Is the championship more important today?

[streicher187]

Look at the list of legends who never won a WWE championship but where and some still are big stars. Can we have a Mr. Perfect, Rick Rude, Roddy Piper or Million Dollar man today who where big names but not championship material.

Today it seems like you need to be a champion to be considered a "star" those guys above at one time or another where big time player even without the belt. Today it seems that to be pushed to a top of the charts guy you need to hold the belt at least once. I don't think Miz, Punk, Bryan would have held the championship in the 80's because they didn't fit the "big guy" mold. In the 90's Miz and Bryan wouldn't have been able to hang on the mic the "attitude era" stars and again would have never held the belt.

It seems today they try and make "stars' by giving them one of the 2 championship belts for a short run then return them to midcard as needed. It does more to cheapen the belt then build stars.

So my question is would guys like the Miz or Bryan be superstars going forward and become big stars if they never held the belt or would they just be another mid carder that no one cared about?

 

[Workrate]

It isn't as important as it used to be.

I hate the argument about this guy or that guy not being "big enough." I mean, it's probably true that in the 80's you wouldn't have seen a guy like The Miz as champion, but so what? That was the 80's. The NFL didn't have instant reply in the 80's either. Times change and it doesn't do much of a service to constantly judge everything against the past (don't ignore the past completely, obviously, but just because something was a certain way doesn't mean it should remain that way forever).

I think Punk's current reign has done a nice job of bringing some value back to the strap -- or at least in the sense that they've finally gotten away from having it changing hands once a month, a tactic that no doubt devalued it a lot. You still see non-title matches main eventing pay-per-views, which I think is a bit sad, but it's been proven that you don't need a belt to sell an event. And I'd agree that Punk today isn't a bigger sell than a Rock or Lesnar, but I think that's just the result of many other changes throughout the years. For example: I have a very difficult time believing that Punk's character wouldn't have been an enormous success in the Attitude Era. In other words: instead of putting down a current star's popularity, maybe we need to realize that, in general, wrestling isn't as popular as it was 10-15 years ago.

The other big, obvious problem with the WWE Championship is the World Heavyweight Championship. I love the big gold belt itself, but it needs to go away (and re-design the WWE strap while you're at it). It has been years since the title felt like a separate entity -- now it just feels like we have a WWE Champion and then that other champion. It's awkward and it sort of defies logic: the WWE Champion is the champion of this company but the World Champion is the champion of the entire planet? Is that how that works? Because it isn't treated that way. It's just a weird, mostly unnecessary dynamic. The only real reason for the big gold belt is exactly what you said: it's a belt they use to give guys to help push them and so that later on they can refer to them as "a former World Champion" (because they foolishly refuse to acknowledge that any other organization exists; there's a difference between acknowledging existence and acknowledging competition, too).

 

[neildittmar]

I'd like to go one further and say Vince Russo got his wish of the title just being a prop for the most part.

In the 70's and 80's, territories would actually vote on who was to be the champion. Other than the financial aspects of that decision, much thought was given to who would hold the belt, when/where it would be defended, potentially how long the champion would hold the title and possibly who would be the next in line. These were often long-term decisions that had much thought and effort put behind them.

Contrast with today, the championships are more or less trinkets that are used to elevate specific feuds or individuals. The short-sightedness of the title reigns is the most prominent difference between then and now. The logic nowadays is that the belt "looks important" so by proxy, the guy holding it is important. In my opinion, it should be the other way around... the guy is important so his title reign augments the importance of the championship.

Though the aforementioned is ironclad and there exists a few exception, how the belt is treated today represents the exact opposite of how things used to be.

