If there were no brand expansion or World Heavyweight Championship
 

...which former champions would've never been the WWE Champion? Discuss at length. The easiest one for me is JBL.

JBL, Mark Henry, Jack Swagger, Great Khali, possibly Daniel Bryan.

Probably none of them.

Eddie, Chris Benoit

Definitely Christian. :(

Jack Swagger is by far the correct answer to this question.

JBL might not have been but he should have been even without a brand split. He's one of the greatest heels in WWE history.

Dolph

Gonna go waaaaaaaaaaaay out on a limb here.

John Cena

If he hadn't debuted on SmackDown, where he was able to slowly build a following without being in the shadow of HHH's Reign of Doom, I don't know that he would have caught on like he did. He was able to evolve his character from orange-shorts Prototype to Doctor of Thuganomics to main eventer without having to worry about running the risk of being treated like RVD, Jericho, Booker, or any of the other guys who got a little over on Raw only to be fed to The Game.

Rey Mysterio.

WWE title reign was more of an excuse to get the belt right back to Cena while his World reigns were because of Eddie's death for the first and a way to quickly transition to Kane for the second.

RVD and CM Punk. No way they get a title reign of any kind in a one-title WWE.

As mentioned, Eddie, Benoit, Rey, Swagger, Ziggler, Kane. I doubt Jericho would ever have gotten a run after his Undisputed reign. MAYBE Edge. Not sure about Cena, the lynch pin of putting him on the list is that he didn't prove his worth to the company until he had the title; I' not sure they would have put it on him if they didn't have another guy to fall back on.

lol I forgot about Rey' shitty WWE title win.

Undoubtedly Edge.

Remember, he was initially knocked for "not having *it*". Rose colored nostalgia is all well and good, but he would have likely gotten passed over. Maybe a title shot eventually, but never the opportunity to run with the ball like he did on Smackdown.

This is a tough one. Although, Eddie Guerrero won the WWE Championship on the Smackdown brand, he defeated Brock Lesnar. Which was a big deal at the time as well. Benoit was being built up for a while for the eventual win. I would say that Benoit had a better chance at winning the strap than Eddie.

Edge's retirement was definitely responsible Christian's first reign as World's Heavyweight Champion. But wasn't he a former ECW Champion?

I couldn't agree more. John Cena would've never made it if he were on Monday Night RAW. His struggle in the first couple of years was evident when he got drafted.

Wasn't Rey Rey being pushed even before Eddie's untimely death? Then again, he would've been the champion on Smackdown. I was genuinely surprised when he won the WWE Championship on RAW. It was either him or The Miz. It was a very good opening match as far as I can remember.

Rob Van Dam won the WWE Championship while being on Monday Night RAW and in the "main event" picture. Although, Punk won the strap on RAW, he had zero credibility as the World's Heavyweight Champion.

Edge is a very interesting case. He was pushed as a "main event" superstar on Smackdown in 2002-03 but never won the belt because he wasn't good enough at the time. His feud with Matt Hardy took him to the next level and solidified him as a credible heel on Monday Night RAW before he won the WWE Championship for the first time. Although the decision was criticized at first, he went on to have 10 more reigns as the champion.

pull it together man oh for pete's sake damn it

Say what now?

Possibly Kane.

Big Show

They were both former WWF Champions before the brand split.

Being cast in Total Divas probably has more value than being ECW champion.

Bret Hart

I wanna say Trple H but thats because I grew up with him being third tier to The people I thought of as actual superstars(turns out alot of people in my age group felt the same way)

MILD RANT WARNING

He has just always looked like that to me and then his Ultra Heel reign came and I couLdnt understand (and absolutely hated the fact that he was beating people with a fucking sleeper And then he beat Booker t and I remember us all just seething basically I felt he never belonged where he was in the main event

I know, but it was presumed you knew I meant Kane's 2009-10 WHC run and Show's WWE Championship run that began at Survivor Series 2002.

You have to keep in mind that guys like CM Punk got the World Title with a Money in the Bank title shot. Now, would they have been given that title shot without a second title there? Most likely not.

I think you can basically write off whoever wasn't the champion on RAW in most circumstances. Maybe guys like Sheamus wouldn't have gotten "trial runs," but it's also quite likely the company would have risked it in the same way, since it was the top dog he beat. Jericho was amazing when he won the World Heavyweight Title, so he probably would have been the star attraction again at some point.

History would have been entirely different, I guess.