WWE’s New Champions: New Blood or Bad Blood? (Part 1)
From the mid-1990s to today, wrestling fans have experienced an extreme transformation of the wrestling landscape. The industry has been exposed and monopolized. This has resulted in a changing of the guard, which can lead to an interesting and exciting future for the business, if handled properly by bookers. But of course, bookers handling angles properly is an oxymoron. Hence, the title reign of Batista as Smackdown’s World Heavyweight Champion and the crowning of Edge as Raw’s new World Heavyweight Champion.
There was no need for WWE to push Randy Orton and Batista so fast. Chris Benoit, an incredible worker, who has won the respect of the fans over and over again ever since he debuted in this sport, finally achieved the pinnacle of North American wrestling by defeating champion HHH and Shawn Michaels in a three-way dance to become WWE Champion at March 14, 2000’s Wrestlemania 20(1). However, Benoit’s WWE championship reign, which, if booked intelligently, would have lasted much longer, was cut short five months later on August 15, 2004 at Summerslam, held in Toronto, Ontario. Not only was WWE stupid enough to have a Canadian wrestling hero like Chris Benoit lose in his home country, but they were also stupid enough to have him lose to a 24-year-old nobody: Randy Orton.
Orton is definitely a talented worker. He is definitely championship material. He is definitely an essential part of WWE’s future. But 2004 was not his time; it was Benoit’s time. The struggles, hardships, and battles he overcame during his 18 year career, now a 20 year career, earned him the right to a WWE championship title reign. Orton’s third generation wrestler status did not earn him the right to a title reign, despite the fact that WWE handed him one. A friend of mine theorizes that the only reason why WWE gave him the title was so that Brock Lesnar, who abandoned the company after his Wrestlemania 20 match(2), could not hold the “youngest WWE champion ever” claim to fame(3).
When Batista won the title from HHH at April 3, 2005’s WrestleMania 21, die-hard wrestling fans all over the world contemplated committing suicide. Orton was bad enough, but since he had the ring skills that proved he had the potential to be championship material, and since wrestling fans had already survived disgraceful past champions like Vince McMahon, David Arquette, and Vince Russo(4), Orton’s title was permissible.
However, Batista as a WWE World Champion was a difficult pill to swallow. Thank God Kurt Angle is the new Smackdown Champion! Batista has done nothing but bore the fans to death in match after match of horrible ring wrestling and pathetic angles and feuds. Since it was so unbelievable that a savvy veteran like HHH could lose to just another nobody like Batista, the shock of witnessing HHH put over Batista in more than one match did not overpower the ubiquitous yawns of die-hard fans watching these annoyingly pathetic matches. Fans are left to wonder what could have happened if Benoit would have received the longer title reign he deserved.
(1) Arguably, he made an accomplishment that was just as impressive four years earlier on January 16, 2000 at WCW’s Souled Out by defeating Sid Vicious to become WCW’s World Heavyweight Champion. Benoit, along with comrades Eddie Guerrerro, Perry Saturn, and Dean Malenko, then shocked the wrestling world by jumping ship on Raw the following night, leaving WCW with a vacant World title.
(2) In a match that was literally booed out of the building, Bill Goldberg defeated Brock Lesnar at Wrestlemania 20. Fans, disgruntled over the fact that both competitors were leaving the company after this match, were very vocal in voicing their opinions about the matter.
(3) Brock Lesnar became the youngest champion to ever hold the WWE title at Summerslam on August 25, 2002 by defeating The Rock.
(4) Vince McMahon defeated HHH on September 14, 1999’s Smackdown. On April 27, 2000’s Thunder broadcast, during a tag team match between Diamond Dallas Page/David Arquette and Jeff Jarrett/Eric Bischoff, in which DDP put his title on the line, David Arquette pinned Eric Bischoff to become WCW champion. On September 25, 2000’s Nitro broadcast, Vince Russo defeated Booker T in a steel cage match. Just as Booker T was about to step through the cage door, Bill Goldberg speared Russo through the cage wall.