A Monster Reborn, World Title No More?
Similar to Kane’s re-birth in 2010, Mark Henry captured the World Heavyweight Championship from Randy Orton and the Night of Champions PPV in September of 2011, and immediately showcased a new passion that excited and intrigued the fans. Henry’s promo work, ring work and overall character development were on a new level he had never quite reached in his 15+ year career as a professional wrestler. Henry feuded with the Big Show leading to a match at Vengeance that actually collapsed the ring, a play off a similar incident years before where Brock Lesnar and Big Show did the same thing. Henry lost the title to Big Show at the annual TLC pay-per-view. For months, Money in the Bank winner Daniel Bryan had been working his way up the WWE’s midcard, and had actually “won” the title on Smackdown at one point, following a Knockout Punch from Show. However, general manager Teddy Long voided the match, stating that Henry was not medically cleared to compete. So at TLC, when Bryan cashed in on his friend, immediately after Show had won the World Heavyweight Championship, it resulted in some animosity between the two. Bryan held onto the belt through the Royal Rumble and the Elimination Chamber, but lost the championship to Sheamus in only 18 seconds at WrestleMania.
The fans were so outraged by their indie hero losing his title in such a manner, even though he had turned heel earlier in the year, that the loss would actually go on to make Daniel Bryan’s career. By this point, the brand split was long gone, and Superstars from both Raw and Smackdown were free to come and go as they pleased, sometimes wrestling two or three matches ever week. When Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and John Cena both mentioned Bryan’s signature “YES!” chant, the hot post-WrestleMania crowd fed the flames that led to Bryan’s amazing level of popularity with the WWE Universe today. He and Sheamus went on to have a classic match at Extreme Rules, which the “Celtic Warrior” won on his way to dominating the summer. Shortly after, Sheamus entered a feud with Alberto del Rio which took Smackdown (and some episodes of Raw) throughout the entire summer. Big Show ended Sheamus’ 210 day championship run at Hell in a Cell, which will stand as the third longest reign in the title’s history, after Triple H and the record holder, Batista.
For the next year, WWE experimented with several different World Heavyweight Champions, including Big Show, Alberto del Rio and Dolph Ziggler, who had the break-out moment of his career the night after WWE’s 2013 WrestleMania event, cashing in Money in the Bank in front of an insane crowd. Still, with no real brand loyalty remaining, the World Heavyweight Championship was starting to feel like a second-rate title, appearing on many of the same shows as 434 day WWE Champion CM Punk. In October 2013, in the midst of Alberto del Rio’s second title run, Smackdown general manager announced some shocking news: John Cena, who was reported out of action until the second quarter of 2014, would be making his return at that month’s Hell in a Cell PPV to challenge del Rio for the gold. Despite speculation that WWE was pulling a bait-and-switch to desperately garner views for their second PPV event of the month, Cena did return, and he did defeat Alberto del Rio to begin his third reign as World Heavyweight Champion. After retaining his title against Money in the Bank holder Damien Sandow on an episode of Raw, Cena went over del Rio in their championship rematch at Survivor Series.
Determining that the WWE no longer needed two major world titles under its umbrella, in November of 2013 WWE’s Chief Operative Officer Triple H, along with his wife Stephanie McMahon, announced that John Cena would put his belt on the line in a TLC match against WWE Champion Randy Orton, who would do the same. That match takes place this Sunday, December 15th at the company’s annual TLC pay-per-view event, and WWE has declared that there will be one champion. One man will emerge as the Unified WWE Champion. When that happens, it is likely that the World Heavyweight Championship, the belt first awarded to Triple H at the start of the brand split in 2002, will be no more.
Don’t Miss These Matches:
Chris Jericho vs. Edge (WrestleMania 26)
Edge vs. Drew McIntyre, Kane, Rey Mysterio, Big Show and Wade Barrett (Elimination Chamber 2011)
Christian vs. Alberto del Rio (Extreme Rules 2011)
Randy Orton vs. Christian (SummerSlam 2011)
Sheamus vs. Daniel Bryan (Extreme Rules 2012)
