Your Most Hated World Title Reign in History

[Liam O'Rourke]

So, for this weeks podcast, we'll be discussing the Most Hated World Title Reigns in History, and want your input on what is your most despised run anybody had as a World Champion in any promotion, ever, and of course why?

 

A key point here is we are looking to discuss the title runs themselves, NOT simply a guy becoming champion who you don't feel was worthy (Vince McMahon for example).

 

As always we'll be reading the best contributions on the show and crediting you accordingly - so what is the World Title reign you personally hated more than any other, and what about it pissed you off so much?

 

EDIT - The show discussing your Most Hated World Title Reigns Ever is now online and available to listen to at the following link: http://squaredcirclegazette.podbean.com/mf/web/fumvra/SCGRadio58-TheMostHatedWorldTitleReignsEver.mp3

[King Pitcos]

This isn't one reign, it's probably three or four, but Randy Orton in 2009. He won it in a shit feud with Triple H (which we'd seen before), then had a shit feud with Batista (which we'd seen before), then had a shit feud with John Cena (which we'd seen before). It's the low point of interest in the WWE title for me.

[Michael_3165]

For me it has to be The Miz's title reign in the lead up to WrestleMania 27. Firstly the guy didn't deserve to be where he was (though that isn't the primary reason). Secondly IMO the champion should be 'the man', the person that the company revolves around.

 

Unfortunately the reign was simply a stepping stone in the build up to The Rock vs John Cena and took away any potential credibility that the title should have been afforded. 

 

Nobody ever believed that The Miz could take on, let alone defeat, the biggest stars in the industry and his reign cumulated in perhaps one of the most lacklustre main events in WrestleMania history (from a star power perspective). In comparing The Miz vs Cena with Austin vs Rock, Michaels vs HHH vs Benoit or Michaels vs Undertaker it is clear that the reign was dead in the water. 

[air_raid]

Well Liam, since you liked my rant in the "overdone pushes" thread but missed it for the podcast itself, I'm just going to submit a re-working of the same post.

 

My most hated title reign of all time is JBL. Fuck me sideways. Watching back today, some of the promos and angles were absolutely hilarious, but I'm not prepared to pretend that at the time that I didn't hate it. I stopped watching SmackDown because I was so outraged at the overpushed Acolyte being positioned on top, and I felt my intelligence utterly insulted at the idea that he could have been such a loser for eight solid years, and jump from Acolyte to title contender in a month, then champion within another month. It was utterly ridiculous to me, and not just because I was anxious to see John Cena on top and he was wasting time with even bigger losers. It might not have been as bad if they'd actually managed to change my mind that Bradshaw was capable of being champion by beating anyone worth beating, but he took the belt from Eddie without pinning him, escaped a run with the Undertaker without pinning him - even by cheating, he was still not permitted to get a pin - and then he won a few multi-mans where other people did the work, or there were run-ins, or both.

 

He was a loser. I didn't believe for a second that he could beat anyone without a raft of mitigating circumstances, and he was champion. I know people like to say "he was a heel so you were supposed to hate him as champion" but at least with every other heel champion in recent memory, from Hitman to HBK to The Rock to Triple H to Angle to Brock Lesnar, whether it was cunning, skill, clever cheating or being an unstoppable brock brick shithouse, I believed in every one of them. JBL was just fucking lucky. The day he won the belt, I didn't think he deserved it, and right up until the day he lost it, I didn't think he deserved it. I'm familiar with "I can't wait to see this guy lose" heat, but JBL was pure "fuck this guy, I'm watching something else" heat for me. Doesn't help that his matches were still the same boring dross they'd always been. I probably would have appreciated the act if he'd have been Honkying his way through a midcard title run, but at the end of the day, the Honky Tonk Man was the Intercontinental champ, not top of the fucking food chain.

