What constitutes a "long" reign'?

[MattRhys20]

We've heard over the past few months that HHH is in favour of 'longer title reigns' instead of the title changing hands every month/two months. So my question to you is...

How long should a 'long reign' be?

Would 3 months (enough to cover 3 PPV's) be enough, or should it be half a year at minimum. Obviously this whole business with Punk being champion for nearly a year is building into a very good story long, but is it too long in your view for example?

Discuss

 

[rodneykm]

Personally, I think a minimum of about 5 months makes sense. It gives you time to build credibility for not only the championship but the title holder as well.

 

[Dr. Mantis Toboggan, M.D.]

To me it's getting to the 10 month mark as champion, what will set it off is the year mark like Punk is closing in on. In the last decade the only other people I consider to have had a long WWE Championship reign are JBL and John Cena. I'm not counting the WHC or any other titles but the WWE Championship when I'm talking about this. You could give the argument that holding it for a year isn't even long because look at Bruno's first reign (2803 days as champion), Pedro Morales' (1027 days), and Hulk Hogan (1474 days). Hulk's first was the last to ever reach the 4 digit mark.

 

[Wolf Pac]

5 or 6 months for pretty much the same reason rodneykm mentioned and because it won't get people bored out of their minds. If it goes on longer than that, it would get boring, I've heard some people complain about Sheamus' reign cause it's gone on this long. In CM Punk's case, it's different though because it's been such a long time since we've a reign like his & someone breaking records like he has and it's nice & refreshing, it's only if they keep doing the same with other wrestlers will it be overkill & boring.

 

[info62]

I agree with 10 months. There just isn't excitement for a title change when they change hands more often than every 5 months imo so 3 months is still really short.

When you think about it, a 3 month reign generally means that the champion only successfully defended their title 2 or 3 times. It also means you only see the champ with the title around their waist about 12 times on RAW before they lose it if the reign is only 3 months. To me that makes it less of an accomplishment to hold the belt

I don't think long title reigns are boring at all. Well, they can be, but that all depends on the booking/storylines and short title reigns can be boring too if the writing is not entertaining. If longer title reigns continue to be a trend then I think it will be a good thing

 

[Wolf Pac]

5 or 6 months for pretty much the same reason rodneykm mentioned and because it won't get people bored out of their minds. If it goes on longer than that, it would get boring, I've heard some people complain about Sheamus' reign cause it's gone on this long. In CM Punk's case, it's different though because it's been such a long time since we've seen a reign like his & someone breaking records like he has and it's nice & refreshing, it's only if they keep doing the same with other wrestlers will it be overkill & boring.

I clearly wasn't thinking when I made this post and about what I mentioned about Sheamus' reign, but I had to rush this post cause I had to go out. I assumed Sheamus' reign was longer than 5 or 6 months but it was 6 months and people must've been complaining about Sheamus' reign because he was just beating Daniel Bryan & Del Rio over & over again and his storylines were uninteresting which is understandable, and after remembering two of my favourite title reigns of all time, Shawn Michaels' title reign in 96 and Bobby Roode's recent TNA title run, I take back what I said about 5-6 months and say 7-9 months instead as long as the writers are giving the title holder interesting storylines as info666 said and different credible opponents like every 1 or 2 months. That's what made Shawn & Roode's title reigns great & so enjoyable to watch. If they are just gonna do what they did with Sheamus' then 5 or 6 months is enough.

 

[Slash-LN]

I agree with the people who said it depends on the booking. 3 months sounds really short but when you get the same 3 matches in a row at a pay per view it feels so much longer. I would say at minimum it should be at least 6 months as long as the champion faces different people. I feel like heels work better with longer reigns because with good booking it makes you want to see the face beat them more and more the longer they hold the title. It works in their favor. With a face holding the title for a long period of time (10-12 months) it starts to get a little boring especially if they win every match clean.

 

[xXxTheDevilGodxXx]

We'll NEVER have a reign like Bruno Sammartino EVER again. Now, as for what constitutes a long reign, well I would say hitting the 5 month mark would do that for you. Of course, I don't think having constant long reigns is such a good idea, but longer reigns definitely does do the World titles justice in the sense that they both appear credible. I wouldn't want to see EVERY reign last that long, or even longer, but I think that 5 months would do just fine.

