Chris Benoit's WWE Career

To me, throughout his whole WWE career, Benoit seemed to have been held back because he came from WCW.

When he came in in 2000, he was treated as an upper mid-carder. While he did fight against some of the WWF's top stars, he was never treated as a seriouse threat because coming from WCW, Vince was never going to give him a big win over a top star in his first year. Benoit's false title wins at Fully Loaded an Unforgiven were awsome, but never counted.

After spending most of 2000 in the mid-card, he recieved a huge push in 2001, and seemed destined to win one of the two world titles(WWF or WCW Title). His neck injury couldn't have come at a worse time, as it derailed what could have been a career year for Benoit when he was feuding w/ Austin.

When he returned in 2002, instead of starting where he left off in the main event, he was thrown into mid-card feuds w/ RVD, Eddie, Edge, and Angle for the majority of the year. They didn't book him as dominant as they did in 2001, and he spent 2002 in the mid-card. After an amazing WWE Title match w/ Angle at the RR 2003, Benoit was pushed back down to the mid-card for the rest of the year except for his match w/ Brock on SD in November.

2004 was his career year, and while there are alot of people who didn't feel he should have been a world champ, myself and many other fans felt he did. He was over like crazy and always got a massive pop when he came out. His Rumble win and title win at WM20 are two classic moments to me, and I loved how he was portrayed as a no talk, all fight champ. He was different from other champs in that he basically kicked your butt and that was it. He didn't brag on the mic, he just kicked butt in the ring. 2004 was a great year for Benoit.

Sadly, and for no apparent reason, he was pushed right back down to the mid-card after his title reign ended at SS 2004, and stayed there for the rest of his career. Benoit was always over, yet was always put in the mid-card from mid-2004 through 2007. When SD was seriously lacking top names in 2006, I thought that Benoit should have been pushed right back to the main event and given a title reign when he returned in late-2006, but again he was given the U.S. Title instead.

I think that the "WCW" stigma always stuck w/ Benoit in his WWE career. Even though he was massively over w/ the crowd, he spent about 90% of his WWE career in the mid-card because he wasn't one of Vince's creations. Benoit had an amazing career, but looking back, it seemed like they could have used him so much more than they did.

I kinda wish WWE just pulled the trigger in 2000 and gave Benoit a WWF title reign. Angle still could've won the title in a 3-way or something at No Mercy 2000.

I wonder if Benoit would have stayed in WCW in 2000, how many World Title reigns would he have had??

I was a huge Benoit fan, I made sure to buy his dvd set, and buy all the dvds he was World Champion on, because even then I knew he would never win it again. I think any true hardcore Benoit fan could easily say "well... that was a sweet title run, we got what we wanted, but it won't ever happen again."

And that's not taking anything away from Benoit, but like I said in an earlier post, Benoit and Guerrero were given the World and WWE Titles in 2004 to please us wrestling fans, and to reward them with something for all the years they put into the business. But I am sure that Vince already knew that guys like Cena, Batista and Orton were gonna be at the top of the card in a years time.

a lot of people say Vinnie lost respect for Eddie when he practically begged for the world title to be taken off of him post WM.

I dunno if theres any truth in that but eddie did feel brutal pressure as champ and did ask to be relieved of it.

I am both amazed and thrilled that this has stayed so civil.

I think Benoit was an amazing worker. In terms of a top guy though, he was pretty one dimensional when it came to his character and promo skills. He was the intense guy, yeah, but there wasn't a lot WWE could do with that from feud to feud when he actually had the title imo. Benoit was just a guy that made more sense pursuing the title imo. He is the Rudy of pro wrestling. Once he got in the game the excitement sort of peaked.

Plus, Benoit was awesome at making guys look better than they actually were so I think he was far better off putting guys over in the midcard.

If you look at HBK, I think it's proof that the little guy with a ton of drive can be a huge star. But, Benoit lacked that charisma, and that ability to connect with the audience, at least as a top face. Chris Benoit was just the pure definition of a pro "wrestler." He was just cut out of that Bob Backlund, Bret Hart, old school mold. Which that made him unique during his time imo. Still, it's hard to be just a great "wrestler" in an "entertainment" company and be expected to carry the show.

He had that old school knowledge of the ring and how to work a match, what Bret Hart says is lacking today. He was amazing at telling a story and took bumps all day long. Every time Benoit wasn't on a PPV I was so disappointed and when he lost it made a PPV so much worse for me.

So glad people kept this thread about Benoit the wrestler and everyone in here appreciated what he did in the ring instead of the typical "whos benwa?" and all that.

Eddie Guerrero didn't really have that many guys to compete with on Smackdown either though. He beat Brock, then beat Angle, and then after that it was JBL, which wasn't that believable cause he just got done being in a midcard face tag team.

In 2004, Raw was stacked. Benoit had a lot of guys to compete with. Batista, Orton, Kane, Triple H, Flair, HBK, and if they wanted to, Benjamin, Jericho and Christian if that time ever had to happen.

Guerrero only had JBL and if they wanted to, Booker T. Smackdown just didn't have the star power, it wasn't Eddie being a bad champion, just the roster was bad.

thats a great point Eddie hadnt got anyone to feud with.a feud with UT would have been epic.....

Steiner was killed off during his feud w/ Hunter, so no way he was going to get another title feud in 2004 when he spent most of 2003 jobbing to Test. I always thought that Booker should have gotten the Judgement Day 2004 main event w/ Eddie instead of JBL.

As for Booker and the Dudley Boyz, their credibility was killed off when they were all traded for just HHH. Booker fought Hunter for the world title at WM 19, yet one year later he needed a great tag team with him just to equal one HHH. It killed all three of them off. It also didn't help IMO that Booker was jobbed out to a mid-card Cena throughout all of 2004 when he should have been used as a main event heel.