Last Monday on Raw, a champion vs. champion Tables, Ladders, and Chairs match between WWE Champion Randy Orton and World Heavyweight Champion John Cena was announced for the TLC PPV. I don’t feel unifying the titles is the right move, here’s why.
While the World Heavyweight Championship doesn’t have the value it had in the past, it’s still a vital part of the WWE. I would call it the “mid-card World title.” It’s a major championship for guys who are not at the level of the WWE Championship, but good enough of hold a World title. If the World Title is unified with the WWE Title, these guys will be harmed. Cena, Orton, Punk, Bryan, Big Show, and Sheamus are the only ones at the level of the WWE title at the moments. You have upper-midcarders such as Del Rio, Ziggler, Rhodes, Sandow, Miz, and several others who could benefit from World Title runs. With that title gone, these guys, who are above the Intercontinental and United States titles, but below the WWE title at this point, will suffer. They aren’t booked on the level of a top contender and with Cena and Orton and company still actively at the top, their isn’t much room for advancement.
With the brand split no longer in effective, the titles are show exclusive anymore. That created the idea for one champion, but with a deep roster, but a small room at the top of the card, and mid-card level world title is needed. If someone is given as test-run as World Heavyweight Champion and they are successful, it could get them over enough to at least become a top contender for the WWE Championship at some point in the future. In a business that talks about “creating opportunities” they sure are giving the impression of eliminating one here.
The most interest part of this equation is that when the match was booked, it wasn’t officially announced as a unification match, rather a champion vs. champion match. That could be interesting. The idea I have is that the ending will be Cena grabbing the WWE Title while Orton grabs the World title, thus each competitor just simply swapping titles. WWE sees Cena as a bigger star than Orton, so it would make sense for them to make him the “face” of the WWE with the WWE Championship, while Orton can still stay on top as the World Heavyweight Champion. This would be a benefit because it’s more likely for an upper midcarder to be booked to potentially defeat Orton rather than Cena because Cena is booked as invincible. It will be interesting to see if that happens, it wouldn’t surprise me if it doesn’t because TLC just seems to random of an event for a big deal like unification actually going down on it.
Until next time, decide on whether of not you want to unify things,
-Nick
