The Worst 1-Time WWE Champions In History

To be perfectly honest, this countdown was originally supposed to be about the best 1-time WWE Champions ever. Unfortunately, when taking a look at the candidate pool, it became painfully obvious that finding “great” or even “good” 1-time champions would be impossible. The options were basically Eddie Guerrero or Jeff Hardy.

So, instead, we’re pivoting and discussing the worst 1-time WWE Champions ever. Turns out there’s plenty of meat on that bone. We’ve got a little bit of everything, from performers who were terrible in the ring to performers who couldn’t cut promos to save their lives. In one way or another, all these performers dragged the WWE Championship down while they held it.

8

Bray Wyatt

Bray Wyatt’s contributions to WWE over the years can’t be downplayed, but they also shouldn’t be exaggerated. As far as WWE Champions are concerned, Bray was one of the weakest in WWE history. His actual championship win was awesome. Nobody called Bray walking out of Elimination Chamber 2017 as the WWE Champion.

For years, fans had clamored for the talented performer to be given his opportunity as champion. Unfortunately, what followed was a lackluster feud with Randy Orton, which saw Bray drop the title at WrestleMania in a less-than-stellar match. Booking is mostly to blame for Bray’s weak run as WWE Champion. Luckily, “The Eater of Worlds” had a fiendish character change on the horizon that would help immortalize his wrestling career.

7

Rey Mysterio

In 1996, Rey Mysterio debuted in WCW and immediately captured the imagination of millions of wrestling fans. Mysterio was unlike any performer American wrestling fans had ever seen before. Still, not a single WCW fan would’ve ever guessed he’d become a main event star in WCW, let alone WWE. Over the years, Mysterio defied all odds to become a legitimate main event star in WWE.

In 2006, Mysterio won the World Heavyweight Championship in WWE. Still, the biggest prize in the business, the WWE Championship, eluded him. In 2011, Mysterio checked the final box off his pro wrestling bucket list, winning the vacant WWE Championship. Sadly, Mysterio’s dream would last under 2 hours as he’d lose his newly won Championship to John Cena on the same Raw he’d won it on. The booking made 0 sense and left Mysterio looking like one of the weakest WWE Champions ever.

6

Sgt. Slaughter

Vince McMahon created some huge stars and elevated some performers to previously unseen heights over the years. However, McMahon had a few blind spots when it came to booking. One of those blind spots would become a recurring theme throughout his tenure: his affinity for stars of yesteryear. This isn’t something that was only a problem later in his tenure; it was persistent.

One of the best examples of McMahon’s irrational love for washed-up acts came in 1991 when he brought back a well past his prime Sgt. Slaughter. It was bad enough to bring Slaughter back after nearly a decade away from WWE, but McMahon took it a step further and made Slaughter WWE Champion and gave him a WrestleMania main event feud with Hulk Hogan. Needless to say, Slaughter’s reign was a dud, and his feud with Hogan was one of the weakest WrestleMania feuds ever.

5

Diesel

By 1994, Vince McMahon realized he needed to create new stars. This led to the ascension of guys like Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels, and “Big Daddy Cool” Diesel. While Bret was the first of those stars to capture the WWE Championship, Diesel would be the one to get an extended run as champion. In November 1994, Diesel surprisingly won the WWE Championship and embarked on a year-long championship reign.

While it was a breath of fresh air not to have the top of the WWE card occupied by Hulk Hogan, Diesel was a bit underwhelming as WWE Champion. Diesel had an incredible look and was dripping with aura, but he wasn’t the best worker. Out of his entire reign, Diesel’s best match as champion came on the night he lost the title to Bret Hart, and it was mostly because of Bret.

4

Vince McMahon

During WWE’s Golden Era, most casual wrestling fans had no idea that Vince McMahon was the owner of WWE. Most fans thought McMahon was just a play-by-play announcer. In 1997, the curtain was pulled back, and McMahon was finally acknowledged on WWE programming as the company’s owner. Finally, the man who had been pulling all the strings was thrust into the spotlight.

While McMahon became a central character on television, nobody ever expected him to be WWE Champion. In 1999, however, McMahon shockingly booked himself to pin Triple H and capture the coveted championship. McMahon would only hold the title for 4 days before vacating it, but the history books will always show that he was WWE Champion. Somehow, McMahon got a few days as champ while Rey Mysterio got less than 2 hours.

3

The Ultimate Warrior

Perhaps no WWE performer squandered a bigger opportunity than The Ultimate Warrior. The performer who took the torch from Hulk Hogan was always going to have some pretty big shoes to fill. To be fair, any other performer would’ve fallen short of Hogan’s legacy just as Warrior did. However, any other performer would’ve likely respected the opportunity and done more with it than Warrior.

When Warrior won the WWE Championship, it seemed like a changing of the guard. Warrior was supposed to be the superstar who carried WWE into the next generation. Instead, Warrior’s bad attitude and diva behavior, coupled with his limited abilities, made his title run one of the biggest disappointments in WWE history. The Hogan era was supposed to end at WrestleMania 6, but Warrior was so horrible as a successor that WWE was forced to go back to Hogan until another star was ready for the responsibility of being WWE’s flag bearer.

2

Andre The Giant

The Ultimate Warrior was one of the most limited WWE Champions ever. However, there was perhaps one WWE Champion who was even more limited than Warrior. Andre, The Giant. Maybe there’s some sort of generational disconnect, but for some reason older fans seem to hold Andre in very high esteem even though he couldn’t cut a promo to save his life and he was a statue in the ring.

Sure, we’ve all heard young Andre was special in the ring, but the reality of the situation is that only a small minority of wrestling fans witnessed that version of Andre. Most fans remember a slow, lumbering Andre whose biggest accomplishments were taking a bodyslam from Hulk Hogan and holding the WWE Championship for under 2 minutes before relinquishing it to Ted DiBiase. In his prime, Andre was allegedly great, but he was way past his prime for most of his WWE run. Especially when he was WWE Champion.

1

Jinder Mahal

Andre The Giant was not at his best when he briefly held the WWE Championship, but at least he was a draw and a bona fide main eventer when he won the title. Jinder Mahal, on the other hand, is perhaps the greatest example of a performer dragging a World Championship down with him. In 2017, WWE was trying to get SmackDown over as “The Land of Opportunity.” To further emphasize that point, WWE decided to crown a champion nobody saw coming.

On paper, the idea wasn’t terrible. However, the execution and the performer who was picked left a lot to be desired. Jinder was nowhere near as bad a worker or talker as The Ultimate Warrior or Andre The Giant, but he also didn’t have the status or drawing power of either man. At best, Jinder should’ve been a mid-card champion, but he should’ve never sniffed the main event scene or the WWE Championship. Sadly, Jinder’s underwhelming title run likely discouraged WWE from taking chances with their main title going forward.