A mistake so disastrous it put an end to the biggest boom period in modern memory.

Many people like to look at WrestleMania 17 as the finale of the Attitude Era, with the two biggest stars in the industry at the time, Stone Cold Steve Austin and The Rock, headlining the show with the WWE Championship on the line. It couldn't get any bigger than that, and even though the story getting to the show was a little clunky in hindsight (Debra was the focus of it at one point and she's not even at WrestleMania), it's gone down as one of the greatest main events in WWE history...well most of it has. The end of the show saw Austin turn heel, beat the life out of The Rock with a steel chair, and shake Vince McMahon's hand after years of trying to kill each other. 

Austin turning heel made no sense. The Rock was about to embark on his first trip to Hollywood meaning that there was no top babyface left in the company if Austin had turned heel. WWE did try and build up the likes of Chris Jericho, Chris Benoit, and later on in the year Kurt Angle to give Austin opponents, but there was an evident vibe change in the company once Austin had gone bad.

While tickets were still being sold at a strong rate, pay-per-view buys began to drop, ratings were even worse than that, and by the time Austin finally turned back to a babyface, his direction was so aimless that he walked out of the company in 2002. Austin during the match that the turn was a mistake, but it was too late, and by the time they saw the severity of the idea, the damage was done.