The Official WWE Championships Thread

[PlayTheGame]

Since 2006/John Cena's 280 day reign with the WWE Championship where Super Cena began, there's been an astounding 34 WWE Title Reigns. That's right, the belt's changed hands 34 times in just 6 years! Whether you think this is good or bad for the product/the belt, everyone can agree that that is a very, very high number. On average, that's about a new WWE Champion every 2 months. Now, I'm not saying it should be like the old days, where Sammartino would hold the belt for years at a time. That would be boring and rather unbelievable. But I do feel like a new champion every 2 months is too extreme in the other direction. I'd rather have a few less reigns. What makes this number even more surprising is that this doesn't even count all the reigns that guys are getting with the World Heavyweight Championship as well. It's surprising that the WWE belt is getting thrown around so much when the WHW Title is also up for grabs and changes hands on a regular basis as well. What are your feelings on this suprising statistic? Do you think the WWE Title changes hands too much, not enough, or is it just right? Discuss.

 

[Vinco Menz]

That there are this many title changes in wrestiling is just a sad fact about this generation. These title changes totally devalue the belts and make them seem like total props. Sure, they are props, but they used to be props with meaning and value. You could believe that someone would really try and devote their entire life to try and win a WWE World Title. Now I just view it as a cool shinny thing that people pass around like they are playing hot potatoe. Sure, a lot of the blame for this fall on creative, but some of the blame also falls on the fans. Fans today get bored with a title reign if its longer than 4 months. God forbid if a title reign lasts six to eight months. They just get tired of seeing the same guy as champ and complain about their flavor of the month superstar not getting the main event push they "deserve". I'm sorry, but some people are just not main event material and should not be anywhere near a world title, but since there is a title change every two months some of the undeserving get these title reigns just so the real main eventers do not get a rediculous amount of reigns and beat Flair's record. The shortest a title reign should ever be to really be taken seriously is 3-4 months, preferably on the 4 side. Any shorter, it is a joke and a fluke reign, unless you have a pretty damn good story or a legit injury to necassitate a change.

 

[Nate DaMac]

March 29, 1998 Steve Austin wins the WWF Championship.

April 1, 2001 Steve Austin wins the WWE Championship.

Including these 2 reigns, there were 22 WWE Title reigns in the 3 year window between Wrestlemanias 14 and 17. This isn't some new generation thing, this is the same shit that's been going on for more than a decade. To act like it's somehow worse now when in all actuality things have gotten an awful lot better is fucking ridiculous. Length of title reigns, number of title reigns, none of this bullshit matters. It's about the quality. Period.

 

[Raptor93]

obviously short title reigns do devalue the belt but not all are bad, ie losing the title immediately to a money in the bank type situation helps feuds, but by that nature I acctual don't like the whole losing it right at elimination chamber mainly or when christian won it as it was completely obvious the face was going to get it straight back. Case in point many but not all short title reigns are bad

 

[PlayTheGame]

I think title reigns do matter, but to an extent. Sure, the quality is what it's mainly about, that's the entertainment part. But the "sport" part of it is where the titles come into play, they are supposed to be the point of professional wrestling, at least storyline wise. So when a guy finally wins, or racks up numerous world title reigns, a level of respect should go along with that. Title wins and regins often define wreslters' careers. A defining moment in HBK's career was when he finally won the championship for the first time, and he cried holding the belt in the ring. A career's worth of work finally culminating in that moment. I think they CAN be special, but all of this title-changing, especially in recent years, is not good. Sure, it happened in the late 90's as well, but it slowed down a bit in the mid 00's with JBL's long reign and some of Cena's reigns. But now it seems to be picking back up again, which is a shame. If it slowed down a bit, I think there would be a happy medium.

 

[Azane]

You can't cheapen the top titles, because they are the ultimate prize, them being hot potatoed just makes it seem like there's more competition, more title swaps shows that people want the title and covet it more.

a 10 year reign today would kill the product, absolutely would not make the belts any more valuable, you'd either have 10 years of a Goldberg style character, or 10 years of barely defending a belt nobody cares about.


Honky Tonk Man is not the most prestigious IC champion in history, there's a dozen names above him on that list, even though he has the longest reign.

