10 WWE Number One Contenders Nobody Actually Thought Could Win

A championship is only as credible as those who challenge for it. The IWGP Heavyweight Championship hasn't become the most coveted title in professional wrestling by chance; only the cream of the crop are worthy of coming within a victory of immortality. This most prestigious of tables lends weight to the championship belt at the head of it all, covering everything in a veneer of importance.

WWE doesn't seem to understand this. Challenging for the WWE Championship has often required little more than being the flavour of the month or having some perceived name value. The world's biggest wrestling promotion has treated its titles like little more than props over the years, to the point where they carry little or no value. We all know that someone is going to win the belt and carry it for a few months before dropping it to whoever is next in line. Each title reign is punctuated by challengers that tick boxes and little else.

Even in amongst all of that, there have been some number one contenders that really pushed the boundaries of ridiculousness. Men coming out of quite literally nowhere to challenge for what should be a prestigious title is nothing new in WWE, but these challengers took the biscuit. They were never in danger of taking the title, of course, so that biscuit had to suffice.

Gosh, this really feels like a lifetime ago. Cain Velasquez made his WWE debut on the very first episode of SmackDown on Fox, confronting Brock Lesnar and setting up a WWE Championship match for Crown Jewel. Forgetting how irrelevant the whole thing made Kofi Kingston and his title reign look, Cain's debut was hardly the show-stopping moment that WWE officials may have hoped it was going to be. Velasquez looked tentative in the squared circle and not even some typically marvellous Lesnar facials could change that.

Did anyone think Cain Velasquez was going dethrone Brock Lesnar at Crown Jewel? Of course not. Not even Cain Velasquez believed it. The two-time UFC Heavyweight Champion may have famously vanquished Lesnar in the Octagon, but MMA and pro wrestling are two very different beasts. Having a rookie like Velasquez beat Brock for the title would have made no sense at all, and the response to Cain's debut suggests it wouldn't have been particularly popular.

It all led to a WWE Championship that was cold enough to freeze off the brass monkey's proverbials. The match itself was an absolute sh*t-show, a two-minute waste of time that practically killed Velasquez in the eyes of pro wrestling fans. Good job, everyone!