 

[asiatic7]

I think today's society calls for a champion every few months because everybody has a short attention span. Look how fast technology goes in and out of style, today iPhone 4, 6 months from mow there will be an iPhone5. There are also too many PPv's so you have to have a title defense every month. Back in the 80's, there were only a few PPV's a year AND the champion was kept off of TV. The champion never grew stale because it was a treat to see him a few times a year on TV. It kept feuds fres and entertaining as opposed to today, where John Cena would beat an opponent, Then a month later he's wrestling the same guy in a stipulatin match and then again a month after that. The championship also loses prestige when it gets passed around as much as it does between guys who have'nt really paid dues. How as a fan am I supposed to take the title seriously when they don't take it seriously? When Bret won the WWF championship five times it was special. Ric flair is a former 16 time champion over the span of about 20 years, Edge, Randy Orton and Cena are 10, 11, and 13 time champions in the span of about 6 years... There was a time when Cena won it 3 times in one year. Back in the 80's everybody's character was strong, so they didn't need a championship to get them over. Piper, Snake, JYD and others drew money because they had charisma. Today these guys have no charisma, even though they're accused of having tons of it. Fans just don't have patience today for a guy to have a Bruno Sammartino long reign as champion. Look how fast they turned on Cena after he won his first WWE title.

 

[justinept]

It's funny. I was just having this same conversation the other day when discussing Kofi Kingston. Kofi is a classic mid-card wrestler. Twenty years ago, that was fine, but in 2012, it's like a dirty word to call someone a mid-carder. If you call someone a mid-carder, suddenly all the fans just start counting down the days until he's "future endeavored." And why is that? What's the difference between where Kofi is at in the card and where guys like Jake Roberts, Honky Tonk Man, Rick Rude, Big Bossman or even Mr. Perfect were in the 80's/90's?

Well, think about the different WWF Champions in the 1980's. The only guys to hold the belt in the 80's were Backlund, Iron Shiek, Hogan, Andre and Savage. Just last year, Miz, Cena, Punk, Del Rio and Mysterio held the WWE Title - and that number doesn't include the number of stars on the other brand that won the WHC. Because we've gotten to a point where we have as many different champions per year as we used to have per decade, the expectation is that pretty much everybody on the roster will eventually win either the WWE or the World Title at some point --- and those guys like Kofi or R-Truth that don't seem destined to ever carry the strap are viewed as inconsequential talent. Whereas we used to view Hogan, Savage and Warrior as strong because they had won the belt, we now view Kofi and R-Truth as weak for having not won the belt. And that's why you need to give wrestlers the belt in order to get them over.

It's a shame that wrestling has been building toward this because it used to be great to invest on a wrestler's emotional journey toward the title like we did with Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels. But because we expect that everyone will eventually win the title, now we just complain that the WWE isn't pushing our favorite guy there fast enough.

 

[Saeros]

Nowhere near.
Even 10 years ago, the main event of wrestlemania was still the WWE title match. Thats with Rock vs Hogan on the card.
Punk's reign as champion has been very good. More entertaining than others like Cena's and ADR's. But he hasnt been in the main event of a PPV since December.

That IMO devalues the title.

 

[Workrate]

Back in the 80's, there were only a few PPV's a year AND the champion was kept off of TV. The champion never grew stale because it was a treat to see him a few times a year on TV. It kept feuds fres and entertaining as opposed to today, where John Cena would beat an opponent, Then a month later he's wrestling the same guy in a stipulatin match and then again a month after that.

That's a great point. I remember tuning into Raw as a kid because I wanted to see Bret Hart, but you never had any idea if he was going to be on the show or not. Usually he wasn't. It wasn't even like he didn't wrestle -- he would just not appear at all in any capacity. And this was whether he was the champion or not.

Now, that said, I don't think leaving stars off the program is a particularly good idea. But the contrast is interesting. I mean, would so many people feel such vitriol towards Cena if he was only on cable once a month?

 

[I_Like_All_Wrestling]

The other big, obvious problem with the WWE Championship is the World Heavyweight Championship. I love the big gold belt itself, but it needs to go away (and re-design the WWE strap while you're at it). It has been years since the title felt like a separate entity -- now it just feels like we have a WWE Champion and then that other champion. It's awkward and it sort of defies logic: the WWE Champion is the champion of this company but the World Champion is the champion of the entire planet?

Exactly. Having a champion is meaningless when you actually have 2 champions. And then two champions underneath them. And them tag team champions when there's only one tag team who feuds with two singles stars thrown together. Hell, I watch WWE each week and I almost never remember who the US and Intercontinental champions are. There's too many championships that mean the same thing. There should be one champion, one midcard champion, and I think a TV title is a good title to bring in, probably getting rid of the US title.

