Ranking All 19 WWE King Of The Ring Winners

1. Bret “Hitman” Hart (1991, 1993)

King Of The Ring Winners Bret Hart Brock Lesnar Kurt Angle
WWE.com

Of course, the top spot on this list has to belong to the only man to win two King of the Ring tournaments, Bret “Hitman” Hart.

Interestingly, the back-to-back tourney wins were very different for Hart. In early 1991, Hitman was still part of the Hart Foundation, losing the tag titles at WrestleMania VII. Hart had started breaking out on his own, winning the Intercontinental Championship at SummerSlam and then winning KOTR the following month. That tournament victory helped establish his standing as a serious singles competitor.

Bret would lose and regain the IC title, then lose it again at SummerSlam to the British Bulldog before winning his first WWF Championship in fall 1992.

But at WrestleMania IX, Hart lost his world title to Yokozuna, who lost it to Hulk Hogan moments later. Hart would go on to win his second KOTR crown that June, kicking off a feud with Jerry “The King” Lawler, which indirectly helped spawn Bret’s feud with brother Owen Hart.

Bret Hart’s two KOTR wins solidified him as a top singles wrestler in WWF, with the second victory directly leading to a high-profile feud. It’s also a feat we likely won’t see duplicated, so for that, we have to tip our cap to the Hitman.

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.