10 Lamest WWE Title Changes

Screwy finishes, part-time party poopers, and the obligatory Money in the Bank cash-in...

Hulk Hogan Yokozuna
WWE.com

There are many words that I imagine the WWE would like you to use when describing a major title change. Lame probably isn’t one of them though.

Luckily, by and large it’s been a word that rarely creeps into our vocabulary. When we cast our minds back to major title changes from years gone by, chances are we think of Daniel Bryan’s epic coronation at WrestleMania XXX, or maybe Shawn Michaels realisation of the “boyhood dream” some 18 years prior. In these cases, I think you’d struggle to find a single person who’d describe those instances as lame.

Of course, not every title change has been fortunate enough to receive that kind of priority treatment though. Some are left as mere afterthoughts, others the victim of wacky booking decisions. Either way, these ones do remain fairly memorable—but usually for all the wrong reasons.

This article looks back at some such examples, as we round up ten of the lamest WWE title changes that someone, somewhere, somehow thought they seemed like a good idea at the time.

10. Diesel Vs. Bob Backlund

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WWE.com

Prior to winning the WWF Championship in November 1994, Diesel was hardly the most recognised name in the World Wrestling Federation. He’d only signed for the company in June of the previous year, while his TV debut hadn’t arrived until a few months later in September.

So it seems a little surprising that the company would begin his first reign as WWF Champion at an untelevised house show, and furthermore that it would come off the back of an 8-second squash match. If the idea was to use the quick contest to establish Diesel as a monster, surely it would have been better to stage it on television where it would be seen by a wider audience?

Not only that, but an 8-second reign was hardly the most fitting way to end the tenure of the previous champion, the legendary Bob Backlund. Plus, Backlund had only just won the belt at the Survivor Series pay-per-view, meaning his stint with the title lasted a mere three days.

For all of those reasons, Diesel’s victory just seems a little anti-climactic, and perhaps not the best way to have kicked off his first and only run as WWF Champion.

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Elliott Binks hasn't written a bio just yet, but if they had... it would appear here.