The WWE Championship, the richest prize in the game, the mountain top, the big kahuna burger, the juicy plum, Daddy’s little gentleman, Megan Sparkle, The Golden place Around the Waist, the old chungus, Metal Darren, John Cena’s BFF, the gemstone baron of sussex county, the original shiny, golden delicious, Nameplate Q Thunderdump, Spintabulous Glitterpinch, the old-timey glimmer and snaps spit and polish experience, and Douglas.
A prestigious bit of hardware, competed for by the biggest players in the game, Rock, Austin, Cena, Hogan, Maven on Raw in January 2002, Batista, Triple H, Ric Flair and the list goes on, but did you know that some truly silly names have challenged for the most prestigious championship in WWE history, names that don’t quite belong in the aforementioned pantheon.
Let’s take a trip down memory lane and have a look at some matches (all of them televised, some of them on pay-per-view) where the WWE Champion put everything on the line against a challenger that makes you say… him?
I’m Adam hailing from partsFUNknown and here are 10 Wrestlers You Forgot Challenged for the WWE Championship.
10. Gillberg – SmackDown (August 31, 1999)
Aw, the silliest man. The figurehead of WWF being a catty little mister during the Monday Night Wars.
Over in WCW they had Goldberg, have you heard of him, he fought for the WWE Championship at SummerSlam, wasn’t that silly.
He was a big dude who killed medium dudes and entered to terrifying pyro. Vince responded by transforming Duane Gill into Gillberg, a tadpole dude who died often, and came out to sparklers and aggressive fire extinguishers.
Oh and he was also WWF Light Heavyweight champion for [checks notes] 15 f**king months, well how do you do.
During that reign, on August 31’s episode of SmackDown, he had a shot at an upgrade, when he wrestled Triple H for the WWF title in the greatest champion vs champion match since Hogan and Warrior.
He actually got a spear in on trips which popped the crowd before proceeding to be murdered in the kind of arrogant champion puts his title on the line against a jobber that WWE have repeated many times since.
See also, Brock destroying Paul London for the Undisputed title in October 2003, and Sheamus killing Zack Ryder with the spinner belt on the line in August 2010.
9. Cody Rhodes – Raw (August 31, 2009)
I think it’s fair to say that AEW really needs to see a surgeon about the chip on its shoulder.
At the start it was all good fun, Cody doing a Gillberg level squash on giant f**king chair before staring down the lens for 10 minutes saying ‘do you get it’.
While Cody has many legitimate reasons to hate the big dub (most of them polka dot related), the one thing he can’t claim is that he never got a chance to compete for the WWE Championship, cos that’s exactly what happened on Raw on August 31, 2009.
See that night, the guest host of Raw turned out to be the American Dream Dusty Rhodes, who cut a promo about how much he loved his son, who was actually a heel at the time.
Randy put his title on the line against Cody who, holy s**t really looked like Lazytown’s Robbie Rotten at the time, with John Cena as special guest ref.
The actual match broke down almost immediately with it being revealed to be a legacy ambush on Big Match John, but hell the match is technically in the books.
But if you’re not convinced and think this is a wasted entry, Val Venis fought the Rock for the WWE Championship on the October 12, 2000, episode of SmackDown while dressed as a milkman. Venis rhymes with penis.
8. Spike Dudley – SmackDown (June 12, 2001) & SmackDown (June 29, 2004)
Spike Dudley is often referred to as the runt of Dudley litter, but out of all of his brothers, including Big Dick Dudley, never forget him, he’s actually had the most WWE Championship matches in his career.
Devon can testify to having none, Bubba Ray fought Kurt Angle for the strap on SmackDown in December 2000, but Spike has fought for the former Winged Eagle not once, but twice!
In the main event of SmackDown on June 14, 2001, Spike fought Steve Austin for the belt and actually lasted four minutes, good for him!
Three years later, on July 1, 2004, the week after dethroning Eddie Guerrero for the WWE Championship, JBL defended the black and gold against Spike again in the main event of SmackDown, and spike lasted almost twice as long, even nailing the Dudley Dog for a near fall.
Turns out Steve Austin is better than JBL. It’s finally official.
7. Crash Holly – Raw (November 13, 2000)
We almost put Hardcore Holly on this list, but I reckon that most of our fans remember his incongruous match for the WWE Championship at the 2004 Royal Rumble, a fleeting main event promotion as a way of saying sorry about the whole Brock accidentally breaking your neck…thing.
It’s a fairly well-known little wrestling curio, but did you know that BOTH Holly cousins actually wrestled for the big belt too?
Yup, just over three years earlier on the November 13, 2000, episode of Raw, little Crash Holly had the opportunity to add a WWE Championship run to his 22 hardcore title reigns.
The show opened with current champ Kurt Angle declaring himself the most fightingest champion in WWE history, offering to fight a certain superstar who would have to have his arm tied behind his back, that superstar was Crash Holly, arm tied behind his back because damn gotta make this matchup fair somehow.
Despite stacking the deck against Angle by untying his arm, that wasn’t part of the deal, Crash, Angle was able to overcome the odds, survive a near fall, before locking in the ankle lock for a quick win.
4. Eric Bischoff – Raw (October 3, 2005)
Good for you, Dad, you silly karate bastard.
On October 3, 2005, Raw made a special homecoming episode of Monday Night Raw, with the program returning to the USA network after five years with the channel then known as Spike TV.
How do you celebrate such a momentous occasion? First of all, bring back Steve Austin to stun every member of the McMahon family, that works, next have a Kurt Angle vs Shawn Michaels Iron Man match.
Yes please, I’ll take seconds. Third have Eric Bischoff wrestle John Cena for the WWE Championship in a no disqualification match with Kurt Angle sat at ringside like he’s front row of a stripclub.
