Call it The Battle of the Peoples Champions. Everyone knows that The Rock constantly refers to himself as the Peoples Champion, but WCW fans will quickly point out that Diamond Dallas Page also carried the same moniker during his career. After a long struggle to improve as a worker and connect with the fans, Page began making strides, thanks in part to his explosive Diamond Cutter finisher. From there, his battle against the nWo -- and Randy Savage in particular -- in 1997 catapulted him to the top of the list of fan favorites. DDP would sometimes hit a Diamond Cutter on an adversary, then escape into the crowd before the rest of the nWo could grab him and flash the Diamond Cutter sign, with thousands of fans joining in. It was that connection with the fans that led announcers to dub him the Peoples Champion. Over in WWF, Rocky Maivia had a similar long road to hoe before he connected with the fans and rose to prominence as the northern promotions version of the Peoples Champ. Of course, The Rock also became one of the biggest stars in the industry, so its fair to see why hes remembered as the true Peoples Champion. Still, a contest in 1998 between the two, when Page was at his hottest and Rock was still climbing the ladder, would have been a money match.
Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.
