10 Real Life Events That Forced Wrestling World Title Changes

6. Ready To Rumble's Promotional Push Made David Arquette WCW Champion

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WWE.com

Oh, WCW...

Don't get it wrong, World Championship Wrestling was great for a spell. And not just the years in which the promotion trounced the then-WWF in the ratings, for there was plenty to enjoy about WCW once the company formed out of the ashes of Jim Crockett Promotions in 1988.

Of course, the WCW name was tarnished by the dross served up in the final few years of the promotion's lifespan.

One thing many like to regularly point at as being a pivotal factor in WCW's demise, is the call to make David Arquette the World Heavyweight Champion.

For Arquette, he was actually against that idea, and the phenomenal You Cannot Kill David Arquette documentary gives a brilliant insight into the ins and outs of that anointment and the subsequent fallout of it.

Why was the decision made to put Big Gold around the waist of David Arquette, then? That was due to the release of the Ready to Rumble movie in April 2000.

That film featured WCW and some of its biggest stars on display alongside the likes of Arquette, Oliver Pratt, Scott Caan and Rose McGowan. As such, WCW decided that the perfect way to drum up publicity for the movie and for Turner's 'rasslin company would be to put the World Heavyweight Championship on one of Ready to Rumble's headline stars.

To get the title onto Arquette, the actor-turned-wrestler pinned Eric Bischoff to win Diamond Dallas Page's World Championship in a tag bout also featuring DDP and Jeff Jarrett.

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Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main dayjob, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks, Jamie Hayer, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg.