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This is the championship currently defended on SmackDown! For the unrelated championship that existed in the 1970s, see WWWF United States Championship.

The WWE United States Championship is a professional wrestling title. It was formerly the National Wrestling Alliance and then the World Championship Wrestling United States Championship but is now a World Wrestling Entertainment title exclusive to the SmackDown! brand as a secondary championship.

History

Although the NWA had crowned a United States Heavyweight Champion in 1950, "Nature Boy" Buddy Rogers being given the first honor, over the years the many promotions that conformed the NWA began recognizing their own champions. The United States championship recognized by Mid Atlantic Championship Wrestling (later World Championship Wrestling) actually started in 1974, with former World champion Harley Race being given the first belt. The Mid-Atlantic version became the Undisputed NWA United States Championship in 1981, when the San Francisco promotion (the only remaining NWA promotion to recognize its own U.S. champion) closed down. In 1991 the title became the WCW United States Heavyweight Championship. When Canadian wrestler Lance Storm held the United States Championship, he renamed it the Canadian Heavyweight Championship for the duration of his reign, and covered the faceplate of the belt with a sticker of the Canadian Flag.

The title was a WCW championship until, after the World Wrestling Federation's purchase of WCW in 2001, United States Champion Edge defeated the WWF Intercontinental Champion, Test, to merge both titles. Edge then held the WWF Intercontinental Championship, and the WCW United States Championship became inactive. The title was reactivated as a WWE belt by SmackDown! general manager Stephanie McMahon as the WWE United States Championship. This was done shortly after the RAW brand reactivated the WWE Intercontinental Championship as its secondary championship, and thus the United States Championship would be the equal counterpart for SmackDown!. Eddie Guerrero defeated Chris Benoit in the finals of a tournament at Vengeance 2003 to become the first WWE United States Champion.

At the Armageddon 2004, then-champion John Cena revealed a new redesigned, custom-made, United States championship, resembling a disc on a turntable. However, after Orlando Jordan defeated Cena for the title in March 2005, Cena's belt was unceremoniously dumped into a garbage can and burned by John "Bradshaw" Layfield and The Cabinet. Jordan was then presented with the original WWE United States Championship belt, which is still used today.

Statistics

Record: Record holder: Record: Notes:
Most reigns Ric Flair 6 Lex Luger's reigns sometimes are also counted as six, but his "fourth" and "fifth" reign are delimited by the change in name of the title from NWA to WCW championship, in which no title match or forfeit took place.
Longest reign Lex Luger 523 days N/A
Shortest reign Steve Austin c. 5 minutes Austin was awarded the title on September 18, 1994 and lost it less than 5 minutes later to Jim Duggan.
Oldest champion Terry Funk 56 years Funk defeated Lance Storm for the title in 2000. However, WCW never officially recognized Funk's title win; it wasn't officially recognized until after WCW had gone out of business.
Tallest champion Big Show 7'1" Won the title from Eddie Guerrero at No Mercy 2003.
Shortest transitory title match Chris Benoit vs. Orlando Jordan 25.5 seconds The match took place at SummerSlam 2005 on August 21, 2005.
Shortest title defense match Chris Benoit vs. Orlando Jordan 22.5 seconds The match took place on September 9, 2005.
Fastest debut-to-champion Carlito 1 day Won the title in his debut WWE match on SmackDown!, defeating John Cena.

Trivia

  • The longest span between reigns is held by Terry Funk: nearly twenty five years between his first reign (November 1975) and second reign (September 2000). Other wrestlers who had long spans between reigns are Ric Flair and Roddy Piper (sixteen years each), and Ricky Steamboat (ten years).
  • The current NWA/WCW/WWE version of the title is not the first United States Championship in World Wrestling Entertainment history. A previous title existed in the then-World Wide Wrestling Federation, called the WWWF United States Championship. It was a short-lived title that was created in 1970 and abandoned by 1976. It has no connection to this title.
  • Randy Orton became the first person to win the United States Championship for someone else, as Booker T was injured midway a Best-of-7 Series with Chris Benoit.
  • Booker T, Eddie Guerrero, and Chris Benoit are the only three wrestlers to win both the WCW and WWE versions of this title.
  • The United States Championhip has never been retained at a WrestleMania to date. Big Show lost his title to John Cena at WrestleMania XX while Chris Benoit lost it to John "Bradshaw" Layfield at WrestleMania 22.
  • Bill Goldberg is the only undefeated wrestler (storyline/WCW kayfabe) to concurrently hold both the U.S. and World titles.

Current champion

The current champion is Finlay in his first reign as United States Champion, who defeated Bobby Lashley on the July 14th episode of SmackDown!

See also

External links

National Wrestling Alliance championships | Jim Crockett Promotions championships | World Championship Wrestling championships | World Wrestling Entertainment championships

WWE United States Championship | WWE Campeonato de los Estados Unidos | WWE United States Championship | WWE・ユナイテッドステイツ王座 | WWE United States Championship | WWE United States Championship

 

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the "WWE United States Championship".

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