There should never be a "quota" on how often title swaps happen, saying "3 per year" is more awful than having 20 swaps unannounced. The best way to work it is to simply take it feud by feud. Having a surprisingly long reign like Miz's last year was refreshing, but anyone with the title as long as he held it begins to stale out, and of course shelf lives vary. JBL went a whole year with a world title after jumping up from a career jobber, and it took him from being a staple of the lower-midcard to being a HoFer. On the same note, Sheamus has 2 super short title reigns, but they've pushed his career up to the point he's a credible threat for the main event on any given Sunday.

Prestige in general is a funny thing, because relevancy is way more important than any prestige. Although it's a little off topic, giving belts to non-wrestlers like David Arquette or Russo are the only situations I would say prestige is legitimately lost on a belt, where as hot potatoing can raise it.

I don't remember short reigns, but Sheamus' reigns were short, but relevant, and I'll remember he's a 2 time champion more than I'll remember Orton held the belt for 246 days on his 7th reign (made that up, but you get the point)

Another good example is Christian getting the title, for 5 days then for nearly a month, short titles, but you will remember that Christian was a champion, that's more relevant to his career than the fact he spent half a decade out of the company.

 

[Harthan]

I don't think it's a thing you can paint unilaterally. I don't think you can look at 34 title reigns in six years and say "Oh, well, all of that was bad". There's such a thing as a good one month reign. There's such a thing as an awful year long reign. The converse is true for both cases. I don't think it's possible to talk about quality of the product in terms of trends in title length - or, rather, it's possible, but it's not particularly practical or useful. There is no such thing as a predetermined length for a title reign to be good, and I don't care what anyone says, the frequency of title change will not change the fact that the WWE Championship is still the WWE Championship and it will always be the most important prize in professional wrestling, whether there's 34 title changes in six years or six title changes in 34 years.

What's more important in determining whether an individual title reign was quality, and, relevant to the topic at hand, whether a series of title reigns were quality, is, quite tautologically, their quality. Jeff Hardy had the perfect one month reign at the end of 2008. John Cena had a bland reign of epic proportions. The frequency of these title reigns were not important. What happened during them is.

 

[Nate DaMac]

I think title reigns do matter, but to an extent. Sure, the quality is what it's mainly about, that's the entertainment part. But the "sport" part of it is where the titles come into play, they are supposed to be the point of professional wrestling, at least storyline wise. So when a guy finally wins, or racks up numerous world title reigns, a level of respect should go along with that.

I completely agree. I think we missed each other here, my bad. I wasn't saying that the number of title reigns an individual has is irrelevant, just that the number of champions/reigns in a given amount of time is irrelevant.

Title wins and regins often define wreslters' careers. A defining moment in HBK's career was when he finally won the championship for the first time, and he cried holding the belt in the ring. A career's worth of work finally culminating in that moment. I think they CAN be special, but all of this title-changing, especially in recent years, is not good. Sure, it happened in the late 90's as well, but it slowed down a bit in the mid 00's with JBL's long reign and some of Cena's reigns. But now it seems to be picking back up again, which is a shame. If it slowed down a bit, I think there would be a happy medium.

I fail to see your point here. Winning your first championship or being a multiple time champion is still as big a deal as it ever has been. I don't understand how length has anything to do with it.

I see it like this. Championships are important, but the overall goal is to sell your product. I'll use an example from last year; Randy Orton's feud with Christian. Now a lot of people(including myself) were pretty damn upset that Christian dropped the WHC title to Orton in just 5 days. But little did we know, we were in store for what would likely be the most well booked feud of the year.

Now by Money in the Bank, Christian had already been defeated multiple times. If he didn't win then he really could have no reason to still keep going after the title and as a result, Orton would have to build a feud with a completely different challenger for the second biggest PPV of the year, Summerslam. So instead, they go ahead and give the title to Christian in a snaky way, the spend the next few weeks with Orton losing his temper, and at Summerslam, we get to see a clinic on blowing off a feud. Now here we have Christian getting a short little title reign, but in the progress, we added a whole new dimension to an already great feud.

On the flip side, I'll use your example of JBL. He held onto to that damn title for nearly a year and it was one of the most boring fucking years ever for Smackdown. No great feuds, no great blowoff matches, just month after month of JBL. Sure, Cena taking it off of him was a decent moment, but it should have been way bigger than it was. Imagine how much bigger it could have been if he would have taken the title off of someone even remotely relevant? If say, Triple H happened to be the title holder and even if he had only had it for 2 months, it would have been a much bigger deal.

Like I keep saying, the length of a title reign is meaningless.

