10 Cruiserweight Wrestling Champions Who Later Won World Titles
6. Matt Hardy
It’s safe to say Matt’s OMEGA Heavyweight Championship doesn’t count for this list.
Matt Hardy after years of being seen and overlooked as the secondary Hardy Boy kicked off his solo career as the heelish Version 1 Matt Hardy. With Mattitude Follower Shannon Moore in tow, he and his Matt Facts got a push in WWE, with a hilarious storyline involving him trying to drop weight in time to compete in the Cruiserweight division in 2003. He would win the Cruiserweight Championship at No Way Out and had a 3-month reign as champ before dropping it to Rey Mysterio in a great feud, which included the opening match of WrestleMania XIX.
WWE in the WWEECW days took advantage of Matt’s potential and had him win the ECW Championship in a Championship Scramble match at Unforgiven (2008) by defeating Chavo Guerrero, Finlay, The Miz and Mark Henry. There’s a fantastic photo of Matt and Jeff (who won the WWE Championship that same year) looking at each other smiling and both holding different world titles. Matt when he went to TNA realized his potential further with his bizarre Broken gimmick, winning the TNA World Heavyweight Championship at Bound for Glory in his feud with EC3.