevil style, boasted an imposing build that will have you assuming he weighs over 300 pounds.

'Chocolate Thunder', however, weighs under 300 pounds, clocking in at roughly 280 pounds. A former X-Division Champion, Mack was the fifth-heaviest holder of the title, behind Abyss, Samoa Joe, Bobby Lashley, and Brian Cage, proving that the X-Division does indeed have no limits.

Arguably Impact Wrestling's best self-created star, Abyss is synonymous with 'The Land of the Giants' moniker WWE is commonly associated with. He wrestled with such ease and precision that made every Abyss match feel entirely dissimilar to a match featuring anyone else of his size.

At his heaviest, 'The Monster' weighed 350 pounds, though this didn't prohibit him from capturing the X-Division Championship in 2011, being the belt's heaviest holder. Conveniently, Abyss was also the heaviest holder of the NWA World Heavyweight Championship while it was under the Impact banner between 2002 and 2007. Both of these title reigns were largely unremarkable, with Abyss' career-best work coming away from championships and instead in heavy-hitting plunder-based brawls.

Rhino has always been a heavier-set pro wrestler, but he's used this to his advantage throughout his career. In ECW, WWE, and Impact Wrestling, the man once dubbed 'The Man Beast' has put every ounce of his build into Goring opponents into oblivion and when he's paired against smaller adversaries, he takes on the form of a grisly bear hunting for its next prey.

The former NWA World Heavyweight Champion weighs 295 pounds, coming in just shy of the 300-pound mark, but even in Rhino's lighter years, he still maintained a healthy Gore that led him to countless championships across North America.

Perhaps one of professional wrestling's most-tenured big men, Kevin Nash joined Impact Wrestling in 2004, debuting at Victory Road as he and the also-debuting Scott Hall aided Jeff Jarrett in his NWA World Heavyweight Championship defense. Nash subsequently underwent a number of highs and lows in the company, the highest of which saw him as a member of Kurt Angle's Main Event Mafia faction.

RELATED: Every Member Of The Main Event Mafia, Ranked From Worst To Best

At the time of his last match, Nash weighed in at 328 pounds, with the majority of his matches - particularly those which he worked under the Impact banner - being walk-and-brawls. 'Big Daddy Cool' wasn't a limited performer per se, but he certainly chose to work a lighter, easier style throughout his Impact career, particularly when working with the X-Division grapplers.

Known as an esteemed tag team grappler in Impact Wrestling for his work alongside Homicide in The Latin American Exchange tag team, Hernandez played the big-man role of the duo to perfection, though he wasn't limited in the way he wrestled. 'Big SuperMex' used his power and strength only when it was necessary, primarily to perform his savage Border Toss finisher.

As of his latest stint in Impact Wrestling between 2020 and 2022, the five-time Impact World Tag Team Champion was billed as weighing 285 pounds. Having weighed a similar amount for the duration of his career in Impact, it becomes astonishing when you witness Hernandez leap over the ropes with such ease, sometimes doing so better than most cruiserweight-based grapplers.

Matt Morgan floundered in WWE but in Impact Wrestling, he was on the verge of superstardom, thanks to his exquisite work as a bruising heel. Dubbed 'The Blueprint', Morgan had everything you could want from a pro wrestler; the look, the size, the charisma, the agility, everything. He embodied 'The Blueprint' moniker more than what was required of him and for that, he found himself in regular feuds with company luminaries.

He weighs exactly 300 pounds and standing at seven-feet tall, it's no surprise that Matt Morgan attended NBA tryouts with two teams - the Indiana Pacers and the Toronto Raptors. Though he wasn't offered a contract from either team, the fact that he attended a tryout was enough to turn heads in the wrestling business.

Built like your typical redneck, Jethro Holliday - better known as Trevor Murdoch - was a forgotten full-timer in Impact Wrestling in 2009, continuing the redneck personality that he'd forged with Lance Cade in WWE. Going by 'The Outlaw', Holliday amounted to very little in the company, enjoying a stay of less than a year in total.

RELATED: 10 Terrible Names These TNA Wrestlers Had To Endure

He, surprisingly, weighs much less than the 300-pound mark, coming in at just 241 pounds. Though off the mark by 59 pounds, Jethro Holliday was built like a brick house and has come into his own as an in-house franchise player with the National Wrestling Alliance.

If Abyss isn't Impact Wrestling's all-time best big-man performer, then Samoa Joe certainly is. A Triple Crown Champion in the promotion, 'The Samoan Submission Machine' reached great heights in Impact, the peak of his success being the main event of the 2008 Lockdown pay-per-view as he wrestled a deft Steel Cage match against Kurt Angle in what is widely regarded as Impact's best use of the Six Sides of Steel stipulation.

He weighed 310 pounds at the time of his last match in the company, though he never wrestled like it, regularly performing dives to ringside - his forearm Suicida being a constant late-noughties Impact highlight - and going so far as to dive down the stands of the Sears Center at Bound For Glory 2008.

Monty Brown, formerly Marcus Cor Von of WWE's ECW reboot, is commonly touted as the best Impact Wrestling performer the company missed the boat on. He was a potential needle-mover for the company at the height of Jeff Jarrett's reign of terror over the company and could've provided a much-needed Impact-created top babyface, rather than Impact having to rely on the big-money contracts being handed out to a horde of ex-WCW castoffs.

RELATED: 10 Best Former WCW Wrestlers In TNA History, Ranked

Brown was a powerhouse in every sense, though he weighed only 240 pounds. Each of those 240 pounds was, however, put behind Brown's iconic Pounce finisher, a move that has become legendary within Impact Wrestling's vast archive and is a certified crowd-popper whenever it crops up in video packages.

Moose is Impact Wrestling's resident big-man performer for the modern era. Joining the company after a semi-successful stint in ROH, Moose constantly puts his background as an NFL offensive tackle to use in the squared circle, having mastered the art of wrestling as a big bruiser of a monster with a stiff Spear to back up the smack talk that has led him to countless championship victories, including a Bound For Glory 2021 ascendancy to the Impact World Championship.

He weighs exactly 300 pounds but wrestles as if he's half of that. Deemed 'The Wrestling God', Moose acts the moniker, boasting a better, more elegant-looking top-rope Crossbody than many of his X-Division peers; indeed, Moose is a true all-rounder who isn't defined by his formidable stature.

Adam is a freelance writer specializing in the fields of professional wrestling, video games, and film and television. With past experience at an array of media outlets, including WhatCulture, Inside The Ropes, and TJRWrestling, Adam is now employed as a List Writer with TheSportster. Here, he capitalizes on his fifteen years of knowledge to write entertaining, engaging, and informative articles on all things pro wrestling. He's as much a fan of 2010s TNA as he is mid-nineties WCW - just don't make him choose between the two.