When I was a kid, I had a trampoline. My friends and I were all huge pro wrestling fans and long before the explosion of “backyard trampoline wrestling federations,” we would watch the matches together, go out on the trampoline and try and reenact what we saw on television.
Of course if you’re this enthused about professional wrestling as a youngster, you’re going to take your trampoline matches seriously and treat them as if they were part of a legitimate organization — for kids. Were we looking to become millionaires or television stars? Of course not. Did we fantasize and treat it like we were right in the middle of a WWE ring on a WWE Superstars or Saturday Night’s Main Event broadcast?
We sure did.
So the next logical step, seeing is how we were taking this so seriously was to purchase replica WWE Championship belts so that when we won “the big matches,” we could crown ourselves the champion.
What was the first replica belt we bought? Well, obviously it was the WWE World Heavyweight Championship, right?
Wrong.
This was during the early-1990s and mid-1990s, when if you were a kid, the best wrestlers and your favorite wrestlers were generally the guys who held the WWE Intercontinental Championship. We thought the belt itself looked cooler than the “Eagle” championship that the main champions wore and we — even as kids — recognized that guys like Bret Hart, Mr. Perfect and Shawn Michaels were much better wrestlers than Diesel or Yokozuna.
Fast-forward to today.
I can’t recall a time when the secondary titles in WWE have meant less. If you’re an Intercontinental Champion or United States Champion in WWE these days, you basically aren’t a champion at all. I can’t even count how many times a pay-per-view would come and go without an I-C or U.S. title match even taking place on the card. If they were on the card, they certainly didn’t come off as anything important or relevant.
With Brock Lesnar as the WWE World Heavyweight Champion and with the main title in WWE being unified, meaning there’s only one “main” champion these days, and due to the fact that Lesnar has such a limited schedule in WWE, why doesn’t WWE take this opportunity to try and make their secondary titles mean more?
WWE Superstars need to cut promos and make the I-C and U.S. titles seem like a goal that is really worth achieving. They need to act like those titles are the be-all, end-all, if for no other reason than the fact that they are the only consistently active titles in the company right now.
There has been a lot of talk about unifying the I-C and U.S. titles and while I have always been in favor of that idea, I’m not so sure if that should be happening anytime soon. While unifying the I-C and U.S. titles would, in theory, make the one secondary title seem stronger, it would also take away even more from WWE live events having title matches.
Right now, the I-C and U.S. titles are the only men’s singles championships that are on the line at non-televised events. For that matter, they’re the only titles that are defended on television. Hell, they’re the only two men’s singles titles that are defended on pay-per-views more often than not.
WWE needs to raise the value of their secondary championships and make those I-C and U.S. titles mean as much as humanly possible. The good part is, when Lesnar does eventually drop the title and the WWE World Heavyweight Championship becomes active again, the I-C and U.S. titles, if they play their cards right, will at that point mean more and all of a sudden you have three titles of value, something WWE hasn’t had in years.
Basically, it won’t seem odd for a big-name Superstar to explain how important it is to win the I-C title at that point, whereas if Roman Reigns or John Cena said in a promo today, “I won’t sleep until I get the WWE United States Championship around my waist!” you would probably look at them like they have four heads. Although with Cena’s current program against U.S. Champion Rusev, we might actually hear a version of that, if WWE decides to make the title an important part of their feud, which of course is doubtful.
Regardless, WWE needs to work on getting these secondary championships to regain the luster that they had when I was a little kid jumping on a trampoline and pretending like my dreams just came true because I won a match and got to hold the — PRESTIGIOUS — WWE Intercontinental Championship high over my head.
What are your thoughts on WWE’s secondary singles titles? Leave your feedback in the “Comments” section below. You can also follow me on social media for continued news and views at Facebook.com/MattBooneWZR and/or on Twitter @MBoone420.
