Projecting Bad News Barrett's Odds of Retaining IC Title at WWE WrestleMania 31

Since winning the Intercontinental Championship, Bad News Barrett has been losing to almost everyone he meets in the ring. At WWE’s WrestleMania 31, he will likely have to defend the title in a Fatal 4-Way match.

At this point, most fans hope Barrett loses the IC title so he can go back to being one of the top workers and personalities in the company.

While there was a time when the Intercontinental Championship was the second-most important title in the company and holding it really meant something, the wrestler who holds the title now is treated like a jobber and loses on free television as often as possible.

Barrett won the title on January 5 but has gone 4-7 in TV or pay-per-view matches during that stretch, according to CageMatch.net. Booking a champion to register seven losses makes him look incredibly weak and takes away any validity the championship belt holds.

As if the IC title scene weren't convoluted enough with the champion losing all the time, WWE has added three other stars into the mix and has been teasing a Fatal 4-Way match for the belt at WrestleMania.

With Dean Ambrose, Dolph Ziggler and even R-Truth involved in the title hunt during this week’s episode of Raw, the possibility of a multi-person match for the Intercontinental Championship is growing with each passing day.

As great as the individual stories have been in the past (Barrett, Ambrose and Ziggler are all crowd favorites and some of the hottest talents in the sport), the WWE Universe will have a hard time getting behind this match due to the lack of a believable storyline.

Another major issue is WWE's shoehorning R-Truth into this program. While there is no doubt that Truth has the in-ring skills and charisma to be in the same conversation as the other challengers, he has been built as a jobber for several years and has been catapulted into this storyline with no build.

If this was the plan all along, Truth should have been winning more often to get the WWE Universe to believe he will be an actual contender at WrestleMania.

After watching the way the company has booked the Intercontinental Championship and the man holding the belt, the hope for many is that R-Truth actually walks out of the biggest PPV of the year with the belt.

There is little chance the WWE will book the title and champion stronger moving forward, and Ambrose, Ziggler and Barrett deserve better than being jobbers to the stars.

While Ambrose, Ziggler and Barrett have the skills in the ring and on the mic to bring prestige back to a secondary title, the lack of proper storytelling and the recent struggles of whoever is holding the belt have resulted in an utter lack of confidence.

For Barrett's fans, a loss at WrestleMania would free him from the shackles of the IC title and allow him to move on to something more entertaining, such as a one-on-one feud with an actual storyline attached to it.

Bad News Barrett’s Odds of Retaining: 12-1

For more wrestling talk, listen to Ring Rust Radio for all of the hot topics or catch the latest episode in the player below (some language NSFW).