Brett1N
The WWE Championship gets around
by , 10-11-2010 at 12:19 PM (2648 Views)
This is my first blog post on the eWrestlingNews website. I saw a post where a site administrator wanted more bloggers, so I decided to help. I would like to post once or twice a week and I'm hoping my columns will generate some sort of conversation, whether it be good or bad.
Does anyone remember the New Generation era in WWE? It was during the mid-1990s, the last time the WWE would be considered PG before it branched out to the Attitude Era.
There were four championships back then: the WWE Championship, the Intercontinental Championship, the Tag-Team Championship, and the Women's Championship. Each one was meaningful. And back then, it seemed like championships meant much more. It was rare to see titles change hands more than the Washington Redskins change head coaches. But in the past year, think about how many times the WWE Championship has been won and lost. Since June 2009, the title changed hands on ten different occasions. TEN! To describe that in one word: cockamamie.
In the same 16-month span in 1996, the title changed hands only six times. And Shawn Michaels' "lost my smile" speech happened during that period which forced a title change. To be fair, Batista tore his triceps at Extreme Rules 2009 which also required a change, but you see the difference.
Another example: including Ric Flair's WWE Championship win at the 1992 Royal Rumble, the title changed hands 20 times from the 1992 Royal Rumble until Stone Cold Steve Austin won it at WrestleMania XIV in 1998. Since John Cena was forced to relinquish the title when he tore his pectoral in October 2007, the title changed holders 21 different times, including Randy Orton's win at Hell in a Cell. That equates to seven changes a year, which is way too many.
Don't get me wrong, I love to see title changes but if it happens too often, it loses some of its flavor. It doesn't feel as special. It's just like a good song on the radio. It debuts and catches fire, but the more the song is played, the more annoying it can become. And after the station plays the song more than the Broncos pass the ball, it sucks. That's what these title changes are like: a good song that is overplayed.
But as I type this, I feel like that song is about to be played again. Now that John Cena has to listen to Wade Barrett and the fact that Barrett has the rest of Nexus in his corner, I feel as if there is no way to preserve Orton's title reign. I hope I'm wrong, but I do understand what the WWE is doing. It needs to get the young guys over and experiment by giving them the title (i.e. Sheamus). Should the title change hands before year's end, it will be the 22nd change in three years which is double the pace during the 1992-1998 period.
Who knows what will happen, but I can only hope that the WWE will rewind clocks and start treating the WWE Championship better. They need to stop handling the title like a one night stand girl. It just isn't as cool if everyone can touch it.
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