10 WWE Champions Who Weren't Ready For The Belt
9. Randy Orton
You can build a sports entertainer from the ground up, but not an authentic main event talent.
Included here because it was in 2004 analogous to its older brother, Randy Orton captured his first World Heavyweight Title at SummerSlam 2004. The spite and the cynicism underpinning the switch yielded a worthy winner, owing largely to Chris Benoit's sumptuous ring generalship - but not a worthy Champion.
Orton acquitted himself very well to the technical framework of a Benoit match, using his size advantage, sh*thousery and his own under-appreciated science to remove himself from peril. It was a match that in pitch and execution cast him as a prodigy.
The subsequent run was more of a sprint to disaster. Orton's youth allowed for an intriguing, unique story, and a f*ck you aimed in Brock Lesnar's face, but it crotched him just 24 hours later. Orton hadn't yet mastered his character - he had played just one - and was unable to evolve it over the course 24 hours, incredibly enough.
The new babyface Orton wasn't a badass, or an irrepressible scamp, but simply the old heel Orton: an entitled brat averse to a fair confrontation.