Ken Patera's comeback was such a letdown. He looked like a total badass in photos and in the old Coliseum Video intro where he's doing the swinging full nelson on Tito Santana. What we got was instead was an unmotivated, broken-down shell of his former self with his natural hair color. Pretty obvious even then that he was filling space for a steady paycheck.
I didn't really notice at the time because I was a little kid and any wrestling on TV was good enough for me, but the WWF really didn't have much of a babyface roster for a good bit in 1987. Patera and Superstar Billy Graham were both washed up. Billy Jack Haynes was batshit crazy. Don Muraco was past his prime and juiced to the gills. Black Jack Mulligan didn't get over. They gave up on Koko B. Ware and relegated him to undersized JTTS status quickly. Hillbilly Jim went nowhere and was terrible in the ring. I'm guessing that the WWF cut bait with Outback Jack well before WM3. Apparently Mike Rotundo was still on the roster in 1987, but he wasn't going to light up the babyface side without help. Did anyone want to see Chief Jay Strongbow and Ivan Putski in 1987? Brutus Beefcake was a brand new babyface who had yet to get over. Davey Boy Smith, Tito Santana, Rick Martel, and Jim Brunzell were all great and could have been plugged in anywhere, but tag team wrestlers rarely worked singles unless it was an angle with another team.