10 Worst Booked WWE Champions Of All Time
2. Jinder Mahal
When Jinder Mahal became a WWE main eventer overnight in 2017, fans didn’t know what to make of it. On one hand, WWE were bringing a new star to the main event scene. On the other hand, it was Jinder Mahal… Mahal was a well established jobber and was never positioned as anything remotely credible on WWE programming before.
Naturally, when WWE went all the way and put the title on Mahal at Backlash, it took people by surprise. Mahal would go on to have a 170 day reign as champion and the reign was met with a lot of disdain from fans who loathed the SmackDown product during this time period. The issue with the booking of Mahal was that the audience was supposed to view someone who was a jobber three weeks prior and take him seriously as a legitimate champion. It was hard for fans to process, and was made even worse by Mahal cutting outdated, stereotypical anti-American promos that did little to build up a meaningful, interesting character.
Mahal was booked strongly on PPV events, with wins against Orton and Shinsuke Nakamura, but the booking didn’t want to make fans see Mahal lose, it just made them not want to see Mahal in the main event scene at all. Therefore when AJ Styles beat Mahal for the title in November, fans rejoiced and hoped Mahal would never return to the main event scene ever again. And he hasn't.