My dad… look, he did his best, Angle accidentally hit himself in the head with a chair, one FU later Bischoff was done, hilariously as someone held up a sign saying, Cena, Kill him 4 Nitro fans.
5. Fabulous Moolah SD (November 26, 2002)
By accounts Fabulous Moolah was the worst, with heaps of allegations against her for ripping off her trainees, trainees that she would allegedly pimp out to other promoters, she helped screw Wendi Richter back in the 80s, she sounds terrible.
Moolah famously beat Ivory to become WWF Women’s champion in 1999 at the ripe old age of 76.
However, three years later, on the November 28 episode of SmackDown in 2002, Moolah came to the ring, 79 years old, in her hometown to wrestle a mystery opponent.
What would Thanksgiving be without the destruction of an old turkey, as that opponent turned out to be WWE Champion The Big Show in a match that Stephanie explicitly stated was for the WWE Championship.
The match never really got going as Brock Lesnar came out to kill The Big Show, but it’s in the books. If that doesn’t satisfy you, first of all, bite me, but also on April 10, 2000, Triple H defended the WWF title against Taka Michinoku, which is also very silly.
Although thinking about how good taka was, it really shouldn’t be. Got a hell of a nearfall on Trips as well.
4. Faarooq – King of the Ring 1997
It shouldn’t really be a surprise that Ron Simmons got a WWF Championship match at some point in his career, after all the man became the first African-American to win the WCW World Heavyweight title, but in WWE he would always be remembered as a midcarder, his most famous run being one half of the APA.
However, before he was always pounding ass he used to be the leader of the Nation of Domination, a faction that helped usher in the Attitude Era throughout the late 90s, peaking with Farooq receiving a WWF Championship match, on f**king pay-per-view no less.
At King of the Ring 1997, Faarooq, accompanied by members of the nation, took on reigning champion the Undertaker, including Crush, lol Crush what are you doing there, in a 13-minute match that was really quite boring indeed, which goes some way towards explaining why it’s so easily forgotten.
After the match, Ahmed Johnson beat up The Undertaker. Did Ahmed Johnson get a WWF Championship match? He did not.
3. The Patriot – In Your House: Ground Zero 1997
Rest in Peace, Del Wilkes, the man beneath The Patriot mask, who passed away in June earlier this year. The Patriot wrestled throughout the world during his career, including a cup of coffee in WWE, for about six months in 1997.
Most fans remember him for having a pretty kickass entrance theme, that would go on to be known the world over as Medal, Kurt Angle’s entrance music.
Years before Angle would make his debut that music sounded before a match for the WWF Championship at In Your House: Ground Zero, in September 1997.
Champion Bret Hart was in the middle of his yay Canada boo USA feud that gradually everyone else in the world would come to realize was a righteous cause, Bret Hart way ahead of his time.
To bolster that feud, The Patriot was rushed into a title match with Hart to try and sell as many flags as humanly possible.
The highlight of the match saw The Patriot lock Bret in his own sharpshooter, though Bret would, of course, emerge victorious.
The Patriot only had three pay-per-view matches in WWF before succumbing to a triceps injury and being released shortly after, but when one of them is a 20-minute bout against WWF Champion Bret Hart, that’s pretty good going.
2. X-Pac – Capital Carnage 1998
Ah, the original karate kid. DX on, DX off.
Sean Waltman has had two major lifetimes in WWE, the first as the 1-2-3 Kid who was very good but also looked like he was about to burst into tears at the slightest breeze, and the second as X-Pac, who was very good but also spent most of his time doing hateful kung-fu poses like your mum’s new boyfriend.
Neither gimmick strayed above the midcard but amazingly, BOTH iterations of DX’s most earnest penis indicator received shots at the WWE Championship.
The 1-2-3 Kid got a shot against Bret Hart’s winged eagle on the July 1, 1994, episode of Raw, a match which went a whopping 17 minutes, was called by the commentator odd couple of JR and Macho Man Randy Savage, and was actually really bloody great.
Four years later, in 1998, the WWF produced the UK exclusive pay-per-view Capital Carnage, a show famous for featuring Vinnie Jones, Jacqueline having her top ripped off, and JR suffering an attack of Bells Palsy during the show.
With all that going on it’s easy to forget what the WWF Championship match was, the Corporate Champion The Rock putting his Big Eagle belt on the line against X-Pac, in a rematch of another WWF Title match the two had on Raw 3 weeks earlier, and in both cases the matches were… fine.
It was the late 90s, it was run-in central. They were fine.
1. The Brian Kendrick – Unforgiven 2008
Brian Kendrick was and remains awesome. He was the emotional heart of the Cruiserweight Classic, looks like what would have happened if Charles Manson had gotten in disco instead of cults and in the late 2000s his gimmick of The Brian Kendrick was really great.
A sort of Jack Sparrow rocker slash drug-addled swan, it was a lot of fun, he won the right to compete for the WWE Championship in a Championship Scramble at Unforgiven 2008, in a match that featured guys who also never otherwise got title shots MVP and Shelton Benjamin.
What makes the story even more fun is that not only was this cruiserweight with the odd gimmick getting an incongruous title shot, but he actually sort of won the WWE Championship…. Kinda.
See the rules of the scramble, and now I just really want a plate of eggs but I’ll get through it, stated that the match would last exactly 20 minutes, superstars enter every five, if you pinned someone you became interim WWE Champion, and whoever was champ at the end of the match won.
Shortly after he arrived, Kendrick pinned Jeff Hardy, became interim Most Prestigious Champion in all of Wrestling, held it for 6 minutes, before being pinned by Triple H.
Officially not part of WWE canon, Kendrick is unique as not only receiving a forgotten WWE Championship match but a forgotten WWE Champion reign, all 6 minutes of it.
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