10 Last-Minute WWE Champions
2. Dean Ambrose (2016)
When WWE's biggest focus of the past three years, Roman Reigns, violated the Wellness Policy in the middle of his third WWE Championship reign, it was clear that Roman's loss would be another talent's gain. The only question was: who would benefit from the chaos surrounding the WWE Champion?
Already facing incredible amounts of rejection and backlash, Roman Reigns as the company's next top babyface and WWE Champion had been an unmitigated disaster. As punishment for his Wellness violation, Roman faced a 30 day suspension and lost the WWE title.
Reigns dropped the title to Seth Rollins at Money In The Bank, but then immediately after, Dean Ambrose (the evening's Money In The Bank contract winner) cashed in his briefcase on Rollins to win his first WWE Championship. Instead of keeping the title on the returning Seth Rollins (the man who never lost the WWE title), WWE opted to crown Dean Ambrose the new WWE Champion.
Even if, prior to Roman's violation, plans called for Ambrose to win the briefcase and cash-in eventually, WWE decided to speed up the process and made a quick call to put the title on Dean. Despite the rushed nature in which he won the title, Ambrose would remain WWE Champion until losing to AJ Styles at Backlash in September.