What The Hell Happened?

[Maddog Lionheart]

Don't you remember the times, when having the U.S or IC title was such a grand thing. Do you think that these titles are now kind of.....meh?

Let me feel what you feel.......

 

[therockiswwf]

Money in the Bank happened. It basically took over the IC/US title spot. Though they still go through times of pushing the title then doing nothing with it, back to doing stuff with it again.

 

[berlinbrawler]

Secondary belts have become next to meaningless. There are several reasons for that, but one of the big ones is having two brands. With two world champions running around, following two secondary champions as well is a bit much for the attention span of the casual viewer.

But to be honest, the IC title was already greatly devalued BEFORE the brand split.

It was devalued because it changed so damn often and seemingly anyone could win it. It also suffered when even more belts were around, like the European Championship, the Hardcore Championship and the Lightheavyweight title. If everyone has a belt, none of them matter.

Also, to a lesser extend, te IC title suffered when they changed the belt design from the one Shawn Michaels, Bret Hart and Mr. Perfect wore back in the day.

All things together contributed to the sorry state the IC and US titles are in these days.

 

[Hazardous]

You guys are off a bit.. It hasn't been THAT long since the IC title was rendered..well.. Useless. Same goes for the US title. The best IC title use in the past decade was the Jericho/Mysterio feud a few years back. Those guys had some great matches, and made people interested in the title again. As for the US title, back in 06 the US title was on Benoit, and his matches with MVP and Booker-T would sometimes follow the World title match at PPV's. Benoit's feud's with Cena, Booker, and MVP really made Smackdown's secondary title look better than their main title. I thought DB would have brought the US title back into the main stage, but that didn't work out so well. Every few years a great feud happens to make people care about those titles again. Just sit back and wait I guess.

 

[The Dragon Saga]

They will always have meaning and a legacy behind them, but they're more used as an object to get someone over or experiment on if someone is capable of being a Champion sometime in the future.

Intercontinental Championship being on Wade Barrett isn't a bad decision. Barrett deserves to have a belt, he was one of the fastest rising guys in professional wrestling in late '10. He doesn't deserve to hold a World Championship, so what's the next best option? Intercontinental Championship.

The United States Championship is currently rendered useless, more-so as its on Kofi "Bland as Growing Grass" Kingston. The last time the US Championship was something of credibility and notable hype was while Danielson held it, and that was only due to his feud with The Miz. The Miz also has to be given credit for making the Championship look good in recent years, one of the better ones to have held it.

They still have meaning, and definitely a legacy but it depends on who holds them to me.

 

[FightOwensFight]

I agree completely. I used to love the time when the IC belt was something that the wrestlers actually strived for. I still really think WWE is missing the boat on this by having all the mid-card guys in silly pointless feuds while the belts are hardly ever defended.

I would love to see a couple of those mid-card guys actually make it a point to go after the IC or US belts. Not as a launching pad to the ME scene, but as their ultimate goal. They just need to bring up the names of the illustrious people that have held those belts in the past, like Savage, Steamboat, Mr. Perfect, Hart, etc. Say that is who they looked up to growing up and that is what they want. Maybe even bring up that throughout the history of WWE/WCW it has been widely accepted that the best "wrestlers" held the IC and US belts.

I just really feel they could add some meaning to the mid-card scene if everyone in it wasn't ultimatley trying to be in the ME scene.

 

[NitroWCW]

I think that the U.S. title is pretty much useless, I actually forgot who has it anymore. I dont think you could bring much prestige back to this title anyway. They should just scrap it or unify both mid-card titles. U.S. title has been held by some good superstars the past two years. But I think IC has had better. U.S. title reignsKofi,Miz,Sheamus,R-Truth,Bryan, and Bret Hart. <<<(wtf)


On the other hand I think that the IC title isn't completely useless, I enjoy the title being on Barrett. And looking on the past 2 years the IC title has had great superstars holding it, unlike the U.S. title. IC title reigns: Mysterio,Jericho,Jomo,McIntyre,Ziggler,Barrett,Kofi(boring)Kingston.

 

[ApexPredatoRKO730]

What has been done to these championships is completely disrespectful to some of the legends that have held the titles with pride. Seems to me that these belts are just a status to some superstars. There's nobody that strives for it or feels accomplishment when they've won it, they all want to be in the main event scene.

But guys who have worn these belts early on have had their careers escalate. Best example, Chris Jericho. Most superstars are either main event guys or Superstars wrestlers. Nobody is comfortable as a mid-carder anymore.

Personally, i'm bored with seeing the same guys always holding the belt, and of course when i say this i'm referring to one man, Kofi Kingston! He's been a mid-carder his whole career and will never be anything more or less, but can he please step aside for some other guys to have their shot.

My U.S./IC Champion wishlist includes: Zack Ryder, Jack Swagger, Evan Bourne, Cody Rhodes, Ted DiBiase Jr., Alex Riley, and David Hart Smith

 

[WWEIsLife2]

Current IC Champion-Wade Barrett
Current US Champion-Kofi Kingston

For the people who forgot who holds the respective Titles. I still think both have plenty of importance,yeah maybe not as much as the late 80's-early 90's but still enough to get whoever has it over.