 

[PlayTheGame]

I completely agree. I think we missed each other here, my bad. I wasn't saying that the number of title reigns an individual has is irrelevant, just that the number of champions/reigns in a given amount of time is irrelevant.



I fail to see your point here. Winning your first championship or being a multiple time champion is still as big a deal as it ever has been. I don't understand how length has anything to do with it.

I see it like this. Championships are important, but the overall goal is to sell your product. I'll use an example from last year; Randy Orton's feud with Christian. Now a lot of people(including myself) were pretty damn upset that Christian dropped the WHC title to Orton in just 5 days. But little did we know, we were in store for what would likely be the most well booked feud of the year.

Now by Money in the Bank, Christian had already been defeated multiple times. If he didn't win then he really could have no reason to still keep going after the title and as a result, Orton would have to build a feud with a completely different challenger for the second biggest PPV of the year, Summerslam. So instead, they go ahead and give the title to Christian in a snaky way, the spend the next few weeks with Orton losing his temper, and at Summerslam, we get to see a clinic on blowing off a feud. Now here we have Christian getting a short little title reign, but in the progress, we added a whole new dimension to an already great feud.

On the flip side, I'll use your example of JBL. He held onto to that damn title for nearly a year and it was one of the most boring fucking years ever for Smackdown. No great feuds, no great blowoff matches, just month after month of JBL. Sure, Cena taking it off of him was a decent moment, but it should have been way bigger than it was. Imagine how much bigger it could have been if he would have taken the title off of someone even remotely relevant? If say, Triple H happened to be the title holder and even if he had only had it for 2 months, it would have been a much bigger deal.

Like I keep saying, the length of a title reign is meaningless.

I think you make some good points, and I totally agree that JBL's reign was bad, and that some shorter reigns are definitely good. It is always fun to see a guy all of a sudden lose his belt from a MiTB cash-in, for example. So, I'm totally with you there. Overall, I agree it is quality over length. I guess its just shocking looking at the number that 34 reigns have occurred in a few years. I'm not calling for WWE to take out all those "short" reigns in favor of "long" ones, because I agree that's not where the quality lies, but maybe just to be more careful as to who and when they give the belt to. I think the reason why 34 reigns is shocking is because, how many memorable ones were there? If the product had been stellar since 2006, I probably wouldn't have ever created this thread or thought about it in the first place... but since 34 reigns have gone by with some lackluster years, it looks as if the WWE is just throwing darts at a board and hoping for the best. 34 reigns + a bad product = skepticism, at least for me.

 

[thebarber]

my problem is the title belt itself. The current WWE Championship belt is disgraceful. The World Title is a rip off of the old WCW Title, ironic since Vince doesnt like using things that are not his own creation. fIX THE TITLE BELT SO IT LOOKS LIKE A CREDIBLE CHAMPIONSHIP, then book the title around solid wrestlers in proper storylines. This is how the belt will retain its value

 

[Azane]

With your "throwing darts and hoping" point, it's kind of funny, because this is how you can create stars.

Some nobody mid carder gets a World Title, he becomes a star, and wins the Royal Rumble a couple years later while still toting a former world championship to make him more credible, Sheamus did this, and it made him a very strong contendor.

Jack Swagger was a polar opposite, he got thrown into the ME from nowhere, nobody gave him a chance, and his reign fizzled out.

Bad product or not, Cena holding the belt for 5 years would be so much worse than 34 reigns. (even if 7 were his)

 

[DeathClutch]

1. The reason why long title runs don't happen today like they back in the 80s and backover is simple, they only had a handful of big shows PPV quality, so title runs could be long and feel fresh, nowadays the champions can be on 2+ shows each week, back in the 80s I bet the champion was on 1 show per MONTH. Nowadays it just wouldn't work.

2. The belt being the hot potato is fine by me; I certainly don't need to see the belt on Cena nor Orton for long periods, neither need the belt their over the fans know they're the main guys so allow the younger guys or the Christians who are over but just not at that level as the Cena's or Orton's allow them to get the belts and play musical chairs with them allow the fans the illusion that these guys can compete with the Orton's and Cena's and win cleanly give them the opportunity they other wise wouldn't get if WWE weren't playing musical chairs.

John Cena having the belt from 06-07 for 13 Months was tidious but it allowed the fans to get behind people they wouldn't normally in the off chance they are the guy to defeat him, Orton was screwed that Cena was injured but at least Orton did get a nice clean win over Cena at WM24 which kind of righted that wrong.

