Former WWE Name Calls Title A ‘Death Knell’ For Talent

WWE

A former WWE name has revealed which championship was seen as a ‘death knell’ for the star who was holding it.

Former WWE writer Court Bauer, the owner and promoter of Major League Wrestling, spoke to The Ringer and gave some insight into the late 90s/early 2000s era of WWE.

During this time, Bauer revealed:

“When I was in WWE, if you were the Cruiserweight Champion, that was basically a death knell

“You were given a ceiling. Even if you lost the belt, you were now pigeonholed into being a cruiserweight.”

Bauer would claim that this isn’t just a thing in WWE but in many other promotions.

He would state that many promotions had to figure out how to match up performers of varying sizes and styles.

Bauer believes that MLW does this better than other companies on the scene.

The WWE Cruiserweight Championship was active between 2001 and 2007.

It took its lineage from the WCW Cruiserweight Championship.

The last champion to hold the title in WCW was Shane Helms, with the first of the WWE era being Billy Kidman.

It would be held by the likes of Matt Hardy, Rey Mysterio and Chavo Guerrero.

The final champion would be Hornswoggle with the title being vacated on September 25 2007 and quietly retired.

In 2016, WWE would hold the Cruiserweight Classic which featured wrestler of 205lbs and under from around the independent wrestling circuit.

TJP would be the inaugural champion for this title that would eventually become the NXT Cruiserweight Championship, appearing on 205 Live and NXT.

It would eventually be unified with the NXT North American Championship in January 2022 at NXT New Year’s Evil.

Transcript from Wrestling Inc.

Think you’re a wrestling mastermind? Well you can prove it by taking quizzes in our brand new quiz section! Don’t forget to tweet us your results!

• Court Bauer
• Cruiserweight
• wwe

Share this article with friends