 

[Dagger Dias]

To me a long reign is when the current champion has held onto his belt for over 100 days. That's 3 months' worth of PPV events. The belts change title holders so much more these days than they used to. Punk's nearly year long reign is unheard of nowadays, I'm surprised that they let him hold onto it for this long. Cena's 2006-2007 reign was the only other WWE Championship reign that lasted as long in this generation. We will probably never see a reign last until reaching four digits ever again. Wrestling was very different back in the days when Hogan had his first reign, let alone the days of Bruno.

I personally think it would be cool to have a 1,000+ day reign again but the only person in either federation capable of pulling it off without putting his respective federation out of business is Cena, and even with Cena the haters would all protest the product if it dragged on too long. The unfair hatred towards him back in 2007-ish was ridiculous, and that wasn't even 400 days. Imagine that for 2 more years. There's no telling what they might do, they could make crazy threats or say extremely hurtful things like they did at the ECW One Night Stand show in 2006 during Cena's match against RVD. The fans today want change constantly. WWE, TNA, and all of the other federations have no choice but to provide that. There's no way that title reigns lasting longer than a couple hundred days will be tolerated before fans get sick of the champion, unfortunately.

 

[Jack-Hammer]

In this day and age if you're talking about a World Championship reign, then I'd say 4 to 5 months constitutes a long one.

Other titles are more complicated because, in all honesty, pro wrestling history is full of titles that change hands frequently. It's happened to pretty much every NWA regional championship back during the territory days, which included both singles & tag titles. Having mid-card titles change hands frequently is also something that's been common. It became far too common during the Attitude Era and has continued through into modern times.

 

[FlairFan2003]

You probably need at least 5 months to establish yourself as "Must See TV" on RAW, appear on mulriple PPV's with at least one major match on one of the Big 4 (Rumble, WM, S-Slam, S-Series), and make your way through the house show circuit.

As has been discussed in various posts over the past few years, the days of longer reigns, like Hogan near 5 year run, Backlund's 5 plus year run, Sammartino's incredible 7 year run (followed by a 2nd reign that lasted about two years) or Flair with a whopping 5 separate reigns each lasting 13 months or more, those days are gone. The TV is so much different now, with weekly live shows and monthly PPV's, for most of the 80s een with wrestling all over local and national TV, none of the major promotions did more than one or two big shows per year and rarely showed top level matches on free TV. WWE did maybe 3 or 4 Sat Night Main Events, the NWA would do one or two Sat Night SuperShow events in their weekly Sat evening TBS slot, eventually transitioning into an occassional Clash Of Champions event. Excluding the other promotions that ran durng this time, in terms major events, pretty much all you had was WrestleMania & Starrcade (which actually came first, the massive success of which prompted WWE to create WrestleMania). By the end of the decade Survivor Series was gaining credibility as a must see event, something The Great American Bash already had. That was it, even SummerSlam didnt debut until 1988.

In that era champions held titles longer because you did not see them wrestle as much, at least against top competition, unless you saw them on the house show circuit. Even then a guy could appear in your town 3 or 4 times and be a draw each time, it was the only time you saw him wrestle against his arch enemies and top contenders. Now, chances are you'll see the top challenger face the World Champ as many as 3 or 4 times just on RAW, let alone at least two PPV's. With such an expediated schedule feuds move faster making it tougher to keep champions viable longer. Unfortunately faster changing titles makes it seem less special when a belt changes hands. I cant even remember half of Cena's or Edge's title losses, but even after twenty years I remember every time Hogan or Flair dropped a title in the 80s, or Backlund's historic loss to Iron Sheik.

To that point I'd say 5-6 months is probably good, unless someone is really over and has significant potential, then ride it out for awhile, making it that much more special when they finally do drop their title.

 

[radec]

I agree with the others, around 5 to 6 months is pretty good. But it all depends if your matches are booked wisely. Example: look at sheamus tittle run, he defended it like 3 times vs daniel bryan and del rio. Thats 6 matches and only 2 opponents. If you look at it like that then it seems alot shorter disregarding the months held.

 

[CrucifiedRaven]

I consider 4 months as a substantial title reign. To me 4 months has been the mark, since the early 90s of what's considered a "reign" vs a transitional title holder.

Even back in the attitude era, 4 months was the longest title reign possible.

Less than 4 months, just keeping it warm for someone else
4 months is a good run
Longer than 4 months is a long run

 

[ShawnyBoy]

I guess it depends on the title...For the WWE And World Heavyweight title i guess like the others that a 5-6 months reign is rather long. Intercontinental and us around 3-4 months i think you have a good run with it ... 5-6 Months for the Divas title i guess would be kinda really long too ...

 

[XXJJ]

I would say anything over 4 months in todays age should be considered a long reign.

