10 Babyface Champions WWE Fans Just Wouldn’t Accept

5. The Ultimate Warrior (1990)

WWE

Hulk Hogan was such a success during the 1980s for Vince McMahon that searching for his replacement as calendars creeped towards 1990 cannot have been an easy task. Looking to use Hogan's magic to shine up another star, the forward-thinking McMahon decided on The Ultimate Warrior as his next top babyface champion.

Unfortunately for McMahon and Warrior, the WWF fanbase didn't fully embrace the 'Warrior Wildness' as much as they had 'Hulkamania' before it.

Warrior was put over strong at WrestleMania VI; beating Hogan to become the new WWF Heavyweight Champ, the energetic wild man should have shot into the stratosphere as the promotion's new hand-picked star of the '90s, but he couldn't live up to the hype at the box office or inside the ring.

McMahon's new pet project may have had more success if he hadn't been following the mighty Hulk, and he was let down after 'Mania by a lack of suitable feuds (issues with Rick Rude and poking his nose into affairs between Demolition and The Legion Of Doom played second fiddle next to Hogan's rivalry with Earthquake, for example).

People found it hard to accept Warrior as Hogan's replacement largely because it appeared the WWF were struggling themselves.

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Lifelong wrestling, video game, music and sports obsessive who has been writing about his passions since childhood. Jamie started writing for WhatCulture in 2013, and has contributed thousands of articles and YouTube videos since then. He cut his teeth penning published pieces for top UK and European wrestling read Fighting Spirit Magazine (FSM), and also has extensive experience working within the wrestling biz as a manager and commentator for promotions like ICW on WWE Network and WCPW/Defiant since 2010. Further, Jamie also hosted the old Ministry Of Slam podcast, and has interviewed everyone from Steve Austin and Shawn Michaels to Bret Hart and Trish Stratus.