10 Reasons The WWE Title Is Meaningless In 2017
'That stupid piece of tin you've got on your shoulder'
Shawn Michaels was prone to sacrilegious remarks like the one above during his most reckless moments under a fog of drug and alcohol dependency in the mid-1990s.
His outburst came at the expense of Bret Hart, who proudly held the WWE Title as the symbol of excellence in an industry he still truly believed he was at the top of during a tumultuous final reign as champion.
Hart was frequently accused of taking the wrestling business too seriously, and the barb was a shot across the bow by Michaels designed to diminish the prestige 'The Hitman' felt he held by the virtue of his position as champion.
Of course, deep down 'HBK' felt the exact same way. His paradoxical reduction of Hart was the latest strike in a war of words between the two, but the quest for supremacy within the company was a real competition, and in 1997, holding the gold placed you at the very top.
20 years on from that fractious period, and just about everything has changed about the company and the business in general. The 'piece of tin' Bret and Shawn viciously fought over has suffered more than most over those two decades, but has now landed at a previously unthinkable nadir.
As the wrestling world awaits a potential pay-per-view WWE Title meeting of Randy Orton and Jinder Mahal, here are 10 reasons the once beloved championship has become virtually meaningless in 2017.
10. Record Breaker
Much was made of John Cena's attempt at equalling the iffy-but-accepted record set by Ric Flair as he prepared to take on AJ Styles at January's Royal Rumble pay-per-view.
'The Champ' dethroned 'The Phenomenal One' to win his 16th WWE/World Title since scooping his first back in 2005, amassing the same number as Flair in just under half the time it took 'The Nature Boy' to set the target.
However, Cena would criminally find himself a transitional champion on the 'Road to WrestleMania', and subsequent mentions of the historic reign were muted as the company moved towards the Elimination Chamber pay-per-view with sights locked on getting the belt into the Randy Orton/Bray Wyatt programme.
Cena's fabulous dethroning of Styles deserved a far superior follow-up than it subsequently received, and the reign in general mirrored Flair's own final stints with the title in WCW's miserable final years.
Vince Russo stripped him of the prize after just a week holding the gold in his penultimate period as champion, but Flair was given the title back by Kevin Nash the following Monday on Nitro. He wouldn't even make it to the end of the episode with the strap, losing a match against Jeff Jarrett in the main event of that very broadcast.
WWE's treatment of the top title this year has been only slightly better.