U.S title > I.C. title

[emceelokey]

I was watching Smackdown and MVP made his debut with the U.S championship belt and I just started to think that the way the U.S. title has been used has been better than the way the I.C. belt has.

I think the way they have used the u.S. title has made the title not seem like a secondary title. It doesn't seem like that "launching pad" title and it has it's own prestige. To me it doesn't seem like it's just given out to whoever they want to push. It seems more like the people actually work up tp that belt and strive for the U.S. belt opposed to the way the I.C. belt has been used. To me the I.C. belt always seems to be an after thought in a match. It's like whoever wins this match, and oh yeah, the I.C. belt was up in this match and he gets that too for winning.

It may just be the fact that the I.C. belt is on Raw and it's pretty much impossible to break into the main event card there. they brought in Khali and had Lashley take up three segments on Raw! They could have totally used thse segments to really push someone toward the main event status but I guess Cena, HBK, HHH, Flair... have made money for them before and they'll continue try to milk that for as long as possible.

One of the things that I really liked about the U.S. title was that JBL won it after being the Heavy Weight champ. It gave the U.S. champ more respect to see a former world champ "take a step down" and actually give the belt a push. Also another former world champion, Benoit and his extended run with the belt made that belt even more of a prestigeous belt over the I.C. title.

 

[Cracker5000]

I totally agree since the SD writers are giving the title to those who deserved it and are not trading it around. The U.S title is featured every week on SD unlike Raw where they have some greenhorn hogging the belt. Santino who?

 

[Slyfox696]

While people complain about long title reigns, one cannot deny that extended runs with a title help to give a title more prestige. Because it makes it very clear that the champion is one of the best, and whoever beats them, must be damn good.

I totally agree since the SD writers are giving the title to those who deserved it and are not trading it around. The U.S title is featured every week on SD unlike Raw where they have some greenhorn hogging the belt. Santino who?

I think it's Santino Mozzarella.

 

[justinsayne]

I agree he US title is a far superior title to the IC title, but then SD! has always known how to use their title belts more to their advantage, giving Benoit the title so so long was good for the US belt because it added pestige to it making it seem like an important title, the IC title just seems like an empty prop, nobody really cares about it anymore, they should have MR. Mozzerella defending his title every week, or at leat doing something on the show, if not then they should just give the belt tyo someone that can make it worth while to have again, like oh I don't know Carlito maybe

 

[Shocky]

The US title has been the more prestigous of the two since they brought both of the belts back from their respective hiatus's. The IC title use to symbolize a guy was bouncing up to main event level, yet no one on raw has broke that barricade down. Multiple title swapping between Jeff Hardy and Johnny Nitro have drug that title into meaningless status, and then putting it on Umaga and hotshotting it to Santino Mozzarella have buried it.

The feud between MVP and Benoit alone has been better then anything the IC title has provided the last 4 years.

 

[Moon Knight]

The US title has been the more prestigous of the two since they brought both of the belts back from their respective hiatus's. The IC title use to symbolize a guy was bouncing up to main event level, yet no one on raw has broke that barricade down. Multiple title swapping between Jeff Hardy and Johnny Nitro have drug that title into meaningless status, and then putting it on Umaga and hotshotting it to Santino Mozzarella have buried it.

The feud between MVP and Benoit alone has been better then anything the IC title has provided the last 4 years.

What? If anything that MVP/Benoit fued has left me sleeping before MVP even opens his big mouth! The Hardy/Nitro fued was pretty good as those 2 single handedly rebuilt that IC title into something wtachable again, did you miss their ladder match in november on raw? That was a match of the year canidate and one of the best matches they have done in 4 years! I haven't seen the crowd so into a match since the attitude era and was flat out awesome. But the IC title got trashed when umaga got it and never defended it and them Santino Morella, who is a hell of a wrestler, watch him OVW..BRILLIANT..Just wasted here. The IC title went from above the WWE title to below the european title in a short peroid of time. (That bad)


The US title is just as lame and sad. I have yet to see a match worth watching and MVP is starting to grow thin on me, it's the lack of talent behind it that harms it. The US title is only about 2 inches better then the IC right now and 1 inch from deserving to be tossed in the trashed.

 

[A.J.]

For me both these belts are worth nothing anymore. Honestly the last time these belt were used to bring a mid-card wrestler to the main event level and establish that wrestler as future star was when randy Orton was holding the Intercontinental championship and John Cena holding the United States championship.

Since then these belts have been tossed around and none of the young guys who have held these belts gone to the main event scene except Lashley if you want to count that. Hell you can say Kennedy but the man never held the belt long enough before they took it off him for Benoit.

