8 Greatest Transitional WWE Champions Of All Time

Even though Chris Jericho enjoyed the single greatest response of any WCW transplant in his WWE television debut and remained incredibly popular during his initial run with the company, ol' Vinnie Mac was still reluctant to give him a legitimate run as the WWE Champion in 2001.

It was more or less the same situation as it had been with Ric Flair, with the prevailing notion being that Vince still couldn't stomach the idea of a former WCW guy - who'd been with the WWE for two years by this point - becoming the top dog.

But hey, that didn't mean he couldn't use the talented and over Jericho to unify the WWE and WCW Championships - after all, he was incredibly popular in both companies - and then pass the Undisputed Championship onto Triple H once he returned from his quad injury.

It was nice to see Jericho receive his day in the sun, beating both The Rock and Stone Cold in the same night and etching his name into the history books. But it was heartbreaking to see such an amazing performer fall back down into the bowels of the mid-card immediately after losing the title at WrestleMania.

That was Jericho's longest reign at the top, by the way. All three of his World Heavyweight Champion reigns lasted less than two months each. Which is all kinds of sad.