 

JBL's worthless title reign can be best eulogized by how when John Cena's moment itself finally came, it came across as lukewarm and anti-climactic when he won the WWE title at WrestleMania 21 when you compare it to Batista's ascension on the same show. Cena winning the WWE title could have been a big deal but it wasn't, because while Batista got to win his belt from the most dominant heel of the decade, Cena only had to beat JBL who we all knew was shite. As hot as Cena seemed in late 2003 and early 2004, I was livid at how long we had to wait for him finally to win the title, while it was on JBL. I sat there thinking "You're holding off on your next big babyface star... for this dickhead??" JBL came along when I'd been watching every SmackDown since the roster split, and crushed my enthusiasm to the point I stopped watching the show while he was champion, because I found it fucking depressing. I was completely unwilling to watch him try and get the WWE title back from Cena, and after the draft I thought it was nothing short of a DISGRACE that a guy that had received the star treatment that Big Dave had, needed two goes on Pay Per View to put this clown away. JBL had a title reign so shit, it managed to carry on shitting up SmackDown PPV title matches for months after he'd lost the sodding belt. Just typing some of this has made me want to still never watch SmackDown again, because I feel like I'd somehow still be endorsing the show that fucking JBL got to be champion of once. What a shower of shit.

[HarmonicGenerator]

Raid said it better than I ever could. Superb post and I absolutely agree with every word of it! But I will add that at the same time he was being shoved at the top of the card, he had a column on WWE.com full of right-wing, hate-filled Fox News awfulness that was absolutely not part of the character, plus there was the goose-stepping on a show in Germany thing. But yeah, what Raid said - it's definitely JBL for me.

 

Second is probably Rey Mysterio in 2006. What a fucking loser he was when he was champion.

[Guest]

JBL is a confusing one, not that I'm against it in theory - i could buy that he sold out his mate (which they really should've done a match for first) and got a quick opportunity + team of jobber henchmen but the fact he won off Eddie at the Bash with a screwy finish, and they don't even do like HiaC/cage blow-off to a pretty decent feud.Then they had fuck all viable face challengers that it became so obvious way in advance they were waiting for Cena, so it had very little effect when it happened. Low point was probably No Way Out '05 - what a step down from the year previous that was, barbed wire steel cage (not even as interesting as that sounds) with Big Show, they do a through-the-ring spot which is the only time the crowd got above tepid. Big Show breaks the cage door lock, but before he's out JBL already wriggled underneath the ring. Bradders was allergic to pinfall victories it seems

[King Pitcos]

[Callum1993]

One reign I really didn't enjoy was Sheamus's World Heavyweight Title run in 2012. Him beating Bryan in 18 seconds at Wrestlemania was a bad move to start with and it didn't get any better from there. He seemed to feud constantly with Del Rio and Ziggler before dropping the belt to Big Show of all people six months later. Every promo he cut turned into Irish folk stories and they all seemed to end with him wanting to go for a pint after he 'kicked arse'. His staleness started then and carried on until his heel turn this year. Some of the in-ring stuff he did was alright at this time but getting paired time and time again with the same opponents didn't do anything for him. Really didn't enjoy that reign at all.

[TheLowdown1987]

Hogan, 2002, surely?

[Snitsky's back acne]

One reign I really didn't enjoy was Sheamus's World Heavyweight Title run in 2012. Him beating Bryan in 18 seconds at Wrestlemania was a bad move to start with and it didn't get any better from there. He seemed to feud constantly with Del Rio and Ziggler before dropping the belt to Big Show of all people six months later. Every promo he cut turned into Irish folk stories and they all seemed to end with him wanting to go for a pint after he 'kicked arse'. His staleness started then and carried on until his heel turn this year. Some of the in-ring stuff he did was alright at this time but getting paired time and time again with the same opponents didn't do anything for him. Really didn't enjoy that reign at all.

I could have dealt with that reign if HHH had ended it at WrestleMania - it would have seen like they'd have done it for a reason. Instead he dropped it the month before and was annihilated by HHH in their subsequent confrontations.

[tiger_rick]

I can't think of anything I've hated more than the Ultimate Warrior losing the title to Sgt. fucking Saddam who then went on to face Hogan in a feud that just went way over my head back then but either genuinely offended people or just left them completely unmoved. WrestleMania pulling such a tiny crowd and the buyrate dropping so drastically was unsurprising given how utterly crass the whole thing was.

 

I'll never understand as long as I live why anyone in the WWF thought this would draw money. It's inconceivable stupidity. While I'm delighted we ended up with the Savage/Warrior showdown - why on earth wouldn't you do Warrior/Hogan II at WM7? It just seems so utterly obvious.

