Ranking EVERY WWE Champion From Worst To Best
27. Jeff Hardy
WWE should have crowned Jeff Hardy as Champion at the 2008 Royal Rumble when he was the most over babyface in the entire company and WrestleMania plans could easily have been remade around outgoing titleholder Randy Orton and eventual challengers Triple H and John Cena.
Numbers were up, buzz was high, and between the impending moves to HD and PG, change was in the air anyway. Hardy was the one people were willing to pay to see. They should have strapped him up.Or should they?
Just a month after a deflating RKO trampled on the dream, Hardy failed a wellness test that took him out of WrestleMania completely, delaying any further gratification until December when he finally climbed the mountain. 2009 looked like it’d go the same way when the first run ended at the Royal Rumble, but it all came good again at long last ahead of his Autumn exit from the company.
A scintillating programme with CM Punk resulted in the ‘Straight Edge Superstar’ turning heel in the company for the first time, unleashing a slew of matches and promo exchanges between the pair that smoked anything else happening on TV. By the time he was gone - personal issues notwithstanding - he was significantly missed.