10 Strangest Ways To Win A Wrestling Championship

2. Being Given Power Of Attorney (WCW World Television Championship)

Britt Baker DMD
WWE

It's a trope all too common in the wrestling landscape: champion gets injured, champion selects representative for title defences, elected champion loses title.

It still exists in form - Samoa Joe's AEW World Championship victory was the result of him having substituted for an injured Adam Cole in multiple ROH World Tag Team Title defences - but in July 1998, WCW, a promotion teetering on implosion opposite an explosive Attitude Era-bolstered WWF, took this trope to a new level of Vince Russo-booked absurdity.

Booker T was the World Television Champion. It was his fifth reign with the strap because WCW hadn't yet identified the main event potential that stood in front of them. He was injured, though, and was written off company programming in an instantly-forgotten injury angle where Bret Hart obliterated his knee.

Now what? Would WCW vacate the championship? Would a new champion be crowned in the novel idea of a tournament? Would the belt be quietly retired?

Nope!

Stevie Ray became the new champion because he had signed a document giving him Power of Attorney in the event Booker T became incapacitated. This was Ray's solitary singles gold in WCW(!), yet he didn't defeat anyone to become the champion and he dropped it to Chris Jericho in his first defence.

Stevie looked like a geek. A golden geek, admittedly, but a geek nonetheless.

Contributor
Contributor

Can be found raving about the latest IMPACT Wrestling signing, the Saints Row franchise, and King Shark in The Suicide Squad.