WWE Championship Statistics: Title Changes Since 1963

The WWE Championship is one of the oldest titles in existence. Yet as CM Punk put it, there has been something of a hot potato mentality going on, with the title seeing several holders in the past few months.

How bad has it really been? There is only one way to find out: Compare the number of times the championship has changed hands in previous years.

This list will only count official changeovers. It also counts the changeover as happening when it actually happened, not when its taped recording was broadcast.

Year	Title Changes
1963	1
1964-70	0
1971	2
1972	0
1973	2
1974-76	0
1977	1
1978	1
1979-82	0
1983	1
1984	1
1985-87	0
1988	2
1989	1
1990	1
1991	4
1992	4
1993	3
1994	3
1995	1
1996	2
1997	6
1998	5
1999	11
2000	5
2001	5
2002	7
2003	3
2004	2
2005	1
2006	5
2007	3
2008	3
2009	9
2010	6
2011 (so far)	8

So there we have it. This year is three title changes away from tying the record year for handovers of the WWE Championship. Personally I feel that the championship belt won't leave CM Punk's waist for a while, and I could only see two more potential changes at most this year.

CM Punk is scheduled to face Alberto Del Rio for the championship in tonight's edition of Raw. Then there is the Tables, Ladders and Chairs PPV scheduled for December. After that, there are only two more editions of Raw, making time for changes tight.

Still, it is worth notifying that WWE's 11 changes in 1999 could be justified over this year's eight. Back then, WWE was still in competition with WCW, and title changes used to equal ratings.

Mick Foley proved this with his first title win. Then there was the fact that Steve Austin was injured later in the year, leading Creative to quickly scramble ideas together, which would eventually lead to The Rock versus Triple H throughout most of 2000.

Why have there been so many changes this year? While it may not be the highest, it is still nearing ridiculous heights. Miz carried the title for the first four months of 2011, giving the impression that this would be a calm year.

Once again, I suppose it comes down to unexpected popularity. John Cena won the title and was probably going to lose it briefly to Alberto Del Rio before winning it back and taking it to WrestleMania and his match against The Rock. CM Punk, however, had his huge burst of popularity, and thus the decision was made to make him champion. Unfortunately, I still believe we could have avoided four of this year's title reigns with better writing.

There didn't need to be a tournament to crown a new WWE champion after Money in the Bank. Considering the speed with which CM Punk came back, we could have just skipped ahead to a Cena-CM Punk rematch at SummerSlam.

Del Rio could have still cashed in his Money in the Bank without losing the title to Cena. Del Rio should have had one reign of three months instead of two that barely lasted a month each.

The whole point of the draft lottery back in 2002 was WWE's effort to keep some quality control over their product. For a few years, it worked. WWE Championship changes were rare, and reigns had some length. But for the past couple of years, WWE has taken on a "Flavour of the Month" mentality.

Does a guy like Alberto Del Rio get two title reigns in the space of a few months because he deserves it? Or is it that Vince McMahon likes him, and that's it because he is the boss? Did Sheamus get his first two title reigns because he was over or because he needed to get over as a serious threat?

It is true that the WWE Championship has been something of a hot potato for the last few years. It is a culmination of having too many main-event wrestlers active on one single brand and a Creative team not up to the challenge.

At one point, John Cena, Batista, Randy Orton and Triple H were all active on Raw with the WWE Championship up for grabs. Combine this will a weak Creative team that does not know how to write a compelling story without involving the championship. We have a terrible combination.

The title has also been used incorrectly several times, like when Sheamus was given the belt in 2009 and when Del Rio this year became champion, not because it was a culmination from years of hard work, but it was an easy way to put them over as legitimate threats. It was used to start or further a push rather than be the result of one.

Hopefully with CM Punk as WWE champion, we will return to a time where title changes only happen a few times a year. It has already begun in the mid-card division with Cody Rhodes and Dolph Ziggler gaining the foundation for respectable runs with their titles.

In the end, however, only time will tell if this is a blip on the system or a true change of attitude over the championship.