Brock Lesnar v1.0
By Scott Keith on 30 June 2012
Scott,
Do you think SummerSlam 2002 was the right time to make Brock Lesnar WWE Champion? That was a REALLY quick ascent from beating up the Hardy Boyz at Backlash to beating The Rock at SummerSlam. Would it have been better to build him until Wrestlemania? Perhaps he gets fed up with Heyman as his mouthpiece and goes Goldberg-style loner. Then you build him as a babyface leading to his domination of the Royal Rumble. All the while, have Kurt Angle and Chris Benoit trade the WWE Title from summer on (with the decisive match being the Rumble '03 classic) to 'prime' the transition to mat-based main events. Then the Kurt vs. Brock Wrestlemania XIX main event is built up as more 'special' AND it's Lesnar's first title win? It worked out just fine for Brock, and the wins over Rocky and Hogan ran him to the top quickly, but I felt like there was more appeal in the 'chase' with Brock, at least for that initial phase.
Summerslam was fine to put the belt on him, the problem was that they shouldn't have BEAT him right away like they did. Had Brock held onto the belt through Wrestlemania XIX, the Angle feud might have felt like a bigger deal instead of a hot-potatoed World title feud like it ended up being.