Long reigns can be overrated though. A lot of Punk's title reign has been overshadowed. I got bored with Punk's reign for a few months. It took him doing a heel turn to breathe some new life into his reign and got me more interested.

I guess its a balancing act. I hate when they play hot potato with the titles, but if they keep the title on somebody too long it can feel a little dull.

 

[theBec2101]

Depends, before Punk if you held the belt for more than a month that was pretty long. Back in the day people would hold it for years. I would consider over 6 months pretty long now considering they wrestle a lot more now a days.

 

[HBKperfect23]

In that last 10 years I have always considered those who won the title at Wrestlemania to have a long run if they got to Summerslam. So my answer is around 5 months.

I agree with a lot of what FlairFan2003 said about it changing with additional tv/ppvs. I'd like to see a lot less live tv/ppvs and more time building storylines. Obviously this wont happen but thats the time I enjoyed wrestling most. It should be rare for the champion to defend the title on free tv. Although, Punks reign has been a pretty good throw back reign, IMO.

 

[The 1-2-3 Killam]

Championship title reigns are totally situational; there shouldn't be an expiration date, nor should there be a minimum amount of time for a champion to hang on to his belt. What really matters is that whoever holds it be made to look like the #1 guy in the company; or at least, in the case of CM Punk and John Cena, to look like he's carrying the proverbial ball.

CM Punk has held the title for 349 days, and being that there is not a title match scheduled for Survivor Series, it would appear that he will hang on to it for at least a year. I would actually be surprised if WWE comes up with somebody else to throw it on before the match against the Rock at the Royal Rumble. Punk's reign has been good, overall, but it certainly has had its misses. Regardless of being the longest reigning champion in ages, he has spent a good majority of it not being nearly as important to the written product as John Cena. I'm not complaining, that's just how it goes in the business world sometimes. In this situation, Punk holding the title for a year has been good for the product.

Contrary to popular belief, between 2003 and 2007 there were plenty of "long" title reigns. JBL and Cena each had a 280 day reign, sandwiches in between two 133 day reigns from Eddie Guerrero, and another by John Cena. Cena also held the title for 380 days in 2006. Randy Orton for 203. Triple H for 210 in 2008. The Miz for 160 in 2010. And there was a plethora of 3-4 month reigns thrown into the mix in the last decade as well. CM Punk is never going to reach Hulk Hogan's monumental run, and he wont come close to Backlund. Bruno is pretty much out of the question. I doubt very much that will ever be a reality again. Nor should it be; in this day and age of over-saturation and instant gratification, it might actually bring down the industry.

But very short, and almost non-existent title reigns can be, and have been very good for the product in the past. Andre the Giant ended Hulk's reign, and only held it for what...a few minutes? But the classic selling of the WWF title will always be remembered. Yokozuna won the title from Bret Hart, but dropped it to Hogan in the same night. I will always remember that, as will many fans, because it set Yoko up for a pretty lengthy and dominant run later that year.

Short or long, it really doesn't matter if the writing is solid and there is a reason for every decision made. The last few months of Punk's reign have been very intentional, and it shows. The ratings have tanked, but fuck the ratings. Punk has carried the WWE, and without his title reign I wouldn't even bother watching on a weekly basis. But he'll have to lose it eventually, and the next guy in line may not hold it for 2 years. He probably shouldn't. It's totally situational.

 

[JandSman]

I agree it's totally situational, I think that a general rule is that for WWE and World Titles, the minimum for a long reign is around 150 days and up in today's age. I also think it has to do with the Champion and how relevant he is, and his challengers.

 

[spaldoni]

I always liked a long title reign. I like a champion who defends the title against a variety of challengers during a long reign. It makes it exciting to wonder who will finally dethrone him. It also adds excitement like when Hogan lost his title to Andre and Warrior or when Flair lost to Dusty during the Bash tour. If you have the right guy that keeps his long reign fresh and interesting (like Flair and Hogan in the 80s) then it works well. To answer the question, I think a year is a good long reign.

 

[HBsam31]

I also agree that it depends on the situation. Punk's long reign has been a breath of fresh air. I want to see if Punk will retain one more time each time he goes out there. I have really enjoyed this reign. I think for this day that 5 to 6 months would be a long reign. With Sheamus and ADR the three months they feuded seemed like 3 years so the booking has a factor in it to. I don't see The Big Show having a long run with the title, but I was happy he ended Sheamus' reign. If the champion is consistently given credible opponents I think it makes a long run much more interesting than seeing the same opponent over and over.