World Heavyweight Champion (WWE)
| World Heavyweight Championship | |||||||||||||||||||||
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The World Heavyweight Championship was represented by WWE's modified version of the Big Gold Belt
(September 2002–December 2013) |
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| Details | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Promotion | WWE | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Date established | September 2, 2002 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Date retired | December 15, 2013 (unified with the WWE Championship) |
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| Statistics | |
|---|---|
| First champion(s) | Triple H |
| Final champion(s) | Randy Orton |
| Most reigns | Edge (7 reigns) |
| Longest reign | Batista (282 days) |
| Shortest reign | Big Show (2 minutes) |
| Oldest winner | The Undertaker (44 years, 334 days) |
| Youngest winner | Randy Orton (24 years, 136 days) |
| Heaviest champion | Big Show (441 lb (200 kg)) |
| Lightest champion | Rey Mysterio (175 lb (79 kg)) |
The World Heavyweight Championship was a professional wrestling world heavyweight championship owned by WWE. It was one of two top championships in WWE from 2002 to 2006 and from 2010 to 2013, complementing the WWE Championship, and one of three top championships from 2006 to 2010 with the addition of the ECW World Heavyweight Championship.
The title was established under the Raw brand in 2002, after Raw and SmackDown became distinct brands under WWE, and moved between both brands on different occasions (mainly as a result of the WWE draft) until August 29, 2011 when all programming became full roster "supershows". The World Heavyweight Championship was retired at the WWE pay-per-view, TLC: Tables, Ladders & Chairs, on December 15, 2013 when it was unified with the WWE Championship. The unified championship became the WWE World Heavyweight Championship, retaining the lineage of the WWE Championship. Triple H was the inaugural World Heavyweight Champion, with Randy Orton being the last.
The title was one of six to be represented by the historic Big Gold Belt, first introduced in 1986. Its heritage can be traced back to the first world heavyweight championship, thereby giving the belt a legacy over 100 years old, the oldest in the world.
WWE introduced its World Heavyweight Championship in 2002 by Eric Bischoff with Triple H becoming the inaugural champion on September 2. However, its origin is attributed the first world heavyweight championship, and then to events that began in the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA), which had many different territorial promotions as members. In the late 1980s, World Championship Wrestling (WCW) was a member of the NWA, having been formed by the purchase of Jim Crockett Promotions (JCP), which had absorbed many other NWA members, by Turner Broadcasting, which aired WCW's programming. During this time, WCW used the NWA World Heavyweight Championship as its world title. The WCW World Heavyweight Championship was soon established when the recognition was awarded to then-NWA World Heavyweight Champion Ric Flair in 1991. In 1993, WCW seceded from the NWA and grew to become a rival promotion to the World Wrestling Federation (WWF), itself a former member of the NWA. Both organizations grew into mainstream prominence and were eventually involved in a television ratings war dubbed the Monday Night Wars. Near the end of the ratings war, WCW began a financial decline which culminated in March 2001 with the WWF's purchase of selected assets of WCW.
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