Beyond that. Who hasn't been champion these days? Cena, Orton, Punk, Jericho, Del Rio, Miz, Mysterio, Big Show, Sheamus, Lesnar, Daniel Bryan, Mark Henry, Khali, Jack Swagger, Christian, and Kane have all been "champion" champions. Even Ziggler was champion for like 3 minutes. Then you can throw in The Undertaker, The Rock, HHH, and Booker T as champions too. They're easy to dismiss as "legends" though. Barret almost certainly is going to be a champion at some point, whether you like it or not. And I wouldn't be surprised to see Otunga somehow get the belt.

There are some midcard guys like R-Truth, Cody, Kofi, etc... who are fine where they are.

But when almost everyone is a champion, there are two of them, and it changes hands 20x a year...no, it's not important.

 

[ECW Sandman]

The Championship would be important if they got rid of The US belt and The Big Gold Belt.

I like the big gold belt but with having the super show now It is just stupid to have both champions on Raw every week I know it gives more people the chance to be a champion but keep it simple either go back to having the smack down guys on smack down raw guys on raw or just get rid of some titles.

Here's what they should do

Keep the WWE Title but update it to the Classic WWF Winged Eagle Belt

Get rid of The Big Gold Belt

Keep the Classic WWF/E IC Title

Get rid of The US Belt

Update the WWE Tag Titles to the Classic WWF style

Get rid of the ''Spartan Heads ''

and just redesign the Diva's Title and get rid of that stupid butterfly looking belt.

 

[Midnight_express]

The main reason for the refusal to trim the number of titles in my opinion is due to the failures of creative.....cannt think of a storyline for this guy and this guy....give them a belt to feud over. Added to this the lack of charisma todays talent have compared to the past.

Guys like jake the snake, roddy piper, million dollar man, jimmy snuka etc could captivate you and make you watch just by being entertaining, guys like hogan, savage etc were given the title as they were special, THEY made the title important, these days its the other way around.

 

[Wald]

No.

Twice in the last three Wrestlemanias the WWE title match hasn't closed the show. In the old days you could have had a card full of jobbers wrestling a 180 minute battle royale for the undercard so long as Hogan was fighting for the title at the end.

 

[The Perfect Max]

As much as I agree that the WWE Championship just gets tossed around the place, may I remind you Punk has been champion for over 160 days. Just saying. But, for the most part in the past five years, this has been the case. With that being said, some would say "No, the title isn't more important", I disagree.

I agree with what YOU are saying when you say stars are only made now when they win the title. In the past five years, the only exception I can think of that defeat this is CM Punk, but even then, the WWE Championship win really, really helped.

In many ways, it is, because today, when you win the title, it can make you big, but in other ways, it may not matter, because, in The Miz's case, you just get chucked to a pre-show match, one year after he headlined the event.

 

[sdelfin]

I think today's society calls for a champion every few months because everybody has a short attention span. Look how fast technology goes in and out of style, today iPhone 4, 6 months from mow there will be an iPhone5. There are also too many PPv's so you have to have a title defense every month.

True. Not sure if the attention span thing really is true or not, but I've heard it. Title defenses on PPV every month wouldn't be too bad if they didn't have the title defended on regular TV as often or give away potential PPV main events(Punk vs. Miz, Punk vs. Ziggler, Punk vs. Bryan) on free TV as often, especially if they're going to make those actual PPV matches shortly after.

 

[Mantis]

Championships are less important today because of the simple fact that "John Cena vs Part-Timer" is more prestigious than both World Titles.

 

[Jack-Hammer]

First, as in regards to the "big guy" thing. In my eyes, this is one of the most heavily perpetuated myths in all of pro wrestling, in WWE especially. In this day and age, you hear a lot of internet fans complaining about only "big men" being the big stars in WWE and you also hear it from some former wrestlers that never made it as far as they believe they should have. In a lot of instances, they try to put the blame on the "size" thing. Most of the great stars to come out of wrestling during the 80s weren't these massive freaks of nature. Guys that were built like Hogan, Warrior and Luger during the 80s especially did not grow on trees, despite however much some try to insist otherwise. Guys like Flair, Steamboat, and Savage weren't exactly "big guys". All three of them were around the 6 foot mark and weighed probably in the 225-235 pound mark in the prime years of their careers. It's easy to point at guys like Hogan & Warrior and say that they got pushed only because of their size but the actual truth is that they kept people's attention and interest. While I personally think neither of them were anything special to watch inside the ring, they still drew huge crowds and lots of money. At the end of the day, that's what Vince cares about. If it was just about "big men", then how could guys like HBK, Bret Hart, Chris Jericho, Chris Benoit & Rey Mysterio go on to the main event scene?