 

The one that very nearly beat that was Triple H's reign of terror in 2003 including those awful matches with Scotty Steiner, the WM ruination of Booker T, absolute snoozers with Kevin Nash and then, when given the chance to redeem the bloody thing, killing off Goldberg at SummerSlam. I feel sick just thinking about it.

 

Honourable mentions to both Benoit's and Guerrero's runs in 2004. Waited years for those only for both to be the dampest of damp squibs.

[Tommy!]

I'm going to chip in and defend that JBL run a bit. To start with I hated it, it was Bradshaw and despite the blood bath at Judgmentday being fun it was clear they were trying to go down every cheap heat shortcut they could to push the loudmouth semi regular tag act, although the concept of the heart attack on a house show felt novel at the time to me. That Bash match was the shits on many levels, no defense of that.

 

However, I grew to love the JBL run because I longed to see some one topple him and at the same time I longed to see how he could scrape through one more time.

That barbwire cage match at No Way Out was a perfect example, in my view, of what I loved about JBL's run, he was either finally going to get what was coming to him or he was going to find a crafty way to scrape through, and that's what I was tuning in to see.

It didn't produce matches I will rush back and re watch years on, but at the time I grew to love to hate him, and I grew to love watching the crafty fucker slide by.

 

It's sad that the big pay off with getting Cena in as the man got cut, and cut again if I remember right. It should never have been a long match, short and sweet is the way wit those two at the time, but it would have been good to have thrown something worthwhile at it.

 

I may be on my own on that one......

 

 

 

My pick is the Rey run in 2006. I liked Rey, but it all felt so sycophantic, over blown and forced it made me loath the guy. Then they seemed to just take away everything that was fun about him and he just showed no pizzazz for the most part. The Orton no way out bit was shocking, his mini run with JBL was tiresome and saw him plodding about doing little of interest. Then we had the Chavo turn.

[tiger_rick]

Rey's a good shout. The chase was actually worse than the reign though. I grew to enjoy JBL too. I was initially willing to give the gimmick change a shot, then horrified when he actually won the title and then found him more and more entertaining.

[Cobra1000]

 

I'll go for Rey Mysterio. 

 

To start with I love the guy. He could have been a great Champion etc etc. But good lord. EVEN before his title reign began he was screwed. After winning the rumble he puts his #1 Contendership on the line at No Way Out and loses. Loses! To Orton.  It begins. Then Teddy Long just takes pity on him cause his friend died and puts him in the World title match, which Rey  then wins. I don't think any one had a problem with the 'do it for Eddie' stuff but it could have been done so much better. Once Mysterio won the belt is where the problems began.

 

"The Underdog Champion" nothing has made me want to throw my TV at the window more than this. Well, maybe JBL's title run, but thats already been mentioned. Suddenly Mysterio became childlike and inept and suddenly couldn't win a match. The booking was atrocious and nothing felt as good as King Booker beating the little tosser at the great American Bash. WWE made me hate one of my WCW favourites. They made one of the most exciting, dynamic wrestlers of all time look like David Arquette winng the WCW title.

[Zebra Kid Mark]

 

One reign I really didn't enjoy was Sheamus's World Heavyweight Title run in 2012. Him beating Bryan in 18 seconds at Wrestlemania was a bad move to start with and it didn't get any better from there. He seemed to feud constantly with Del Rio and Ziggler before dropping the belt to Big Show of all people six months later. Every promo he cut turned into Irish folk stories and they all seemed to end with him wanting to go for a pint after he 'kicked arse'. His staleness started then and carried on until his heel turn this year. Some of the in-ring stuff he did was alright at this time but getting paired time and time again with the same opponents didn't do anything for him. Really didn't enjoy that reign at all.

I could have dealt with that reign if HHH had ended it at WrestleMania - it would have seen like they'd have done it for a reason. Instead he dropped it the month before and was annihilated by HHH in their subsequent confrontations.

 

You're thinking of his WWE title reign in 2009/2010. His world title reign was in 2012. It took them a while to rebuild him after getting battered by HHH.