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| Kofi Kingston is a worthy Champion, but WWE's history with Black wrestlers is not ideal Photo Credit: WWE.com |
It's not like WWE didn't have opportunities to put its top title on a Black man. While I cannot speak for pre-Vincent Kennedy McMahon (W)WWF, I have a fairly good idea of how many Black WWE wrestlers could and/or SHOULD have held the title since the beginning of the WrestleMania era. I will list them below:
Junkyard Dog - The interesting thing about JYD is that if Vince McMahon couldn't poach Hulk Hogan from the American Wrestling Association, he would have gone into national expansion on Sylvester Ritter's broad shoulders. If JYD was a backup plan, why did he never win the top title at least once as a test run or at least as a "gold watch?" He was one of the most beloved wrestlers in Mid-South history. Perhaps the reason was that he was pretty busted up by the time he got to WWE. Still, that didn't stop them from running Andre the Giant in the main event of WrestleMania III or giving him the title in the run-up to WrestleMania IV.
JYD could have been Champion sometime during Hogan's epic first reign with the title. I would have put the title on him somewhere around the fall of 1986, after having a token heel like King Kong Bundy or Harley Race winning it at Madison Square Garden. He could have held the title into WrestleMania III defending against a heel challenger on the undercard while Hogan/Andre headlined without the title. Or perhaps his reign could have ended somewhere in January allowing Andre to go into Mania III as Champion. I'm not sure history would have looked at Hogan any less fondly with the interruption in his reign.
Bad News Brown - One of the first true badasses in WWE, Brown cast a fearsome presence. He projected anger and hatred like few others could, and his brawling skills backed it up bigtime. Of course, WWE had reasons not to push him, but they were mostly reasons that scared White dudes with power use not to push a POC that isn't some kind of shucking-and-jiving gimmick, friendly to viewers who didn't want to confront their racism. Rather than doing free propaganda for the US government in their push to go to war with Iraq, Brown would have been a far better candidate to upend the Ultimate Warrior at the 1991 Royal Rumble than Iraqi traitor Sgt. Slaughter. Granted, going back in time with the optics of the present make Hogan going over a Black guy at Mania not so great, but Brown would've still been an incredible WWE Champion nonetheless.
Faarooq/Ron Simmons - Simmons became the first ever Black World Champion in any major promotion when he defeated Big Van Vader for the World Championship Wrestling World Heavyweight Championship in 1992. Why didn't he repeat the feat in WWE? The answer may lie in how he was presented at first, coming in as a fetishized gladiator in foam-rubber gear as a vehicle for Sunny to get over. However, when he adopted the Black liberation character in the Nation of Domination, it was the perfect time to put the title on him. While I view Black liberation as a babyface gimmick, sometimes, you have to play with the cards you're dealt. Faarooq going into WrestleMania 13 as Champion would've been a far better option than a second Sycho Sid reign, especially with his challenger...
Ahmed Johnson - Yeah, Johnson wasn't very good at wrestling, but by this time, WWE still didn't care about workrate. I mean, at this point, Sid was still Championship material, and you know if McMahon could, he would have put the title on Warrior again. Johnson was charismatic and had a dope finisher. Had they cultivated his character better, him challenging Faarooq in the main event of WrestleMania 13 would've packed an enormous emotional punch.
Shelton Benjamin - Even more than Edge or CM Punk, Benjamin embodied Money in the Bank. The fact that he never won one feels criminal to me. Would he have been a good Champion? It remains to be seen, but WWE put one of the belts on Great Khali at some point. Benjamin would've at least been a decent Champion who could work good-to-great matches, and unlike the other guy they tried in that role, he didn't end up murdering his wife and kid. The thing is, the match he should've won was the one he wasn't involved in. WrestleMania 23 saw him standing on the sidelines as a lumberjack. I would've put him in this match and had him win the briefcase. In hindsight, he'd have been a far better winner than Mr. Kennedy, who never even got the chance to use his briefcase as he got hurt, necessitating him losing it to Edge.
Montel Vontavious Porter - I have no idea why MVP never won the title. He was involved in some prominent feuds and helped carry the midcard titles in an era where the cupboards were pretty bare. Was he a victim of WWE signing a bunch of indie guys around the time he was ready to be done with the company? Did WWE not want to put the title on someone with a criminal past? It didn't stop them when they put the belt on Randy Orton the first, second, third, and every time after when he had a history of desertion in the military. MVP could have won either title somewhere in 2009 or 2010. The titles were pretty free-flowing at that point.
Postscript - Of the four men with Black heritage who held some version of the big title, only one won his at about the right time. Some might say that The Rock won his first title prematurely, that he wasn't ready. In retrospect, I think his first win at Survivor Series '98 was probably perfect timing. The other three, however, probably could and should have won the title sooner:
Mark Henry - Henry probably should have won the title within five years of joining the company. Sure, he was pretty green, but he was a victim of coming in at the absolute wrong time and also of racism. Here you had a big Black guy who couldn't work, but you could bounce any number of really bad and really hurtfully stereotypical gimmicks on him, hence Sexual Chocolate. His Hall of Pain run in 2011 isn't something so nuanced that you had to teach him. A rampaging Henry could've been a perfect foil for Mankind, Steve Austin, or even former stablemate The Rock.
Booker T - Although I was a huge Chris Jericho fan back then (and still am for the most part, at least in the ring), Booker T should have unified the WWE and WCW Championships, and he should have done it far sooner than Vengeance 2001. In fact, Booker probably should have been positioned as the top heel for The Alliance, not Austin. While his heel turn was brilliantly executed at WrestleMania X-7, it lost a ton of steam, and the reinforcement of it for him to join the Alliance was a mistake. Booker as the lead villain from the point of the Alliance's beginning to its end would've created a supernova star in WWE. Instead, he never really got above the level of the upper midcard/occasional main event guy.
Kofi Kingston - While Kingston's reign right now has been as great as anything in 2019 WWE could be, I firmly believe he should have won the 2010 Royal Rumble. He was riding a huge wave after getting over on Randy Orton and being the sole survivor in his match at Survivor Series '09. Kingston for some reason stalled out after that, a combination of Vince McMahon knowing he was getting Edge back and some form of latent racism. The final nail was put in the coffin when he was out of place on a RKO attempt, and Orton pitched a temper tantrum the likes of which were outrageous, even for his pissbaby standards. For whatever reason, Kingston's rise to the top was truncated and only restored when Mustafa Ali got hurt and the company cooled on reintroducing Bray Wyatt before Mania. All the best things happen in WWE by accident, even when those things are delayed indefinitely from the initial time of when they should've happened.
WWE's history with race relations is abysmal, but it can get better. It has a crop of Black wrestlers who can carry the company in the future all around its roster. Whether it be Velveteen Dream, Big E, Xavier Woods, Isaiah Scott, Jordan Myles, Dio Maddin, Cedric Alexander, Montez Ford, or even Bobby Lashley, the crop of Black excellence in WWE right now can help the company right the ship. However, WWE has to be willing to do such a thing. The question is, will they allow it to happen?