When it comes to the importance of a title, at least among internet fans, as usual, internet fans tend to be their own worst enemy. You can't please everybody, there's no way to do that but even when WWE does something quite good, they get as much criticism as when they do something "bad". Some will scream that they want longer title reigns but will start to complain after a guy has the title for 3 months. They claim to want epic feuds like back in the old days but like so many other aspects of pro wrestling, many of them remember the "old days" as being much better than they actually were. A lot of people talk of Hogan's days as WWF Champion back in the 80s as a grand time but, in all honesty, how many truly great feuds & matches did Hogan have during his first WWF Championship run? How many of these championship matches were truly the stuff that dreams were made of? How many of his challengers gave us matches that were truly the stuff of greatness? The answer to all those questions is: not very many at all. If you go back and compare Hogan vs. Andre to Punk vs. Cena, in terms of compelling promos & of course match quality, Hogan vs. Andre is an embarassment compared to Punk vs. Cena.

Wrestling has had to change since the 80s because everything else in the world has changed from movies to television to music to politics. Wrestling has a generally stronger & more extensive presence on television now than it had in the 80s. While I loved Prime Time Wrestling when I was a kid, most of the matches shown on PTW were matches filmed at house shows that usually weren't all that hot to begin with. Having a WWF Championship match on PTW was EXTREMELY rare, thus it may have had more of an important feel to it. It's just not that way now because it can't be, not with the way media & technology are today.

At the end of the day, I consider a title important when a champion is able to do his most important job: make me care about what he's doing. Miz, Bryan & Punk have been able to do that and do it extremely well. I'm not going to quivel over nonsensities such as how they may or may not have gotten over in the 80s because, quite frankly, I don't give a damn. The 80s are gone and while fun, weren't nearly as great as some hype that age to be, same thing with the Attitude Era. As long as I've got compelling wrestlers involved in interesting feuds & great matches that keep me interested in what they're doing as champion, then that's all that matters in my opinion.

 

[VeryReal1980]

The championship is not important at all!!! It has no value. Back in the 80's you never saw a champion lose so often. It seems as if the wrestlers these days have no charisma and the writers forgot how to write. They collect a check and go try another form of entertainment.... THen come back again for the second time.

 

[Headman]

It's less important now than it's ever been. When the title is on the top guy in the company it's important. When the title is defended in the middle of the show it's not. There is a misguided notion that putting the belt on someone is the only way to make them a star. I disagree. I believe you have to find a star and then put the belt on him.

 

[asiatic7]

Now, that said, I don't think leaving stars off the program is a particularly good idea.

Today's product can't afford to leave a Major star off TV for weeks at a time because everything is driven by ratings. As a fan I just want to enjoy the product and not have what I'm watching affected by ratings, merchandise sales and fake twitter trends. But the times are different and the world is a much different place for a kid who grew up watching WWF Superstars, saturday mornings in the 80's. I agree with your point, but, The championship suffers and loses prestige because of this. To me, it's not the same championship held by Bruno, Backlund and Hogan. Eras were defined by these men at different times. Now eras are defined by who trending on twitter and it makes me sick.

 

[STILLNWO4LIFE]

The championship doesn't mean shit compared to what it used to mean. The championship now is just a draw to give the current superstar a bigger following. Superstars don't hold the titles as long as they used to back in the day neither. I would like to see the Championship have bigger regulations as who gets to hold it and if they can carry the title with pride. These stars that don't get the title or don't get that big shot like Mr. Perfect and all of those guys back in the day, you can't have that these days because they just get buried and until the WWE changes that attitude, forget about the championship meaning anything.