Long runs should be fun, and not against guys the fans know you'll defeat that was Cena's problem in 2006-2007, the only guy anyone though would defeat Cena was Shawn at WM23 other than that it was a given Cena would win.

 

[NegativeFeedback]

Edge def. John Cena (Elimination Chamber)
John Cena def. Edge (Royal Rumble)
RVD def. John Cena (One Night Stand)
Edge def. RVD, Cena (Raw)
John Cena def. Edge (Unforgiven)
Randy Orton is awarded WWE title (No Mercy)
Triple H def. Randy Orton (No Mercy)
Randy Orton def. Triple H (No Mercy)
Triple H def. Randy Orton (Backlash)
Edge def. Triple H, Kozlov (Survivor Series)
Jeff Hardy def. Edge, Triple H (Armageddon)
Edge def. Jeff Hardy (Royal Rumble)
Triple H wins Chamber (No Way Out)
Randy Orton and Legacy def. Triple H, Batista and Shane (Backlash)
Batista def. Randy Orton (Extreme Rules)
Randy Orton def. Triple H, Cena, Big Show (Raw)
John Cena def. Randy Orton (Breaking Point)
Randy Orton def. John Cena (Hell in a Cell)
John Cena def. Randy Orton (Bragging Rights)
Sheamus def. John Cena (TLC)
John Cena wins Chamber (Elimination Chamber)
Batista def. John Cena (Elimination Chamber)
John Cena def. Batista (WrestleMania)
Sheamus def. John Cena (Fatal 4 Way)
Randy Orton def. Sheamus, Wade, Cena, Jericho, Edge (Night of Champions)
The Miz def. Randy Orton (Raw)
John Cena def. The Miz, John Morrison (Extreme Rules)
CM Punk def. John Cena (Money in the Bank)
Rey Mysterio def. The Miz (Raw)
John Cena def. Rey Mysterio (Raw)
Alberto Del Rio def. CM Punk (SummerSlam)
John Cena def. Alberto Del Rio (Night of Champions)
Alberto del Rio def. John Cena, CM Punk (Hell in a Cell)
CM Punk def. Alberto Del Rio (Survivor Series)

Taking in accounts everything from storylines, suspensions, big reveals, booking decisions, and so on, I'd say that of those 34 title reigns, 12 of these were completely unnecessary.

The first two unnecessary reigns were when Triple H and Randy Orton played Hot Potato for the title at No Mercy. If it at least led to an immediate feud, it would have made sense, but instead it was a one-night feud that went nowhere. Instead of rewarding Randy, they could have had Triple H vs. Randy for the title with Randy coming out on top.

Edge winning the title at Survivor Series was also lame. If Jeff was winning at Armageddon, they didn't need to have Edge enter as Champion. Jeff should have beat Triple H for the title. It doesn't matter he lost it to Edge at the next PPV, that made sense due to the Matt Hardy storyline (which sucked), but Edge didn't need this transitional reign.

The most useless reign of them all is Batista winning the Steel Cage at Extreme Rules. It was rumored that he was injured, but he won the title anyway and vacated it the next night. That doesn't make any sense. If it at least led to someone else as champion, I would understand, but Randy got it back anyway so this literally served no purpose.

John Cena and Randy Orton then played Hot Potato with the Championship. In my opinion, this devalues the title. Cena won at BP, Orton won at HiaC and then Cena again at Bragging Rights. If only they would have held off on Cena's win until Hell in a Cell, he could have won the rematch at BR and we wouldn't have had 2 unnecessary reigns.

Batista beating Cena right after his Chamber win was dumb as hell. They didn't need to give Cena the title and take it away immediately. Just like a Money in the Bank win, except instead of putting over a young star, it was putting over Batista -_-

The next dumb reigns are due to the double-champion fiasco this summer that WWE didn't know how to handle. They had Rey win the title and immediately lose it to Cena as if Cena were a bully heel. When Batista did it in the Chamber, it was horrible, but when Cena did it to Rey, it was completely okay. They could have moved the tournament finals to SummerSlam with a Cena/Rey main event, something a lot of kids would have loved to see. After Cena's win, they could have nullified his reign due to Punk returning. Two champions at the same time is dumb and WWE certainly devalued the title with that little tidbit.

