12 Times WWE Buried Their Own Champions
Becoming champ should suggest that WWE management is behind you. SHOULD.
'Business must be in the toilet if we're putting the belt on ***insert wrestler here***'.
That loosely-transcribed, but totally cutting phrase was reserved for one worker in particular. He's right here on this list, and he's joined by a bunch of other champions that WWE crowned then badly let down. On paper, you wouldn't think that the company's top brass would even bother to stick a title on somebody if they didn't think they could cut it, but that sometimes doesn't ring true.
At times, it's almost like Vince McMahon, Triple H and other bosses wanted to test the roster by seeing how they'd adapt to pressure or an unwanted helping of disappointing booking. If that sounds like a counterproductive way to go about things, then that's surely because...it is. Everybody's supposed to be on the same side and striving for the same thing, but nobody should ever disregard the cruel political backbiting that goes on behind the scenes.
Then, on other occasions, champs were just afterthoughts who were never going to succeed despite being pushed early on. They might've been the apple of creative's eye before bagging belts, but then writers moved onto their next project like some 5 year old ripping open a pile of Christmas presents.
Of course, wrestlers themselves have to take some responsibility for things going south, but it'd be bold to imply that anybody on this list deserved to be buried. All of them did their best and all of them were/are talented - they were simply let down by a machine that cheerfully criticised them or pushed them aside whilst they were key champions.
12. Karrion Kross Makes NXT Look Less-Than
At the risk of making Karrion Kross sound like Gene Snitsky, it wasn't his fault.
Kross was reigning NXT Champion when he was called up to the WWE main roster and debuted on the 19 July 2021 Raw. Anyone excited by the thought of this would soon come crashing right back down to earth when the menacing heel champ lost to Jeff Hardy in around 2 minutes. Ouch. This wasn't quite the Raw debut that anyone had envisioned for the guy, to say the least.
From there, Karrion dropped his NXT belt to Samoa Joe at TakeOver 36 on 22 August and officially joined the main touring crew after that. Not content with jobbing his new man out, Vince McMahon changed up Kross's look to include some goofy props that sort of made him look like the cast member of a 1990s children's TV show.
Everything that had turned Karrion into such a force on NXT immediately vanished. Scarlett wasn't by his side, and he lacked the presence he'd had by the bucketload down in developmental. It was a masterclass in stripping away everything that had made Kross viable for a promotion in the first place. Baffling.
Worse followed. Both Karrion and Scarlett got released on 4 November, and the pair wouldn’t return until August 2022 under Triple H's watch. Another so-so spell followed before Kross watched his contract tick down. He claims that WWE only gave him a short window to agree fresh terms, and that they didn't want to sign Scarlett. So, he decided to leave instead.
That second saga is a sorry one, but it's nowhere near as pathetic as what happened in 2021.