A fan's delight and a wrestler's dismay, few things go viral quicker than a massive botch. For a myriad of reasons, human beings love watching others screw up, and as soon as somebody makes a mistake between the ropes, you can guarantee that X and Reddit will quickly be awash with gifs and gags.
It's bad enough when these mistakes happen in the middle of a bout, but they can become the main reason a match is remembered when they occur near the conclusion. Tossing a championship into the mix, and the effects are amplified even further, forcing promotions to chuck weeks of well-laid plans into the shredder.
Companies like WWE don't always treat their titles with respect, but they still want to maintain control. Unplanned title changes, though rare, give them an embarrassing mess to clean up, and while they're usually successful in doing so, these situations often leave audiences bewildered, and the promotion with a number of misplaced 1-2 day reigns sticking out in their title histories.
From the 1960s through to the present day, let's look at the most prominent examples.
Michael is a writer, editor, podcaster and presenter for WhatCulture Wrestling, and has been with the organisation over 8 years. He primarily produces written, audio and video content on WWE and AEW, but also provides knowledge and insights on all aspects of the wrestling industry thanks to a passion for it dating back over 35 years. As one third of "The Dadley Boyz" Michael has contributed to the huge rise in popularity of the WhatCulture Wrestling Podcast and its accompanying YouTube channel, earning it top spot in the UK's wrestling podcast charts with well over 62,000,000 total downloads. Within the podcasting space, he also co-hosts Benno & Hamflett, In Your House! and Podcast Horseman: The BoJack Horseman Podcast. He has been featured as a wrestling analyst for the Tampa Bay Times, Fightful, POST Wrestling, GRAPPL, GCP, Poisonrana and Sports Guys Talking Wrestling, and has covered milestone events in New York, Dallas, Las Vegas, Philadelphia, London and Cardiff. Michael's background in media stretches beyond wrestling coverage, with a degree in Journalism from the University Of Sunderland (2:1) and a series of published articles in sports, music and culture magazines The Crack, A Love Supreme and Pilot. When not offering his voice up for daily wrestling podcasts, he can be found losing it singing far too loud watching his favourite bands play live. Follow him on X/Twitter - @MichaelHamflett
