10 Super Rare Times WWE Promoted Rival Titles
It's not a belt, it's a "Championship". But what about when it's not even a WWE Championship?
Rare will an article in modern times start by noting WWE's consistency. But in this particular arena, WWE are extremely, extremely consistent.
They do not f*cking care for other pro wrestling and to parrot Vince McMahoh himself, quite frankly not withstanding the occasional arrangements and things of that nature, they never have and never will. Championship belts included.
McMahon is a marketeer more than a promoter, graduating on his own terms when his skills at doing the latter allowed him to buy the family business from his Father and embrace his true calling as the former. The territorial takeover throughout the 1980s was built on the back of the incredible marketing surges that made WrestleManias I and III such a success, and the glitz, glamour and merchandise cheques offered in Stamford that dwarfed just about every other kind of offer on the North American map.
As the company grew, so too did the Chairman's insistence that the branding be protected and preserved at all costs. This included (but wasn't limited to never), ever acknowledging the opposition. Especially not their pathetic, mud show titles.
Apart from when....
10. Dan Severn: Belt Collector
Sporting multiple UFC Championships from the MMA league's earliest years as well as an NWA Worlds Heavyweight Championship he'd held for three years (in a reign that lasted another year) after his WWE tenure, Dan 'The Beast' Severn looked the part on Night One even if his time with Vince McMahon was destined to be short.
Proffering the strong, silent type of danger that McMahon's historically struggled to promote, Severn was a realistic hard case but struggled to gain a foothold deep into the bombastic bluster of the Attitude Era. This shouldn't have been an issue, particularly with 'The Beast' used as Jim Cornette's old school killer, but the demands of the time called for more of what people loved rather than a sprinkling of difference here and there.
Without a catchphrase, quick-hit finisher or the constant mentioning/showing of t*ts (apart from that time he stretched D'Lo Brown's so hard it tore his pectoral muscle), Severn was a stranger in a strange land regardless of all the gold.