10 Real Life Events That Forced WWE Title Changes (1)

1. Kurt Angle Wins WWE Title At Unforgiven 2001 Because Of 9/11

September 11, 2001 is a very famous date for reasons that all of us wish we could forget. When two planes flew into the two buildings at World Trade Center in New York City and approximately 3,000 people died due to the attacks, it sent shockwaves around the world. People started to live in fear with good reason. We had no idea if something like that could or would happen again. We also had a tough time returning back to our “normal” lives whatever that meant.
In WWE, they had a Smackdown taping the night of Tuesday September 11th that they postponed until that Thursday when they aired a live special edition of Smackdown. It was a show where we saw superstars in tears as they honored America and did their best to entertain. That show wasn’t about storylines. It was about trying to cheer people up.
When WWE held their Unforgiven event in Pittsburgh on September 23, 2001, the heel WWE Champion Steve Austin defended against the babyface challenger (and Pittsburgh native) Kurt Angle. They had a very good match like they always did with Angle winning by making Austin tap out to the ankle lock.
It was a clean win although when Austin tapped out, his other hand was under the bottom rope as a way to create a rematch. Seeing Austin tap out was very rare. Two weeks later on Raw, Austin won the WWE Title back from Angle, which meant that Angle had one of the shortest WWE Title reigns ever.
It’s hard to know if WWE would have put the WWE Title on Angle considering he only had a 15 day title reign. What was the point of it? He was booked an American Olympic hero so it was a feel good moment to see him celebrating with the WWE Title just 12 days after 9/11 happened. It was also in his hometown, so that helped the moment too.

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10 Real Life Events That Forced WWE Title Changes (2)

2. Shawn Michaels And Bret Hart At Survivor Series 1997

Bret Hart was the WWE Champion heading into Survivor Series in Montreal. He was also somebody that had signed to leave WWE to go to World Championship Wrestling. The reason that Vince McMahon gave him is he couldn’t afford to keep him anymore. What he wanted from Bret on his way out was to put over Shawn Michaels for the WWE Title. The problem with that was Bret had a very personal rivalry with Shawn that led to him refusing to put Shawn over in Canada.
The reason Bret didn’t want to put Shawn over was they legitimately hated each other by that point. They each made personal comments about the other while also engaging in a backstage fight several months earlier. Due to the competitive nature of the business, their egos were too strong to allow them to do business the right way.
Bret was told that the match would be a DQ finish. Vince had other plans as he devised a secret plan involving Shawn, ref Earl Hebner and a few others. In Vince’s mind, he had to get the WWE Title off Bret because he was worried that he might leave Survivor Series and take the championship with him on WCW Nitro. If that happened it would have been a huge blow to WWE. Maybe Vince was paranoid to think Bret would do that, but at the height of the Monday Night Wars it wasn’t a crazy thought either.
Looking back on it, obviously they all would have liked things to be different. However, on that night November night in Montreal, Vince had to do what he thought was best for his company. Because of that, ref Earl Hebner rang the bell even though Bret had not given up and Shawn left with the WWE Title.
There will likely never be another situation similar to this one. It’s one of the most famous matches ever, but it was also something that WWE wishes never happened.

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10 Real Life Events That Forced WWE Title Changes (3)

3. Rey Mysterio Takes Eddie Guerrero’s Place And Wins World Title At WrestleMania 22

Would Rey Mysterio have become a World Heavyweight Champion in 2006 if Eddie Guerrero didn’t pass away in November of 2005? That’s a question that nobody can really answer except for Vince McMahon, but the general feeling is that it would have been unlikely. We all know how much WWE values wrestlers that are bigger. Mysterio was the smallest guy on the roster. They could justify it by saying he was really popular and sold a lot of merchandise, but it’s not like they had to push him that far.
Mysterio went on to dedicate the 2006 Royal Rumble to his late friend Eddie by wearing an Eddie shirt along with the “EG” arm bands. He went from bell to bell as the second entrant in the match and has the all-time record for time spent in a Royal Rumble at 62:12. They must have mentioned Eddie’s name 30 times during the match as Mysterio became the underdog winner. In the buildup to the WrestleMania match, Randy Orton used Eddie’s name to get heel heat. Mysterio went on to beat Orton and Kurt Angle to win the World Title in a match that was too short for a World Title match (about ten minutes), but was still very good.
When Rey was the World Champion in 2006 he was booked terribly. They had him lose non-title matches far too often. It was as if Vince wanted to make a point that he didn’t really believe in the guy, but it was an opportunity that he couldn’t pass up so at least he did put the World Title on him for about three months.
In 2010, Mysterio won the World Title again although that reign only lasted one month since he was a transitional champion that took it from Jack Swagger before dropping to Kane. Then there was the really brief WWE Title run in 2011 that didn’t even last one night.
While Mysterio can be considered one of the most popular WWE stars ever, it’s hard to know if he would have ever been World Champion if not for the tragic death of his friend Eddie Guerrero.

