The Dragon / Professional Wrestling

• Vince McMahon, being WWE's owner and Big Bad, has had a LOT of Dragons throughout the years. Wrestlers who have been Vince's Dragon include: Mick Foley, The Rock, The Undertaker, Triple H, Kurt Angle, Big Show(when he wasn't The Brute), Brock Lesnar, Batista, Eric Bischoff, etc. Even Hulk Hogan was this when Vince brought in the nWo to help him kill WWE, though they didn't interact much until Hogan turned face and feuded with Vince. Perhaps the most shocking was "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, Vince's Arch-Enemy, who became Vince's Dragon in order to be WWE champion.
• Shane McMahon was Vince McMahon's most consistent Dragon. He started off as a non-action one, serving as Vince's second-in-command and letting whoever was the other dragon do most of the fighting, but over time began wrestling more frequently and he eventually Took a Level in Badass so that he played a more physical one as well.
• ARN ANDERSON: Basically made a career as "The Enforcer" of The Four Horsemen, always there as the second-in-command to Ric Flair. Even the one time they were at odds in September-October 1995, it was all a setup for Flair to turn on Sting at WCW Halloween Havoc 1995 and reform the Horsemen with Brian Pillman, and Chris Benoit being added the next night on WCW Monday Nitro.
• In wrestling, Asskicking Leads to Leadership. Therefore, usually if you're going to have a Dragon, it's in a situation similar to Vince McMahon and The Corporation - a Corrupt Corporate Executive as the Big Bad and his hand-picked champion as The Dragon. Some examples...
  • The Rock to Vince McMahon in The Corporation
  • Hulk Hogan to Wrestling/Eric Bischoff in the New World Order (although Hogan was more of a Dragon-in-Chief)
  • The Undertaker to Vince McMahon in The Corporate Ministry
  • Triple H to Vince McMahon in the McMahon-Helmsley regime.
• Meng/Haku made a career out of playing The Dragon to various heels. He Dragoned for Bobby Heenan, Colonel Robert Parker, Kevin Sullivan (during the Dungeon of Doom), and his final mainstream wrestling role was The Dragon to Rikishi during Rikishi's attempted main event heel push.
• CHIKARA had a rare subversion of the Asskicking Leads to Leadership with Die Bruderschaft des Kreuzes (BDK). The stable's top wrestler was Claudio Castagnoli, but the real mastermind behind the whole thing was Claudio's tag partner Ares.
• Jack Swagger played this role to Michael Cole during Cole's feud with Jerry Lawler.
• John Laurinaitis had David Otunga as one...who at one point left him during a match against John Cena.
• Dolph Ziggler seemed to be playing the role of The Dragon to Vickie Guerrero, until he went out on his own, aligned himself with A.J. Lee and now has Big E. Langston on his side.
• Most recently, Randy Orton to Big Bad Triple H.