Every WWE King Of The Ring Winner Ranked From Worst To Best

5. Booker T (2006)

King Booker World Heavyweight Champion
WWE.com

Now, we turn our attention to the only brand-specific King of the Ring tournament, the 2006 edition, which rebooted the tournament after a four-year hiatus.

At the time, Booker T was a five-time WCW World Champion and multi-time WCW and WWF/E tag champ, but his career had leveled off as 2006 rolled around. Winning KOTR that year would lead to a dramatic shakeup for King Booker’s career – in more ways than one.

The Houston native started speaking with a faux (and deliberately poor) British accent, recruited a “king’s court” of William Regal and Fit Finlay, brought his wife Queen Sharmell into the mix, and reinvented himself.

King Bookah then went on to win the World Heavyweight Championship, his first (and only) WWE World title. He’d continue to use the king moniker well into 2007, battling Jerry “The King” Lawler and Triple H due to their use of the royal title. He would maintain his king title until he left WWE in October 2007.

Booker was unique (aside from Harley Race) in that he used the king title to great effect to get himself over, rejuvenating a flagging WWE career and returning to World champion level as a result. Others have ascended higher, but few have reinvented themselves to the extent that Booker did.

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.