Better Wrestler #277

[itsmeJD]

Originally Posted by DLVH84 I have to say Rude, because he was a real cool heel. Great look, phyisque (at a smaller scale than many of his co-horts), great wrestling ability, great talker, the whole nine yards. It's a damn shame he wasn't WWF or WCW World Champion (although he was the first World Champion of WCCW, but it was out of spite of Jim Crockett, Jr. not wanting the NWA World title defended in Dallas anymore, just his territory, which was why WCCW broke away from the NWA in 1986.)

Rude did win the NWA World Heavyweight Championship, making his intentions clear on August 28, 1993, when he was the guest on then-champion Ric Flair's "A Flair For the Gold" talk segment. Rude defeated Flair for the title in September 1993 at Fall Brawl. As WCW had recently withdrawn from the NWA, WCW lost the rights to continue using the NWA World Heavyweight Championship. WCW created their own championship, dubbing it the WCW International World Heavyweight Championship, which Rude lost to Hiroshi Hase on March 16, 1994 in Tokyo, Japan. So at least he had that!