WWE: Ranking Ric Flair's 16 World Title Runs - From Worst To Best

3. NWA World Championship (5th NWA, 5th Overall) November 26, 1987 - February 20, 1989

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=em6OBJ3NMqk Ric Flair's fifth ascent to the top of the NWA mountain was his third of four straight reigns to last at least 400 days, clocking in at 452 days unbroken. This was a phase of change for NWA and Jim Crockett Promotions as in October 1988, Crockett sold the company to media giant Ted Turner and the company would become World Championship Wrestling. Flair claimed championship number five from Ron Garvin in a Steel Cage match at Starrcade '87, the first pay-per-view for the NWA and Jim Crockett Promotions and was the person considered by many to be the best wrestler in the world. Flair winning the championship was the best way to close out the show for Crockett and have them put their best foot forward in what was an opening salvo in a battle with WWE who was running their first Survivor Series pay-per-view that evening and had told cable providers that carrying the Crockett show would be forfeiting the chance to broadcast the Survivor Series and all future WWE pay-per-view telecasts. Most carriers yielded to McMahon's demands, greatly affecting the availability of Starrcade in most markets and ensuring WWE came out on top when looking at gate numbers and pay-per-view buyrates. Despite the inauspicious first shot in the battle against Vince McMahon's Titan Sports, having Flair front and center as the face of the company was the best way for JCP and NWA to become the preeminent wrestling company in the United States and the world as a whole. Flair did not take this responsibility lightly, continuing from where he had left off with his loss to Garvin two months prior, Flair would maintain his consistent in-ring dominance through his talent and underhanded tactics against the Garvins, Dusty Rhodes, Barry Windham, Michael Hayes, Nikita Koloff and others. Amongst them, a newcomer to NWA after Jim Crockett's purchase of the UWF, an up and comer named Sting. The careers of Ric Flair and Sting, which would persist all the way to WCW's final match, began to intertwine during this reign and a rivalry, which Tony Schiavonne called WCW's greatest on the final Nitro, with a rival who many consider to be Flair's greatest, dug its roots in, as Sting quickly banded together with Dusty Rhodes and other common foes of the Four Horsemen upon arrival to the Mid-Atlantic region and challenged Flair and his compatriots in singles and tag competition throughout 1988. With fierce matches throughout the year, the chances of something special happening when these two faced each other in the ring was always high and these matches greatly boosted Sting's fan base during his early stages wrestling in a company where he would eventually attain his own iconic status. Flair would also be confronted by Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat who was returning to the NWA and wrestling after a four-year absence from NWA and less than nine months after retiring. Steamboat had Flair counting the lights in his first match back as a mystery partner for Eddie Gilbert in a tag match against Flair and Barry Windham, reigniting a vendetta between Steamboat and Flair that goes all the way back to the late 1970s and the Horsemen that had gone dormant when Steamboat left for WWE. Steamboat would then quickly succeed in extracting the championship from Flair in the first of what would be four matches in three months all rated at five-stars by Meltzer and the Wrestling Observer, a feat not accomplished in the United States since. While the title did change hands and was held up several times during those matches with Steamboat, the changes are no longer recognized due to the controversial finish of each and they did technically come AFTER Flair had lost the championship, these matches more than likely do not happen without Flair having been champion at the time Steamboat returned. Flair has said that Steamboat was his favorite opponent to wrestle and that he had his greatest matches of his career with Steamboat during this time. In a career that spans four decades in active competition, five decades total in the industry and thousands of matches in his storied career, that is quite the statement to be said about this span.