Who is the Greatest Intercontinental Champion of All Time?

[Hidden Blaze]

No love for Razor is a travesty


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He’s top 5 for sure!

 

[Crippler]

benoit

 

[Hoss]

Tough to rank them when the belt has been in so many hands over such a long period of time.

Pedro Morales deserves some sort of mention, though I can count the number of Pedro matches I've seen on one hand. He had the belt forever between two reigns and helped to pioneer and solidify the belt.

In the 80s, Honky has already got a mention. Randy Savage definitely needs a shout out because when I picture the IC Title belt, I often picture Macho Man holding it. Given he was one of the top three, if not top two, guys in the company during his run he certainly brought up the prestige level. Plus the classic with Steamboat at WrestleMania III helped put a lasting spotlight on the belt. Then you must mention Warrior. Like Mach, he was one of the very top guys while he held the belt and he also took it into the main event of WrestleMania VI, which is probably the biggest stage it's ever been featured on.

90s had a lot of great champs between Razor, Shawn, Bret, The Rock and Triple H. Hard to say who stands out from that pack.

2000s also saw it held by basically all of the best workers of that decade. Jericho, Benoit, Guerrero, Edge, Christian, RVD and so on. I have to give a shout out to Randy Orton for his reign from 2003 to 2004. It seemed like he really came into his own while holding the title and it was one of the longer reigns of that era.

In the late 2000s and early 2010s I think it fell off considerably. The various runs of Kofi, Dolph, Drew, etc. were very unremarkable and at this point the belt really became an afterthought. The only person who really helped bring the title back time and again was The Miz. And I also gotta give props to Seth Rollins for his two runs in 2018, the matches with Miz and Ziggler were huge and the highlight of Raw for that stretch. He even brought the title back to a PPV main event with his Extreme Rules 2018 match against Ziggler.

Anyways. If I had to answer... I think I'd go with Macho Man first. Honorable mentions to HBK, The Miz, Jericho and Orton.

 

[Mitch Buchannon]

Christian for me tbh, I loved his reigns

 

[Chris]

benoit

What a fuckin' part-timer response didn't even capitalize the man's name and EC out here typing paragraphs like a good hard-working member.

 

[Crippler]

cause no explanation was needed, but just for you Chris I will.

The year was 2000. The show WrestleMania 2000. The GOAT wins the title in a meh match, its good for what it was. Anyway goat wins the title. He then proceeds to defend his title almost every week for 3 months giving Taz, Rikishi, Matt Hardy, Jeff Hardy all their best single matches in the WWF to date. Hell, even D-Lo had his best match since 99, Made 2000 Big Show and Road Dogg watchable for 3 minutes. Other title great title defenses were against Kurt and Val I didn't even talk about the Blassics with Jericho at Backlash and Judgement Day before dropping the title to Rikishi.

Then fast forward to the end of 2000/2001. Killed that waste of time Billy Gun then had the greatest Ladder match not only in royal rumble history but wrestling history, I don't class TLC as ladder matches so yeah, so had the best ladder match every and finally puts over Jericho.

Fast forward to 2002, that return pop

Right into July wins the title from RVD who you can also make a case for best IC champion, anyway it's not always about title defenses it's about what matches you were involved in as champion and the GOAT was involved in 2nd best TV Tag team match of all time and it's a crime it does not get talked about to this day. SMACKDOWN, AUGUST 1ST, Charlotte NC - Chris Benoit/Eddie Guerrero vs. The Rock/Edge, then the next week another amazing tag match Chris Benoit/Eddie Guerrero/Kurt Angle vs. Edge/Rey Mysterio/John Cena, then singles match against the Rock and you know what they do together and if that wasn't enough they ran back Chris Benoit/Eddie Guerrero vs. The Rock/Edge II before dropping the title back to RVD at SummerSlam in a match I Love but I know some are down on it.

 

[Chris]

That's a nostalgia pop done right

 

[Cwalker]

Look at the part timer

Even Undertaker can remind us of what he USED to be every now and again.

 

[Benoit's Weight Machine]

First off, I prefer when the Intercontinental was a true midcard title and not just a stepping stone. I think Bret Hart, Kevin Nash and Shawn Michaels eventually getting the world title set sort of an unfair expectation. I'm not saying they weren't good IC champs, but they were really world champs in waiting with nothing better to do at the time. For this purpose, I'm not considering future world champions. Here is my list.

1. Mr. Perfect (epitome of an IC champ, his reigns got both himself and the title over without overshadowing the upper card)
2. Scott Hall (similar to Hennig but on a lesser scale)
3. Roddy Piper (he was really really fucking over as a face in 92)
4. Don Muraco (his heel work was ahead of it's time and he held down the midcard while Backlund bored everyone to tears)
5. Honky Tonk Man (I find him to be overrated as a chickenshit heel but his longevity can't be denied. As champ, his heel heat elevated people such as Beefcake and Warrior, neither of which had any business getting over to the extent that they did.)