10 World Champions WWE Never Believed In

In the span of a few months, Roman Reigns has already become a two-time WWE World Heavyweight champion, and likely by WrestleMania 32, he will have won the prestigious prize a total of three times. But just about anyone can see that WWE is high on Reigns and his potential be to be a franchise player for the organization for years to come. The fact of the matter is, he has been heavily protected since his arrival on the scene in late 2012 and will continued to be groomed to be "the next guy" for as long as Vince McMahon is behind him, despite what fans might think of him. Unfortunately, not every Superstar has that kind of luxury, and if they do, officials aren't high on them for very long. It has long been a fact of WWE that it is a land of the giants, dating back to the days of Hulk Hogan and Andre the Giant in the 1980s. Granted, it isn't so much like that these days with athletes of all shapes and sizes succeeding, but even the most talented of wrestlers have to fight harder for their spot atop the card than those larger than them. Sometimes that isn't the case. Sometimes, as you will soon see with a handful of names on this list, the powers that be have full faith in an individual, but because they failed to live up to the hype or aren't paying dividends, they lose hope in their ability to flourish as world champion. They were lucky to capture the world title, but not lucky enough to hold on to it for very long.

10. Kane

Obviously, Kane isn't a small Superstar and has always been one of the biggest names (literally and figuratively) on the WWE roster since his 1997 debut. But in those two decades, he has won the world title on a mere two occasions, surprisingly enough. It's not that officials didn't believe it in him (otherwise he wouldn't have lasted this long), but rather they never thought he was world championship material. His first title reign came in 1998, not long after he arrived on the scene in WWE. Fresh off his feud with The Undertaker, he was thrust into the WWE Championship picture with Stone Cold Steve Austin, who he beat for the belt under dubious circumstances at the King of the Ring pay-per-view. But the very next night on Raw, he dropped the strap right back to The Texas Rattlesnake, ending his reign at one day. It wasn't until 2010 that he would reach the mountaintop again, cashing in the Money in the Bank briefcase less than an hour after winning it to seize his second World Heavyweight Championship. That's not counting the reign he had as ECW champion in 2008, but honestly, was that ever truly considered a real world title? At any rate, Kane dominated the singles ranks on SmackDown for a whopping five months, but even then, his run as champ was fairly forgettable. Sure, we got one last rivalry with 'Taker out of it, but none of their matches were particularly memorable. It spoke volumes what management thought of him in the twilight of his career when he lost the title that December and contended for the championship on few occasions in the years that followed.