Thursday Morning Backlash: WWE US Title Reigns Ranked (Daniel Bryan, John Cena, Miz)

Columns, Top Story

by Jake Ziegler

I was thinking the other day about how Daniel Bryan has held the WWE United States Championship since September, and it made me wonder how his reign stacked up against some of the others of the WWE era (July 2003 – present). Since I was doing that, I figured I might as well rank them just for fun.

Honorable Mention – Orlando Jordan (1 reign, 171 days), Matt Hardy (1 reign, 84 days), JBL (1 reign, 54 days)

10. Kofi Kingston – 1 reign, 126 days

– Kofi won the title from MVP on Raw, and had a nice string of successful title defenses in multi-man matches against challengers like Jack Swagger, The Miz, Carlito, William Regal, and MVP. He didn’t seem to get much credit from the internet crowd at this time, but he had solid matches and regular defenses and I enjoyed this reign.

9. Shelton Benjamin – 1 reign, 237 days

– Despite the lengthy reign, I really don’t remember Benjamin doing much with it. Granted it’s the creative team’s responsibility to find something for a champion to do, but much like everything else with Shelton’s WWE career, he just didn’t click for whatever reason.

8. Eddie Guerrero – 1 reign, 84 days

– Eddie makes it to the list as a result of being the first champion, defeating Chris Benoit in a tournament final in the summer of 2003. During his reign he had a good program with John Cena that really helped elevate Cena’s stock. He dropped the belt to Big Show in October on his way to beating Brock Lesnar for the World Title in February, which is exactly the trajectory a U.S. Champion should take.

7. Big Show – 1 reign, 147 days

– Winning the title from Eddie is reason enough to make the list, but during his reign Show had a memorable feud with John Cena that took over where Eddie left off in making Cena a big star. He dropped the belt to Cena at WrestleMania XX, and while the match wasn’t great it set the tone for the night as the opener and cemented Cena as a major player.

6. Booker T – 3 reigns, 138 days

– The Booker-man feuded with John Cena during his first title reign, and then with Chris Benoit during the second two. The matches with Cena were pretty lackluster, but the best of seven series with Benoit was a bit of a resurrection for him and seemingly had a lot to do with Booker being made the top guy on Smackdown about five months after dropping the belt for the last time. If he had longer reigns he would be higher on the list.

5. Daniel Bryan – 1 reign, 137 days (so far)

– Bryan won the title from the red-hot Miz (who in fact would be WWE Champion about two months later), and has since handled Miz, John Morrison, Ted DiBiase, and Tyson Kidd as challengers. The crowd responds well to him and he can pretty much have a solid match with anybody. I’m not sure how long his reign will last, but with no solid challenger as of this writing it could carry on past WrestleMania.

4. John Cena – 3 reigns, 225 days

– The current face of the WWE came from these humble U.S. Title beginnings. His first reign came at the expense of Big Show. His follow up feud with Booker T was weak, and the feud with Carlito went nowhere. His third reign was a bit of a joke as it was well known that he was about to jump into the main event, and unceremoniously dropping the belt to Orlando Jordan is not exactly an epic end to the run.

3. MVP – 2 reigns, 416 days

– MVP has more days on his resume than any other U.S. Champion of this era, but he often went months between title defenses, and his most memorable feud was with Matt Hardy of all people. He won the title for the first time from Chris Benoit after a series of mediocre matches, a rarity for Benoit. His second reign started off strong on Raw but it fizzled rather quickly.

2. Chris Benoit – 3 reigns, 322 days

– Benoit had already been a World Champion by the time he won the U.S. Title in WWE, and he was an ideal champion because of the credibility he brought the belt. He had solid matches with everyone (excluding MVP, the man he last dropped it to), and just seemed like he SHOULD be champion. He also had a string of memorable matches with Orlando Jordan of all people, most of which lasted less than 30 seconds.

1. The Miz – 2 reigns, 321 days

– The current WWE champion exemplifies a perfect United States Champion. He won it from Kofi Kingston after a solid feud just as he was starting to get over with the crowd. He often bragged about the title, and even teamed up with Big Show to win the Unified Tag Team Championships during his first reign. He got involved with Hall of Famer Bret Hart, even losing the title to him in a joke of a match, but quickly regained the title and further used it to elevate his stock. His feud with Daniel Bryan did a great job establishing Bryan, and Miz sacrificed none of his heat by putting him over, which is ideal. About two months after losing the title, he won the WWE Title from Randy Orton, and then beat him in two successive rematches, cementing his place atop the card.

Glazer is a former senior editor at Pulse Wrestling and editor and reviewer at The Comics Nexus.