5 Ups & 6 Downs From WWE WrestleMania Backlash 2022

Downs…

6. PPV/PLE Secondary Title Defenses Nonexistent

Theory Vince McMahon
WWE.com

Ready for an insane stat? Since WrestleMania 37 14 months ago, the Intercontinental Championship hasn’t been defended on PPV/PLE even once. Not one title defense on a special event. Almost as bad, the United States Championship has been defended on PPV/PLE exactly twice in that same span.

That is beyond ridiculous. These are your secondary titles, which used to represent wrestlers just a step down from the world champion(s), or an up-and-comer who is being set up for big things. In the case of Theory, he’s supposed to be Vince McMahon’s hand-picked prodigy. And instead of getting a PLE match at an event with “WrestleMania” in the title, he and his US title sat in catering.

As for Ricochet, if you’re not going to elevate him or at least give the high-flying superstar a chance to succeed, then why have the IC title on him? This writer would rather they go all-in and see if Ricochet can deliver rather than this hokey-pokey, half-in, half-out approach.

But in the meantime, break out the milk carton, because these titles are missing on PLEs.

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Contributor
Contributor

Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.