From March 22nd 2003 to December 26th 2004, Samoa Joe carried the most prestigious championship belt in Ring of Honor. He was the third-ever ROH World Champion, and his 21-month-long reign is the longest in the companys history. During that reign, Joe had a staggering 29 successful title defenses, which included a series of legendary matches with CM Punk. Back then, the two of them were still very much Indy wrestlers, but after these outstanding wrestling matches, both of them became much bigger stars with more significant reputations. Although it was CM Punk who got signed with WWE (even though he was the smaller of the two wrestlers), Joe became a big star in his own right. Joes reign really helped establish ROH as an exciting promotion, and the belt was quickly elevated to a more prestigious position. Its very rare for anyone to be a World Champion longer than twelve months in this day and age, yet Joe was one of the few who managed to achieve this feat in the 21st century. That says a lot about both his wrestling ability and ROHs faith in his drawing ability. Perhaps thats one of the main reasons why HHH always appeared to have an interest in signing Joe to WWE.