Your Champ Sucks: Rating the 'World' Champions

The thing about professional wrestling is... I don't really watch it anymore. I haven't watched it on a steady basis since probably 2006-2007. Even then I was watching mostly Japanese and ROH stuff. I'm just not very interested in the modern "major" pro wrestling scene.

I realized years upon years ago that I had outgrown what they were trying to push on people. I've covered my disillusion with pro wrestling in detail before, so I'll give a a brief rundown before getting to my main topic. The idea that wrestling is a soap opera is foolish. It's a sort of low-brow performance art. It's something fun for pseudo-intellectual types to critique. Or something. What it shouldn't be is 1 hour 40 minutes of talking and developing horrifyingly stupid stories that are an insult to anyone with a shred of intelligence. The way ahead is through amazing in ring action, and all the major companies have forgotten this despite possessing some of the top talent. Ring of Honor is a huge underground hit, Japanese wrestling never changed it's format, and TNA made it's name based on good old fashioned ACTION.

That whining aside I'll mention the greatest goal of all pros, championships. Every promotion has a prize at the top. Over the years there have been several companies that could truly claim "World" title status. Most of them are dead. Like boxing championships there can never truly be one top champion, but instead dozens of titles all claiming to be the most important in the world. Some companies even have TWO top titles... which is very, very unwise. So let's take a look at the current wrestlers at the peak of their profession.

And yes, I know I probably should have written more about the role that championships play in wrestling. That's sort of a given really. They mean the same thing that any "belt" type championship does. In essence gaining a championship means one of three things: you kissed the right ass, management thinks it's the right move, or the fans are outright demanding it. Sadly the last one happens the least. Fans opinions don't count in wrestling. Ever.

On to the champions!


WWE WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT (Big Gold Belt, WCW Title, Smackdown champion, Trips belt)
Jack Swagger
Grade = F
I don't even know who the fuck this is. I watched one promo he did and it was awful. He had no emotion, a dumb looking face, and a boring suit.

WWE HEAVYWEIGHT (Spinner Belt, Cena Belt, Ugliest Title in the World, RAW Champ)
John Cena
Grade = C+
I don't like him and he really can't get any better than a passable match. Although by this point he's really got the whole "being a champion" thing down. It's not as bad as it was 5 years ago, but that's just because I've gotten used to him. The idiots really like him, anyway, so he'll always be champion.

TNA WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT (NewWCW championship, nottheX Title)
Rob Van Dam (Johnny the Asp, Robbie Winkle)
Grade = A
Rob Van Dam gets only his second world title run... ever. For one of the most popular wrestlers of the early 00s this is well deserved. He was perpetually a top candidate for the glass ceiling award, but finally broke through a few years ago and never looked back. For once, good job TNA.

ROH "WORLD" CHAMPIONSHIP (Better 5 years ago Title, Best of Whats Left championship)
Tyler Black
Grade = C-
He's not the worst and he's not the best. He really is just the best of what's left after ROH got picked clean by TNA and WWE. With the likes of Nigel, AmDrag, Punk, Joe, AJ, and others long gone they don't have a lot to work with. I haven't seen the recent ROH product enough to know if this is a good move but I always did like Black. With Christopher Daniels on his way back, however, I don't think he's long for the title.

NWA WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT (Rectangle title, Means Nothing Anymore title)
Adam Pearce
Grade = D+
He's the booker, he's the champ. Not as bad as Blue Demon Jr. (who's energy drink I LOVE), but there are so many independent workers out there that could add their name to this title. It's vanishing act after TNA dropped the NWA was total. With no exposure and no real competition, this title is unlikely to ever be in the spotlight again. Though that's what people said back in 2001...

TRIPLE CROWN (50s looking & barely holding together, Baba's belts)
Minoru Suzuki
Grade = B
Had I written this even a week ago it would have been Ryota Hama... and the grade would've been F-. Luckily he dropped the titles on his first defense to the always hard MiSuzuki. This will inevitably lead to Masakatsu Funaki vs Minoru Suzuki which will be some stiff goodness.

GHC HEAVYWEIGHT (...got nothing, Belt of Awesome title matches, Kobashi's belt)
Takashi Suguira
Grade = D+
I'm not against juniors going up a division and winning the top belts, but in this case it just didn't feel right. Suguira really doesn't feel like a top contender to me. Go Shiosaki is awesome, but I don't think he really has the fans in his palm quite yet so the title was taken and given to... Suguira? With so much amazing talent in NOAH I feel like this was just the wrong choice of champion.

IWGP HEAVYWEIGHT (Soured by Sapp, Lessened by Lesnar)
Togi Makabe
Grade = A
He was built up pefectly. After years of getting the big wins but failed title shots, a G1 Climax victory and leading his stable to war against Nakamura, Makabe finally earns his championship and it just feel right. It was a classic slow build that just doesn't happen very often anymore. It worked for Makabe.

So there it is folks. What do you think about the current champions, if anything. Or do you just hate wrestling in general. I'll admit I only found out about half of these (mostly the American ones) through Wikipedia. There isn't much of a place for wrestling in my life. Every so often, like today, I'll get in a mood and watch some. Today I watched an FMW and a NOAH dvd. Guess which one was better? Even so, the FMW was fun. Outside of these occasional days I just don't have a lot of room in my life for wrestling.

I honestly challenge you to go and watch an entire two hour episode of WWE or TNA and see if you can get through it without yelling at the screen in disgust. Or changing the channel due to massive stupidity displayed on screen.