hulk hogan has the most world heavyweight championships in wwe.
who has the most world heavyweight championships in wwe?
hulk hogan
after the televised draft, joey styles, the director of digital media content for wwe's official website, interviewed the draftees on their reactions. the drafted wrestlers generally expressed approval of the draft and described what they hoped their experiences would be with their new brand. seven of the wrestlers were champions with their original brand, and as outlined in the draft regulations, they carried their titles over to their new brand; this affected seven of nine championships. champion draft selections included: unified tag team champions the colóns (carlito and primo), united states champion montel vontavious porter, wwe champion triple h, and divas champion maryse from smackdown to raw; women's champion melina and intercontinental champion rey mysterio from raw to smackdown. since triple h was drafted to raw, it left smackdown without a top contested title, as raw now featured two of the three top contested championships in wwe: the wwe and world heavyweight championships (although edge would later brought the world heavyweight championship title back to smackdown as its exclusive-top title following his win against john cena at backlash). when mysterio and porter switched brands, the two secondary championships switched brands for the first time in wwe's history. this also occurred when melina and maryse switched brands, as the two female contested titles also switched brands for the first time. though the unified tag team champions were both drafted over to raw from smackdown, the titles were able to be defended on all three brands due to being unified.
2009 wwe draft
neither the light heavyweight or cruiserweight championship were particularly prominent in the company; however, over the years the notion of lighter wrestlers becoming main event stars has become more accepted in wwe due to many of the top talents over the past 15 years arguably falling into the cruiserweight category. as a result, a very substantial portion of wwe's roster are billed at, slightly less, or slightly more than 220 lbs. many lighter wrestlers have achieved main event status within wwe and, over the years, have won several world heavyweight championships. for instance, the billed weight of former wwe world heavyweight champion daniel bryan is 210 lbs. other lighter wrestlers who have risen to prominence as main eventers and world heavyweight champions include shawn michaels, chris jericho, dolph ziggler, christian, rey mysterio, jeff hardy, eddie guerrero, chris benoit, cm punk, seth rollins, finn balor, a.j. styles, and kofi kingston. with so many successful lighter wrestlers achieving greater success outside the restriction imposed by weight classes, wwe considers the continued existence of a cruiserweight division as nonessential and redundant. however, in 2016, they announced the cruiserweight classic, a 32-man tournament for wrestlers under the weight limit used by mma. t.j. perkins won the cruiserweight classic and became the inaugural champion of the new wwe cruiserweight championship for wwe's raw brand, as well as the cruiserweight division exclusive show "wwe 205 live". the new championship does not share the same title history as the previous cruiserweight championship that was retired in 2007.
cruiserweight (professional wrestling)