WWE/TNA: Power Ranking Every Champion in WWE and TNA

These days, there are so many championships in national professional wrestling promotions that it becomes difficult to keep track of them. 

The saturation of championships has also led to inflation of sorts, as some titles and their respective champions are rendered more meaningful than others. 

In order to better keep track of every champion within WWE and TNA, I found it befitting to create a power ranking of every champion each promotion has to offer. 

And while the No. 1-ranked champion may surprise you, it's not even close when taking into account all the factors that make a great champion. 

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12. TNA Television Champion: Abyss

This championship is so far off the spectrum that it was originally left off of this list.  And it's been changed from the Global Championship to the television championship with a scarce record of defenses.  Abyss won the title as a replacement worker when A.J. Styles got injured. 

Whatever happened to Abyss anyway?  Is he (kayfabe) dead?  Because that belt certainly is. 

11. TNA Knockouts Tag Team Champions: Angelina Love & Winter

TNA tries with its Knockouts division, it really does. 

A Knockouts tag team championship is a bit too ambitious for the promotion, and it does these tag titles no favors when its champions are barely seen with the belts and seem to be more interested in bickering about their hierarchy of friendship (or lack thereof) with Velvet Sky.

10. WWE Tag Team Champions: Justin Gabriel and Heath Slater

I think it's fairly safe to assume that Justin Gabriel and Heath Slater are the worst three-time tag team champions in the history of WWE. 

With their last two reigns a mere hours apart, an otherwise notable pinfall over John Cena means nothing considering how their most recent tag title victory (not to mention the titles themselves) was booked.

9. WWE Intercontinental Champion: Kofi Kingston

I'm starting to believe that Kofi Kingston actually thinks his Intercontinental title is nothing more than an accessory necessary for jeans with obnoxiously large belt loops. 

Kofi has barely defended the once prestigious title since winning it over a month ago on SmackDown, and the title is now invisible as Kofi is exclusively being used as a prop to get Alberto Del Rio over.

8. WWE Divas Champion: Eve

Misreading this very sentence is the only way one can perceive Eve to be charismatic, as the reigning Divas Champion has the charisma of a pet rock. 

WWE is running in place with its Divas division. With the exception of LayCool, WWE constantly cycles Divas in and out only to have them drop the title and disappear. 

This type of booking worked during the territory days, but with everybody under the same umbrella it's out of sight out of mind. 

I'll take the wait-and-see approach with Eve, but if history tells us anything, she'll be right back to working the curtain jerkers on WWE Superstars one month from now.

7. TNA Tag Team Champions: Beer Money Inc.

Beer Money's prestige as a tag team carried them up the list, but prestige will only get you so far. 

Although they defeated the Motor City Machine Guns, ending their own strong run as champions, Beer Money's activity has been down as tag team champions.

6. TNA X-Division Champion: Kazarian

While Kazarian may be a bit of a paper champion, he seems to be destined to have the X-Division Championship for the long haul, as TNA continues to invest in his talents. 

5. TNA Heavyweight Champion: Jeff Hardy

Jeff Hardy's previous world title run was respectable, although many of his wins contained too much of the all-too-familiar TNA Tomfoolery in the form of ref bumps and constant outside interference. 

The length of Hardy's current title run may be up in the air as his sentencing looms, and the mermaid belt he's been carrying around hurts him on this list as well.

4. WWE World Champion: Edge

Edge's quick turnover as champion doesn't hurt him nearly as much as it may others because we have become accustomed to Edge playing 'hot potato' with World Championships to fit his ultimate opportunist moniker.

Edge successfully retaining the World Championship in the Elimination Chamber, the first champion to do so in five years, helps his standing as well.

3. WWE United States Champion: Daniel Bryan

Daniel Bryan is a distant third here as he hasn't defended the United States Championship since Dave Meltzer took a break from gushing about New Japan Pro Wrestling, which was ages ago. 

Bryan's standing is aided by title defenses against Ted DiBiase and Dolph Ziggler in a series of strong matches a while back. 

A possible United States title feud with Sheamus will further solidify Bryan's standing should he be victorious against the Celtic Voyeur, who is suddenly in danger of watching WrestleMania from the sidelines. 

2. WWE Champion: The Miz

WWE is definitely trying with the Miz, and he very well may enjoy a lengthy run as WWE Champion.  WWE has some concerns of how over he is as champion, but the solution would not be to have him drop the title out of sheer panic. 

The key for first-time champions like this is time.  Whether Miz comes off as a beatable champion or not, he has to put together a string of wins over a consistent period of time in order for people to buy what WWE is selling. 

1. TNA Knockouts Champion: Madison Rayne

The Internet is a safe haven to tee off on TNA, and deservedly so, but ponder this:  The greatest champion in any national promotion is a female from a ‘minor league’ wrestling promotion. 

Name any other champion in WWE or TNA who has defended their championship with as much consistency and success as Madison Rayne. 

You can’t. 

 Talk about the way she won the Knockouts title all you want, but TNA booking a former WWE Diva to lay down for its eventually dominant champion is a microcosm of a mindset that TNA needs to adopt going forward: make your own stars, and establish a pecking order between home grown TNA talent and WWE castoffs. 

Since winning the Knockouts Championship in October, Madison Rayne has cleaned out the women’s division, beating big name after big name in both clean victories as well as tainted victories that enhance and reinforce her standing as a heel. 

Rayne’s current run as Knockouts champion is a formidable template for how to book champions in any wrestling promotion. 

Rayne frequently defends her title on TV and at pay-per-views taking on all comers, and while she is more than vulnerable in non-title matches, Rayne always seems to rise to the occasion when her strap is on the line. 

There’s nothing more simple, yet effective, than the way TNA has booked Rayne as champion for the better part of four months, and it would be refreshing to see more of this simplistic booking throughout the embattled promotion.     

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