Last but not least, the Del Rio and Cena rivalry played Hot Potato just like Orton/Triple H, TripleH/Jeff/Edge and Orton/Cena rivalries that preceded it. Cena won the title at Night of Champions, just to lose it at the Cell and give Punk the win at Survivor Series. It would have made more sense for Punk to feud with Del Rio all the way until Survivor Series where he would win back the title. Del Rio and Cena didn't need to switch if the end result was going to be putting Punk over.

Anyway, had all those feud been handled correctly, we'd be looking at 22 instead of 34 which to me isn't that high for a period of 7 years. Plus, John Cena would be an 8-time World Champion, instead of 12. That goes to show you how insignificant some of those reigns were.

 

[mb47]

To start I think it's fair to say we all agree it's the quality of the title reign over the length of the reign.

With that said my personal opinion on the matter is that 34 reigns in 6/7 years is too much. Yes quality is the main factor of a title reign however as Feedback said a lot of the changes were pointless, they had no reason for the title to change that many times or at certain points. Alright it might create a little unexpected curve ball but why not just put faith in whoever has the title and give the curve ball as an unexpected way the champion retains?

To me it comes down to multiple factors overall and I want to quickly break down these factors;

1. Quality - Yes the title reign has to be of a high quality, a good feud for the champion with a good story behind it and some great in ring work.

2. Length - Length isn't as important but it still matters, if someone wins the title and loses it less than a week later you de-value the person, not the belt. It looks like a fluke win, a one off and makes them less credible as a main event opponent.

3. Match finishes - If the champion is heel and won cleanly to get the title then they can't suddenly go about cheating to win every time, again you de-value the person. In the case of D.Bryan he didn't get a "clean" win so to speak so slipping and sliding his way to keep retaining is smart, it builds him, not breaks him.

Agree, disagree, that's your call but bare in mind this is just my opinion. However I'm happy to explain things in more depth if anyone would like!

 

[Headman]

This complaint comes from the same community that is always screaming "Give someone new a chance!". Well guess what, when you give someone new a chance they usually fail. I would rather longer reigns myself because a year long Cena reign doesn't bother me like it bothers most of you. I think the title should never stray too far from the top guy in the company, but as long as the "Give someone new a chance!" crowd is around the title will continue to change hands every other month.

 

[akrassikauda]

my problem is the title belt itself. The current WWE Championship belt is disgraceful. The World Title is a rip off of the old WCW Title, ironic since Vince doesnt like using things that are not his own creation. fIX THE TITLE BELT SO IT LOOKS LIKE A CREDIBLE CHAMPIONSHIP, then book the title around solid wrestlers in proper storylines. This is how the belt will retain its value

It's Vince's company it's his belt he can have it look anyway he damn pleases. The look of a belt shouldn't matter,what should matter is who has the title and are they over as champ not the damn look.

 

[LoudClearVoice]

Money in the Bank has definitely raised the number of reigns. You really have to look closely at some of the numbers though to really understand what's going on. For example Dolph Ziggler has WHC reign that was what like 5 mins? Big Show won the World title only to have MITB cashed in right there by DB, so there's two title reigns right there. I'm looking at WWE and World Title reigns as a whole. The number is much higher than 34 when you combine both belts.

It's really tough to say what a good number of reigns is. If the belts don't change hands a lot, then people will get sick of the champions saying so and so has been champ for too long, but if they keep changing hands every month, people feel it devalues the titles.

One of things I like about the belts changing hands with some regularity is that at any given PPV, anything possible. You know it's possible that the belt will change hands. When the belts would never change hands before, you knew that the champ was probably going to retain although some felt it was more special when the belt changed hands back in the day due to infrequency of that happening.

The brand split and addition of a second "world" title has also increased the number of reigns. I think they should unify the WWE and World title and call it the Undisputed WWE World Championship. That to me, sounds very prestigious. Let everyone on every roster compete for it.

 

[dwith]

It's way to many in my opinion. It is sad when ratings have an effect on who carries the title now adays. if your a champ and your ratings suck when your hold the title they drop it to someone until they find someone who hold's rating's better. Remember the WWE is not a wrestling company anymore they are ENTERTAINMENT, and that's where they care more about ratings than championship's.

 

[IHW]

I think they need to let CM Punk hold the title for at least 6 months. He is over and liked by many. Let him add credibility, then have him lose.

We don't really need to see more then 5 maybe 6 title changes a year. It deludes the Championship.