These belts mean nothing and they hold no valve like they used to as they dont do what they used to it which is help established a young star and eventually that young gun will become a main event player.

 

[emceelokey]

I don't see the U.S. title as that "launch pad" title anymore though. It's has it's own prestige now. It really seems like the 2nd best person on the SD roster is holding that belt. The IC belt does just seem like a prop and holds no meaning right now. I definitely don't think Morella is the 2nd best person on RAW and I don't know why people aren't fighting their asses off for a shot at the IC belt. The US belt at least has someone fighting to hold it and wanting to hold it. This is how I'm going to explain my view on each belt. WHen the UFC does the Ultimate Fighter finales for each season they fight for the contract. Whoever wins also ends up getting something extra as well such as a car or watch or whatever. To em the U.S. belt is that contract. This is what they're out there for. This is why they go out and fight. The I.C. belt is like that watch they also win. It's like, I finally won that contract... oh and I get a watch too. Cool.

 

[Cracker5000]

They don't build any hype for the IC belt. WWE just randomly puts title matches together just like the Masters vs Mozerella match recently. You can hear the crowd reactions to when they mention the IC title, they don't give a shit.
The IC title used to have a proud legacy of great superstars holding on to this championship (with the exceptions of some) such as Stone Cold, The Rock, HHH, Angle, Y2J, Flair but now it's given out like candy to a guy from the audience.

 

[mentalsynapse]

I personaly think its a mixture of the belt not being respected and the lack of talent they have. Samckdown! arguably has the better talent at the moment, mid card wise, with Kennedy, MVP, Matt Hardy (even though he is on both shows), Benoit, Kane, Finlay... and the list goes on. These are the people that make that show watchable and the US Title respected. Any of these guys could have the title and we would be riveted to watch them compete for it.

Raw doesn't have such a diverse mid card talent anymore. Carlito could hold the belt, but who would fued with him? Hardy is a good wrestler but he couldn't talk his way out of a paper bag. Flair is just too old to hold the title, Morella is not established enough to hold it, Masters has been buried to much to be a credible champion, the same goes with Nitro.

I don't see any of the top tier wrestlers taking a step down to hold the title like Orton of HBK, and even if they did that would bury it again.
I think that the solution is that they should try and swap some of the mid tier wrestlers about between the three brands. Put CM Punk and Burke on Raw, Masters to ECW, and Finlay to Raw aswell to help give the title credibility.

As emceelokey pointed out, Raw is to busy promotiong their top tier fueds to bother with the IC Title at the moment and I think thats because their mid card aren't good enough entertainers, (note i said entertainers, not wrestlers. Many of them are aweseome wrestlers and i can watch them all day, but when they grab a mic I automatically want to go to sleep e.g Shelton Benjamin) so they are put aside, which leads to the IC title not being utilised as it used to be.

 

[Slyfox696]

*wonders to himself if people really think Santino's last name is Mozzarella*

And, in my opinion, what makes titles like the Intercontinental title and the United States title so weak is the fact that there are now 3 main-event belts.

So, basically, the ECW and the Smackdown titles play the part of the Television and Intercontinental titles and serve as the launching pad for careers, while the Raw title plays the one that everyone wants to shoot for.

 

[grum999]

The ic belt needs sum new challengers for it like cm punk or marcus cor von. The wwe should never have moved kane to smackdown because if they kept him in raw he could have challenged for the title. They should get lashley a shot at the ic belt because it would give the division a "bigger" star . They could even bring mark henry into raw or randy orton and make them and lashley have a feud for the title. The options are endless if the wwe were a bit more openminded and stopped trying to get too many big superstars into big feuds and give them a good title reign as champion.

The us title is better now because chris benoit who is a big star has been given an opportunity to hold it for a long time. But one thing a would say is that champions need to defend their titles alot and stop with these crappy non title matches which are so boring and pointless. I want to see a champion who has defended his title against all covers.

 

[joet1102]

This reminds me of Mick Foley's promo back in 2001. Right before the conclusion of The "Invasion" angle. He made a promo basically making matches to unify the WWF/WCW titles. What he said in the promo really left a mark in my head. Basically he said that having a championship just doesn't mean anything anymore. Everyone is a champion and it needed to come to an end. Thats the problem right now. Too many titles makes for the championships to become less credible. I realize that they are on different shows, but still the WWE has way too many championship title belts. If you ask me I think the IC belt loses its credibility because the US belt is around...and vice versa. But when ur asking which championship is more prestigious at this moment....id have to agree and say the US title is greater than the IC title. Just og to wwe.com right now and you'll see which title is pushed greater.