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10 Real Life Events That Forced WWE Title Changes (4)

4. CM Punk Wins WWE Title On Day His Contract Expires At Money In The Bank 2011

                                      

This is one of the biggest stories in recent years that most fans know about because of how real of a situation it  was. After CM Punk’s memorable “shoot” promo in Las Vegas on the Raw stage in late June of 2011, there was a lot of discussion about how Punk’s WWE contract was expiring. The word came out that he was signed through the July 17 Money in the Bank event that was going to take place in Punk’s hometown of Chicago as he was set to take on John Cena for the WWE Title.
What was going to happen during the match? We really had no idea going into it. There was a feeling that Punk was going to end up winning the WWE Title and then they would have the Money in the Bank winner cash in to steal the WWE Title from him. Maybe Cena would return and Punk was leaving. There was also a thought that there was no way Punk could leave WWE because he was one of the best performers in the company.
Punk ended up defeating Cena clean for the WWE Title. He also managed to fight off Money in the Bank winner Alberto Del Rio, who was sent out there by Vince McMahon. It was one of the best matches ever and a very cool moment because of how WWE turned a real life situation into a great story.
As we found out later, Punk ended up re-signing with WWE prior to Money in the Bank although we didn’t know that until after the show. He likely got a raise on his salary and became a bigger star until he decided to leave WWE following this year’s Royal Rumble.

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10 Real Life Events That Forced WWE Title Changes (5)

5. Hulk Hogan Wins WWE Title After Gulf War Inspired Feud At WrestleMania 7 With Sgt. Slaughter

When the Gulf War became the biggest story in the world in 1990 and 1991, WWE was there to cash in on the sympathies of the American people. While soldiers were fighting for their lives due the ongoing issues between Iraq and Kuwait, WWE decided they had to turn the American hero Sgt. Slaughter into in Iraqi sympathizer that turned his back on America.
They booked Slaughter to beat Ultimate Warrior to win the WWE Title at Royal Rumble 1991 (thanks to an interfering Macho Man) because they knew how much it would piss off the fans due to what was going on with the Gulf War. They used real human emotions to cash in on this storyline. Warrior wasn’t a huge draw as champion, so they didn’t have a problem in changing things up.
The man that benefited from the Slaughter turn was Hulk Hogan, who as a “Real American” seemed to be the right pick to symbolically save his country from the guy that turned his back on his own people.
Hogan went on to win another WWE Title at WrestleMania 7 while Vince McMahon showed once again that he was more than willing to do what he had to do in terms of playing off a real life situation to make a buck off his paying customers.

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10 Real Life Events That Forced WWE Title Changes (6)

6. John Morrison Wins ECW Title After Chris Benoit Incident

In June of 2007 the ECW Title was vacated because Bobby Lashley, the current champion, was drafted to Raw. The announced match for the ECW Title at Vengeance: Night of Champions was supposed to see CM Punk challenging Chris Benoit. It would have been the first time they ever wrestled each other.
That match didn’t happen because that was the same weekend when Chris Benoit committed a double murder suicide on his wife Nancy, son Daniel and himself. At the time of the show, WWE didn’t know what happened with Benoit. All they knew was that he wasn’t there and they had to put somebody in his place. They even aired a Benoit tribute show the next night on Raw when they had heard that he died.
Due to Benoit’s absence, plans changed and Johnny Nitro took Benoit’s place. According to reports following Benoit’s death, it was revealed that Benoit was moved to ECW to win the ECW Title and be a veteran presence on that brand while working with younger talent.
Nitro ended up defeating Punk clean for the ECW Title. They feuded for several months with Nitro actually changing his name to Morrison while he was still the ECW Champion.
Credit WWE and the performers for making the best out of what was a very bad situation.

