Ric Flair's World title reigns
 

I read an article on the internet that mentioned that Flair was actually an 18-time World Heavyweight Champion but for some reason they never reconized the two other title reigns. Any truth to this?

Flair is an 18-time World Heavyweight Champion.

16-times between the NWA & WCW,and 2 during his first WWF stint.

The other 2 may not be recognized thanks to the BIG fiasco of WCW
splitting with NWA.

When Flair won the NWA belt from Sting in 1991,WCW said
that Flair was the first WCW Champion as well (since WCW
was a new company they used this match to crown their
Champion as well - but the NWA Title is NOT the same as
the WCW one; they are 2 different belts)....

In 1993,Flair won the NWA Title from Barry Windham; however,
when NWA & WCW split,the NWA no longer recognized him as
Champion.In the meantime,WCW had Flair continue defending
the belt,as the "WCW International Heavyweight Championship";
and eventually Sting won the title from Vader.

During all of that,Flair won the WCW World Heavyweight Championship.

So in 1994,Flair (WCW Champ) fought Sting (WCW International
Champ) to unify the titles,and he won.

So just to clarify (because all of the WCW-NWA situation is
confusing as shit),either they did not recognize his 2 WWF
reigns,or they didn't recognize his 1993 win over Windham
(since NWA didn't really recognize it) and his win over Sting
that made him the first WCW Champion.

Thanks, you certainly know your wrestling! :y:

No problem; thanks for the compliment :)

Actually Flair had more title reigns since he lost the title in Puerto Rico and Sinapore (probably other places too) and the NWA never held up the title changes (I know Flair was meant to go over in Puerto Rico but he changed the finish during the match because he was afraid of a riot). Flair himself just last week said he lost count of his title wins but it's over 20.

Yeah there is a great debate about how many he really has. In the PWI Wrestling Alamanac if you go through and count in the title histories I think you come up with 18 but I have read articles counting 20 and I have heard people say it is more like 22.

flair is a 22 time world champ? he lost the belt 22 times? damn!
im only joking! i will ask j.r wat he thinks!

The NWA-WCW stuff is pretty confusing. From what I understand WCW was an NWA promotion, ala TNA, or something? Then Ted Turner bought it from NWA? Or no? I've always tried to figure it out. But perhaps that is for an entire new topic. It's late, and I'm tired.