 

[Big Ace]

The Intercontinental Championship has lost so much prestige over the past few years. What happened to the days where men like Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels, and Chris Jericho would hold the Title? Somehow, that all turned into an ''italian'' winning the Title from the front row. Lost its mystique? I think so.

The US Title, which I expected to be treated like **** in WWE, due to it being a former WCW Title, has been being used the correct way the past few months. It's been used to keep former WWE Champs on the rebound and as a way to promote mid-carders to the Main Event. All you really have to do is compare MVP's character and Santino's character. MVP has been impressing not just me, but the IWC, lately with his impressive matches with Benoit. Did Benoit carry him? Probably. But I think that series of matches will have a positive affect on MVP.

In Santino's case, he was just at the right place at the right time. WWE needed another babyface and they thought he would be alright. Technically, I'm sure he's a good wrestler, but the guy's only had one or two matches. It's just not enough, and it makes him seem bad. When Jeff Hardy had the Title, it was white-hot, just like when Benoit and Rey had it. MVP is keeping it white-hot, but Santino? Not so much.

IC Title has just degenerated itself for awhile. It's not the Title that makes the man, it's the man that makes the Title. 'Nuff said.

 

[Slim Pickns]

The WWE seems to have lost its mind when it comes to the IC belt as of late. In late 2006 and early 2007 Jeff Hardy had the belt and was fueding with Johnny Nitro, Shelton Benjamin, and Carlito. That all went to shit in January after the WWE had Umaga win the belt from Hardy. The took a guy who was fueding with the WWE Champ and didn't need to win the title to get over and gave it to him. When I saw that happen I thought, wow, I can't think of a worse decision creative could have made. After that instead of seeing great young stars fued over the belt we got more Umaga squashes and promos with Vince, Lashley, and Trump. After that they needed to get the belt off of Umaga without making him look weak so they have him squash Santino out of the crowd but lose due to Lashley interference. Then we saw Shelton, Nitro, and Carlito fade away to the background, be left out of Wrestlemania, and got a Battle of the Billionaires gimmick match rather than a stellar ladder match for the IC belt between Benjamin, Nitro, and Carlito(Hardy would drop the title to Nitro allowing him to join the money in the bank match). Now we have to sit and watch as Santino defends against Chris Masters in well below average matches.

With all that said and the great matches Benoit has put on, the IC belt is nowhere near the US title.

 

[ExtremeIronChef]

Of course the IC title is nowhere near the current level of the US belt. The US title has been defended week in and week out in matches that are at the very least 3 star caliber. The MVP vs Benoit matches have really catapulted that title back into meaning something IMO. The IC title used to have a great prestige about it, when guys like Bret Hart, Curt Hennig, The Rock, HBK etc fighting for it, giving us great matches every week, but now it's on a guy nobody even cares about, (Mozzarella lol, Morella) and its leading to a Masters/Morella match which no one will give two shits about. Masters is horrible and Morella is too green to have the IC belt. I say have Santino lose the belt to someone like Orton and then have it defended every single week to try to bring some sort of credibility back to that title.

Another thing though is creative. They don't know shit it seems like half the time and they are only making things worse. Basically, the RAW creative team sucks and the Smackdown creative team do things right.

 

[ratedrsuperstartoronto]

I think that they should stop the Masters-Santino feud and send Masters over to ECW. Then they should make Santino lose the title to Carlito so that the Flair-Carlito feud has the IC Title. Santino should then have matches on Heat or on mid-low card Raw until he gets recognized more and his in ring work is respectable.

 

[Downward Spiral]

The Intercontinental title basically counts for nothing these days. It's thrown around to anyone that wants it, and people don't even care about it anymore. Hell, sometimes I forget who the hell is the champion at the time. There is basically zero competition for it right now, and that is what takes away any credibility it could have. How the hell are people meant to respect the title when a 'fan' is holding it? Raw has the potential to create a decent midcard division, yet they just let the midcarders bumble around every week either jobbing or on Heat. They don't even have the champion on the show consistently every week, and they wonder why people forget about it? Like others have said, they need an established guy that will make the title mean something. Throwing it on people who debut is not doing anything good for it.

One of the reasons I think the United States title is in a lot better position now is because it has more focus over there. It is actually the launching pad for talented midcarders to elevate themselves into the main event. Look at the guys who have held it sometime this year: Kennedy and MVP. And look how popular they are with the IWC now. This is all mostly because of the United States title. SmackDown is not using the title to great effect, but it is still in better shape than the IC title. It means something on SmackDown, and you can't say that about the Intercontinental title on Raw. Marella pales in comparison to MVP, and that's further proof that we will respect a title if we respect the champion. The United States title may not be as prestigious as it ever was, but it certainly looks better than other titles in the WWE.

