10 Awesome Ways Wrestling Champions Elevated Titles
5. Tommaso Ciampa: Gave It A Name
While the NXT Championship has rarely struggled for prestige and importance, both experienced gentle dips when Finn Balor's game-changing reign came to an end in April 2016. Samoa Joe, Shinsuke Nakamura, Bobby Roode, and the others that followed weren't bad champions: they just weren't as strong as Balor.
Enter Tommaso Ciampa, who handled the strap as if it was the most important thing in the world to him as soon as he took it from Aleister Black.
Ciampa's relationship with Goldie was as joyous as it was creepy. The former DIY man treated the belt as if it was sentient. Everything from the way he clutched it to his chest as he walked to the ring and gazed at it in wonderment while raising it aloft told you it was his everything, as did his in-ring performances. Acclaimed blockbuster bouts with Johnny Gargano, Velveteen Dream, and Black drew praise from all corners of wrestling fandom. Ciampa, the madman, had rebuilt the NXT Championship as Goldie, with the only regret being the neck injury preventing him and Gargano from wrapping their story in New York.