10 WWE Stars Who Only Won Gold Because Of The Brand Split

6. Booker T

JBL Royal Rumble 2005
WWE.com

In 2006, Booker T was experiencing something of a career renaissance as King Booker, putting in arguably the best work of his entire World Wrestling Entertainment tenure. The king gimmick managed to breathe new life into his stuttering career, and he was duly rewarded with a World Heavyweight Championship run throughout that summer.

Would he have had a run with the belt if the brand split wasn't in place? It is unlikely. WWE booked themselves into something of a hole by portraying Rey Mysterio so weakly as champion, and when they needed to take the belt off him King Booker was the only major heel available to do so.

Mr. Kennedy had just arrived and it was too early in his run for a world title run, and the next heels on the totem pole were Gregory Helms and Finlay. WWE could have had a face defeat Rey for the strap, but that rarely succeeds in developing a decent narrative. In 2006 the heel side of SmackDown's roster was extremely depleted, which was the main reason Booker received this reign.

Still, King Bookah was excellent.

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Born in the middle of Wales in the middle of the 1980's, John can't quite remember when he started watching wrestling but he has a terrible feeling that Dino Bravo was involved. Now living in Prague, John spends most of his time trying to work out how Tomohiro Ishii still stands upright. His favourite wrestler of all time is Dean Malenko, but really it is Repo Man. He is the author of 'An Illustrated History of Slavic Misery', the best book about the Slavic people that you haven't yet read. You can get that and others from www.poshlostbooks.com.