 

[Moneymaker_90]

The reason why the us title is bigger than the ic is none other than Vincent Kennedy McMahon. The ic title was fine until the chairman decided to give it to Umaga because he was working an angle with him. Then he notices that the ic title isn't doing nothing so he decided to bring Marella. This is not a bad move except for the part that nobody knows him. Mcmahon already did this once with Carlito no SD! so he thought it would work here but he forgot 1 thing. Carlito was getting promos 2 months before he came to tv. As for Marella, Vince believed that he would capitaliza on the star power of Lashley. Vince just doesn't realize that Lashley isn't that big yet.
Summing up: the ic title is weak because of Vincent Kennedy McMahon

 

[tap-out]

I was thinking about this just recently also. I feel the United States Title is being used correctly. The main focus on Raw has been and will continue to be the wwe championship and champion. On Smackdown the US title is treated almost equal to the WHC. They have really focused on it and made it something of an honor to hold. The IC title was that way b4 they had the US title. I think this is also a way to build up smackdown a bit more. Vince said he wanted to spend more time on ECW and Smackdown and this was a good way to do it.

 

[turbomonkey484]

At the moment i would say that US title > IC title however I think that a feud between Y2J and Mr Kennedy would make the intercontinental title more prestigious because both of them are already established stars, and there haven't been any high profile feuds for the IC belt for a long time.

 

[AnthonyMango/NoFate007]

At the moment i would say that US title > IC title however I think that a feud between Y2J and Mr Kennedy would make the intercontinental title more prestigious because both of them are already established stars, and there haven't been any high profile feuds for the IC belt for a long time.

Indeed. I have a feeling, though, that once Matt Hardy wins the US title from MVP, and he has nobody left to feud with, that we'll see a complete shift and the IC title will mean much more than the US title. This is all, of course, assuming that things don't change too much in the draft. The way it is now, who really cares about Hardy/Palumbo, Hardy/Deuce, Hardy/Domino, Hardy/Funaki, lol.

 

[Mighty NorCal]

Indeed. I have a feeling, though, that once Matt Hardy wins the US title from MVP, and he has nobody left to feud with, that we'll see a complete shift and the IC title will mean much more than the US title. This is all, of course, assuming that things don't change too much in the draft. The way it is now, who really cares about Hardy/Palumbo, Hardy/Deuce, Hardy/Domino, Hardy/Funaki, lol.

what aboooouut...Hardy/Morrison??? Because I can almost garuntee thats were they will go after Matt wins that US title, and that pairing could deliver some superb matches.

And at the moment, its for sure the US title, as MVP has feuded with Chris Benoit, and Matt Hardy respectively over the past year, and had a very entertaining program with Rey Mysterio as well. The IC title can catch up tho, if they involve Jericho in some good feuds, Kennedy for right now, maybe Santio, and a returning Jeff Hardy. The IC title has many more eligible possible feuds, so I think the IC will catch up soon if they want it to, but for right now its the US title, for sure.

 

[Father:_Polley]

hardy/noble would be a decent feud, finlay if he comes back to SD, the return of gregory helms. chavo, shelton benjamin, elijah and morrison as has just been mentioned that's not a bad series of feuds you could get out of just the ECW roster alone. add to that the draft will probably bring some new blood into the US title ranks, you could have the likes of carlito added to that.

the thing is though, both titles got neglected big time with Jeff's title program, MVP's loss of matt to injury MITB. new and interesting feuds are needed quickly to bring them both up.

 

[AnthonyMango/NoFate007]

what aboooouut...Hardy/Morrison??? Because I can almost garuntee thats were they will go after Matt wins that US title, and that pairing could deliver some superb matches.

And at the moment, its for sure the US title, as MVP has feuded with Chris Benoit, and Matt Hardy respectively over the past year, and had a very entertaining program with Rey Mysterio as well. The IC title can catch up tho, if they involve Jericho in some good feuds, Kennedy for right now, maybe Santio, and a returning Jeff Hardy. The IC title has many more eligible possible feuds, so I think the IC will catch up soon if they want it to, but for right now its the US title, for sure.

Hardy/Morrison, I'm hoping that they push Morrison past that, but if they had that feud, it would be pretty good. The low end on that one is Hardy in my opinion, so it would all depend. Mysterio, MVP, Hardy, and Benoit vastly helped to legitimize the US title, so I hope that both the IC and US titles keep that sort of strength. With Kennedy, Carlito, Jericho, possibly Punk, and possibly someone like Elijah Burke or whatever, the IC title could be right on par. I just sort of have a feeling that the WWE creative teams are distracted by one or the other. If they're focusing on the US title, the IC title gets lost in translation. Vice versa at times.