Rob Van Dam puts things in perspective.
RVD spoke about the perception of the WWE Hardcore Championship on a recent episode of his 1 Of A Kind podcast. RVD said he thought WWE was mocking ECW with the title and they made hardcore matches something to laugh at.
Rob Van Dam says his opinion changed when he won the title because he was having some of the best matches of the night as champion.
“I was insulted by it until I got it. And that was because I felt like they were making fun of us and ECW because we have this, in my opinion, superior artform, making wrestling cool.
“To people that aren’t even wrestling fans like something like ‘you’ve got to see this’ and and and obviously I was a big proponent of it and and always will be but then I would see the Hardcore Title match on Monday Night Raw or whatever and in my opinion from that competitive state of mind I thought they were making a joke out of it.
“It pretty much meant the hot dog stand is going to get tipped over. They’re going to fall in the pit of balls in the kids area. Like, that’s, the hardcore match was something to laugh at. Stick a plunger in your face. And for me, I had a lot of pride in it.
“So when I was the Hardcore Champion, guess what? And all of a sudden, the Hardcore Title matches sometimes are the best match on the card. That can be subjective, but to the people that enjoyed it, continuously the best match on the card. I even main-evented. And I know they didn’t want the Hardcore Championship to be a main event on their shows. So what do they do? They got rid of it. I was making the belt mean too much.”
Rob Van Dam held the WWE Hardcore Championship four times, with three of his reigns coming in 2001. RVD was also the 230th and final champion. The title was unified with the WWE Intercontinental Championship on the August 26, 2002 episode of RAW.
If you use this transcription, credit Dominic DeAngelo of the 1 Of A Kind podcast / Wrestling Writing.
