Final holders of now defunct WWE titles
It is surprising to learn that WWE has operated over 40 different championships during the promotion's history dating from the old Captiol Wrestling Corporation days in the early 50s. More than half of those titles are no longer active - they have been either retired/replaced or merged with other titles.
That statistic isn't much of a surprise considering that the WWE operated a number of titles like the WWF World Martial Arts Heavyweight Championship, and Intercontinental tag team titles.The first retired championship was the WWWF United States Tag team Championship which wasn't even afforded a formal announcement when it was made defunct in 1967. The final champions were Spiros Arion and the legendary Bruno Sammartino.
Sometimes, titles are also considered to be retired when a new championship takes its place. WWE considers Layla as the final WWE Women's champion before it was replaced with the WWE Divas championship. The current WWE RAW and Smackdown Women's titles are considered to have a separate lineage.
This list takes a look at five such titles in recent WWE history and who were the final wrestlers to hold the gold.
#5. ECW Championship - Ezekiel Jackson
It has been over a decade since the WWE version of Extreme Championship Wrestling ceased to exist. The original ECW had enthralled the hardcore pro-wrestling fans with its liberal use of violence and when the company was declared bankrupt in 2001, WWE swooped in to buy its assets.
Initially, there was no plan to resurrect ECW within the WWE walls - but all that changed when the WWE-produced 'Rise and fall of ECW' documentary broke all kinds of records in video sales. Vince McMahon was sufficiently captivated and when Rob Van Dam suggested to have an ECW reunion show hosted under the WWE umbrella, the Chairman acquiesced.
That show - 'ECW One Night Stand' - in 2005, went on to perform extremely well as far as PPV buys were considered and a year later, ECW was resurrected as the third show under the WWE banner. This version of ECW started with a bang, when Mr. Money in the Bank RVD, beat John Cena in front of rabid crowd to win the WWE Championship.
ECW started as a weekly show on the Sci-Fi channel with Van Dam as the champion and a number of ECW alumni present on the roster. However, the wheels soon fell off the brand after the hot start. Champion Rob Van Dam and Sabu were arrested for possession of drugs within a month and Van Dam was forced to lose his title to The Big Show.
That started the downfall of WWE-ECW and many of the decisions made by WWE management was derided by the ECW faithful. Pushing Bobby Lashley down fans' throat, having Vince McMahon win the ECW World title and original owner Paul Heyman quitting, all added to the frustration. It was too late when fan favourite Tommy Dreamer - who had been treated as a jobber in the WWE for years - won the ECW title.
Guys like Jack Swagger and Chavo Guerrero had dismal reigns with the belt, but no one was more forgettable than the final champion - Ezekiel Jackson. 'Big Zeke' couldn't cut a promo, wasn't good in the ring and didn't have any ties to the original ECW style of wrestling, and was the blandest choice to crown as the last ever champion.
Jackson ended Christian's enjoyable 205-day reign as champion on the final episode of ECW in an Extreme Rules match. He was supposed to build on this and become a major star on SmackDown - but a forgettable Intercontinental title run as part of the even more forgettable 'Corre' stable led to him being rarely seen on TV. Many injuries later, Jackson left the company on a whimper.