 

[H33LTurn]

The titles are as good as the people who are holding them. Dolph Ziggler brought the IC title pretty close to the Heavyweight title back when he had it. Now Wade Barrett isnt doing much with it other than wear it around his waist. The Miz and Kofi have both gained the US title some attention, which is somthing I cant say for Sheamus and Daniel Bryan's title reigns.

 

[TUFFY54]

They lost all meaning the moment the brand split happened. Wrestling used to have a world champion who was without a doubt the number one or two(if he was a heel) guy in the company. They used to hold the belt for a year, or at least 7 or 8 months at a time. With world titles locked up and only changing hands at a ppv, it gave the midcard guys a secondary title to fight for. The IC champions of the past where bigger stars than most world title holders today. Perfect, Bret, Owen, Bulldog, Ramon, HBK, Triple H, Steamboat, Savage, Piper, and Honky Tonk were all huge superstars that defended the IC title for months at a time. It changed hands more often than a world title, but not by much.

When the brand split happened, we now had two world champions. If neither world title is recognized as being the most important in the world, how the hell would people care about a midcard belt. Since the Smackdown champion is usually a smaller star than the Raw champion, the Smackdown belt is basically the new IC belt. With one world title Eddie, Benoit, Mysterio, Christian, Sheamus, RVD, CM Punk, Swagger, Khali, Booker T, Jeff Hardy, JBL, and maybe Edge would never of been a world champ. The Smackdown world title has become the new IC/US belt. The IC/US titles are now more like the old Hardcore and European championships that got thrown around just to give a guy a push.

 

[whoopin' ass]

my thought over the weekend is why are the wwe/world title so important? think boxing or mma - there are various titles for the different weightclasses. the best fighters/boxers, the most popular and successful, are not always the heavyweights. why can't wrestling be the same? why does everyone need to be wwe/world champ? have your cruiserweights, have your heavyweights and then use the IC and US titles for guys inbetween. no saying you can't have the IC champ going after the wwe title, that doesn't mean you can't see Evan Bourne taking on Kane but you give each division a chance to shine and make each title worth something. why not push 5 or 6 champs into the mainstream instead of just 1?

 

[Maddog Lionheart]

They will always have meaning and a legacy behind them, but they're more used as an object to get someone over or experiment on if someone is capable of being a Champion sometime in the future.

Intercontinental Championship being on Wade Barrett isn't a bad decision. Barrett deserves to have a belt, he was one of the fastest rising guys in professional wrestling in late '10. He doesn't deserve to hold a World Championship, so what's the next best option? Intercontinental Championship.

The United States Championship is currently rendered useless, more-so as its on Kofi "Bland as Growing Grass" Kingston. The last time the US Championship was something of credibility and notable hype was while Danielson held it, and that was only due to his feud with The Miz. The Miz also has to be given credit for making the Championship look good in recent years, one of the better ones to have held it.

They still have meaning, and definitely a legacy but it depends on who holds them to me.

Well yeah they have a legacy, but so many great superstars before as made a name for themselves. I just don't like that it's been so discredited now. Jericho did escalate his carrer from winning it and so did Steve Austin.

 

[King Patrick Star]

In my opinion, I think what happened to the Titles is that the Intercontinental and United States Titles took a step down from their respective # 2 spots and went to the number # 3 / # 4 spot, depending on what show they currently are on. I think this all went down at during the WCW / ECW Invasion. Before the Invasion took place, in WWE, the Titles were ranked, WWE at # 1 and Intercontinental at # 2. In WCW, the Titles were ranked, WCW at # 1 and United States at # 2. After the Invasion, I believe it went, WWE at # 1, WCW at # 2, Intercontinental at # 3, and United States at # 4. What happened was the IC took the European Title’s spot and the United States took the Hardcore Title’s spot in the Championship hierarchy. That’s just how I see it.

 

[LoudClearVoice]

Great points in here by everyone. IC and US titles are so meaningless now, that it's sad.

I think it's mostly because WWE has focused so much energy on the WWE and World titles that they've brushed the others under the rug. Also, the rosters are so huge now that they've devalued those other titles.

What they need to do is have a great US title and/or IC title feud and really focus on it. Make it the secondary storyline behind the WWE or world title story.

Part of the problem is that there are so many distractions and storylines now. "Back in the day" there weren't that many stories happening at once. There was the main title storyline, then maybe something with the tag teams and then the IC belt.

Now we've got 10 storylines going at once so it's hard to really devote a lot of time to the "secondary" belts.

WWE could do it if they were willing to put in the time and effort to really hype a secondary title feud.

What might actually work is a serious feud between the US and IC champs OR having the IC champ seriously challenge the WWE champ (putting the IC title back in the spotlight).

 

[berlinbrawler]

http://www.wrestlezone.com/news/article/big-show-performing-overseas-as-wwe-ic-champ-131429

To further stress the unimportance of the secondary titles, they now seem to randomly swap around the belts on overseas tours as they see fit. Last weekend in Spain Big Show came out as IC champ. How weird is that?

 

[Somebody Strange]

I don't get it.. how have they become "meaningless"? Someone care to explain?