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10 Real Life Events That Forced WWE Title Changes (7)

7. Booker T Winning WCW Title On Last WCW Show Because WWE Wanted To Keep Him

When WWE bought World Championship Wrestling in March of 2001, it meant they had booking control on the last edition of Nitro on March 26, 2001. It was a “Night of Champions” style show where titles were on the line and WWE could put the titles onto the men that they wanted.
The reason that was so important is because WWE wasn’t bringing in every WCW wrestler. They signed certain wrestlers while others had to wait until their contracts expired before WWE would consider bringing them in. They didn’t want to spend millions to get somebody out of their deals that they had with Turner.
Booker was a guy that WWE had pegged as a star of the future. He was an exciting performer in his mid-30s that WWE felt like they could build around. Steiner was an older guy that had a big contract that didn’t come into WWE right away. He went there a year and a half later, though.
Leading into the match, Booker was already the US Champion. After a competitive back and forth matchup, Booker emerged victorious and became the WCW World Champion as well. Booker T showed up in WWE a couple of months later and was defending the WCW World Title in WWE that summer. He lost it to Angle, then won it back and then lost it to The Rock in the main event of SummerSlam 2001.
It was the right move to put the WCW World Title on Booker on WCW’s last show. He went on to have a great career in WWE that led to him being inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2013.

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10 Real Life Events That Forced WWE Title Changes (8)

8. Tazz Wins ECW Title Whilst WWF Star Because Of Contract Issues With WCW’s Mike Awesome

The situation surrounding Tazz’s ECW World Title win on April 13, 2000 is something we’ll never see again. Mike Awesome was the ECW World Champion that had signed a contract with WCW. He already appeared on WCW Nitro while he was holding the ECW Title although he didn’t bring the ECW Title with him on WCW TV.
Paul Heyman, who was running ECW at the time, had to get the title off Awesome. He was likely very angry that Awesome left the company while he was holding the title. It made sense why Awesome left ECW because they were having money problems and WCW paid him significantly more money, but the way he went about it really upset a lot of people.
They ended up coming to an agreement that would allow former ECW Champion Tazz to return to the company to face Awesome for the ECW Title. What made that interesting was that Tazz was a WWE contracted wrestler that started there four months earlier. Heyman made the agreement with Vince McMahon, who was helping Heyman at that point, and as we all know within the next year ECW would be a part of WWE while WCW was sold to WWE as well. Tazz ended up dropping the ECW Title to Tommy Dreamer, who was still an ECW guy, soon after he won.
It was a historic night because it was a WWE contracted wrestler beating a WCW wrestler for the ECW Title. Nothing like that will ever happen again.

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10 Real Life Events That Forced WWE Title Changes (9)

9. Christian Becomes World Champion At Extreme Rules 2011 After Edge Retires

There was a big story coming out WrestleMania 27. A week after the event took place, Edge got tests done on his neck and found out that he was one bump away from possibly being paralyzed. He had to retire from wrestling immediately. He announced his retirement on the April 11, 2011 edition of Raw and then on Smackdown that week they also paid tribute to him.
What made things difficult when he retired was that Edge was the World Heavyweight Champion at the time. He defeated Alberto Del Rio to retain his championship at WrestleMania 27 with his best friend Christian in his corner. After Edge’s retirement, there was a battle royal on Smackdown that Christian won to set up a Ladder Match at Extreme Rules against Alberto Del Rio.
They went on to have a very competitive matchup with a happy ending as Edge showed up in a Jeep to distract Del Rio, who had his buddies at ringside trying to help him. Christian was able to climb the ladder to win the World Title for the first time in his career. It was a moment that a lot of people thought wouldn’t happen because Christian was a smaller wrestler that was never pushed to the main event level before that.
While we don’t know if Christian would have ever won the World Title if Edge was still healthy, it was a great moment to see the childhood best friends celebrating Christian’s accomplishment just a few weeks after Edge had to end his career.

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10 Real Life Events That Forced WWE Title Changes (10)

10. Randy Orton Winning The WWE Title At No Mercy 2007 After John Cena’s Injury

Injuries are a part of the wrestling business. Sometimes when somebody is injured and needs to take time off you might see them lose a title before their surgery (like John Cena at SummerSlam 2013) and at other times a person can’t compete, so some other storyline has to be created to make up for it.
In October 2007, John Cena was the WWE Champion after winning it over one year earlier. Then he suffered a torn pectoral muscle during a match on Raw while doing a simple hip toss and due to the surgery that he needed he had to forfeit the WWE Title. Who knows when Cena would have lost the WWE Title if he was healthy? They could have given him a reign that lasted two years if they wanted. That wouldn’t have surprised anybody.
Six days after Cena’s injury was the No Mercy 2007 PPV event. Vince McMahon awarded the heel Randy Orton with the WWE Title, which was actually his first time holding that title (his previous reigns were with the World Title). Orton lost the title to Triple H in the first match on that show. Hunter wrestled Umaga later and then in the main event faced Orton in a Last Man Standing match. Orton ended up winning the WWE Title back that night thanks to a RKO on the announce table.
As for Cena, he was supposed to be out for about six months. That didn’t happen. In one of the most famous Royal Rumble moments ever, he returned at the 2008 Royal Rumble as a surprise to win the match in less than four months after his injury.

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