I also think that the MitB is a good idea, but it certainly wouldn't hurt to have someone cash in and lose. This adds more excitement when they cash in, because as of now we think "oh there he is if the bell sounds the title will change." By having someone cash in and lose, the Champion looks more credible and the belt wont change as much. Granted this is only happening 2, maybe 3 times now, a year, it is still normally ended in a pointless reign.

This is just my opinion of the title changing so much.

 

[Raiden46]

There's a very good reason for this. His name is John Cena. Research has shown that people enjoy watching their favorite stars win the belt more than anything else. Cena's record-breaking number of WWE titles is a result of what fans (not myself mind you) want to see. As long as there is interest in Cena, he'll keep winning more and more titles. It wouldn't shock me at all if he surpasses Ric Flair's championship total count one day.

 

[The Suplexer Perfecter]

So what? It's been 6 years. From 1997 to the end of 2002 there were even more reigns (38), which included the PRECIOUS Attitude Era.

None of you could withstand another 1 year Cena reign. People couldn't even stand Triple H's 9 month run with the World title.

 

[eddy_19]

hey, everybody here is complaining abt the short title reigns but, infact they increase the unpredictability of the WWE.
E.g. If we know that this person X has won the championship n he will have a long reign then for the nxt 6 months or so X will still be the champion, knowing that X is gonna win n retain the belt who will watch the ppvs in b/w of the title changes for those 6 months?? The result of the matches will be pretty obvious if they were to bring back the longer title reigns.. There wud be no shock factor..

 

[The Suplexer Perfecter]

hey, everybody here is complaining abt the short title reigns but, infact they increase the unpredictability of the WWE.
E.g. If we know that this person X has won the championship n he will have a long reign then for the nxt 6 months or so X will still be the champion, knowing that X is gonna win n retain the belt who will watch the ppvs in b/w of the title changes for those 6 months?? The result of the matches will be pretty obvious if they were to bring back the longer title reigns.. There wud be no shock factor..

"Unpredictability" is such a dumb idea. You don't need swerve for swerve's sake. Would you like it if you didn't get what you asked for your birthday because that would have been a "surprise"?

If I watch wrestling to see someone win, then that's "predictable". I saw what I wanted and got it, thus I'm happy.

Most things in wrestling that are unpredictable are trashed to no end. If Santino were to win the world title on Sunday, EVERYONE would bash it. But that was "unpredictable", so why complain about it if it were to happen?

 

[HBKperfect23]

Theres definitly too many title changes. And this problem did start in the attitude era. Everything is too rushed. It seems to have improved slightly with Cena and Punks runs. Also, the title would be more credible if there was only one world title. My biggest problem is as soon as someone gets over they become world champion. Build them, let them get over in the mid card for awhile. Dolph Ziggler is a perfect example. Hes a great mid card champion and should be world champion some day but had no business with the meaningless reign he already had. Also Jack Swagger and Alberto Del Rio both fall into that category.

 

[midgensa]

There have been some very good points here, but to act like this is a new thing is pretty off. As Nate pointed out, this has gone back LONG before Super Cena.

In the six years following Super Cena's loss to Edge there have been 34 champions over a 2,233 day period (assuming Punk holds the title until at least Sunday). That is an average reign of 66 days give or take.

For a similar sample size we can look at the six years prior to Super Cena beating JBL at WrestleMania there were (going back to March 28, 1999 with Stone Cold winning the belt) there were 30 champions in 2,198 days for an average reign of 73 days. Hardly that big of a difference.

In the six years prior to that (back to April 4, 1993) ... there were 23 champions in 2,184 days for an average reign of 95 days ... which is still only three months, but definitely is longer than the reigns today.

It is simple ... the beginning of Monday Night Raw in February of 1993 leading into WrestleMania IX forever changed the landscape of the world championship. Instead of having to defend it every now and then with longer, more drawn out storylines surrounding it ... it had to be defended even more and the target of even more main eventers.

As we saw with both WCW and WWE having two shows at a time (Nitro/Thunder and RAW/Smackdown!) we saw even more title changes taking place (lets not even get into how ridiculous WCW got with it). It simply is not going to change any time soon. Reigns that last longer than four or five months get stale and make booking very difficult. It is an easy way to turn a face to a heel because the crowd gets bored.

They still need the long reigns mixed in every now and then ... but smaller reigns will always be a part of the game from here on out.