15 WWE Title Changes That IMMEDIATELY Backfired
2. Jinder Mahal Shocks The World (WWE Title)
Title Change: Jinder Mahal was released by WWE in 2014, but the dude worked his butt off to get into unreal physical shape and catch the company's eye again. By 2016, he was back, and things seemed different. Nobody thought for a second that Jinder was winning top titles, or anything, but he had more of an edge.
Then, Mahal pinned Randy Orton to earn his first and only WWE Title at Backlash 2017. Surprise!
Why It Backfired: This shocking moment was greeted with popcorn farts from the core audience. Many had been enjoying Mahal since his return, but that didn't mean they were happy to view him as a top guy who deserved to be WWE Champion. WWE's audience refused to accept Jinder as a credible headliner, largely because he’d never been one in the company across multiple stints.
His resultant 170-day reign was a miserable flop. People couldn’t get on board with his dated promos or matches. A feud vs. Shinsuke Nakamura was painful to witness too. It veered awkwardly into racism territory, and that put the wrong kind of heat on Mahal. By the time their SummerSlam effort rolled around, punters just fancied seeing WWE move on from a botched experiment.
Vince McMahon had hoped that Jinder's multi-cultural Indo-Canadian background would help make in roads for the promotion in India. There surely was some interest in celebrating his ascent to the throne, but no amount of hype could change the fact that Mahal never came across as somebody who was going to be on top for long.
He was a pretender to that throne, and everybody knew it.