7 Greatest Champions of WWE’s Modern Era
By Ian Carey
WWE.com
4. Randy Orton
Total Reigns: 12
Total Days as Champion: 747
Orton, like Cena, has competed entirely in the modern era of wrestling. While Orton has been competing in main events for seemingly his entire career, he’s not a guy that fans generally consider as one of the greatest champions of all time. In storyline, however, he is one of the most successful ever.
His first championship reign came as he was a member of Evolution. Orton defeated Chris Benoit at SummerSlam that year, only to be turned on by his stablemates the next night on Raw. Throughout the next decade plus he would trade the title back and forth with Cena, Batista, Triple H, and all of the other main event wrestlers throughout this period.
Orton has never had a very lengthy title run. In fact, only 2 of his 12 world title reigns lasted more than 100 days. His longest reign barely got over 200 days. The reason we don’t think of Orton’s 12 championship reigns the same way we think of Cena’s 15 is because he was rarely on top for long.
Randy, like Cena, is starting to slip into a part-time schedule, which could impact how many world title runs he finishes his career with. At only 36 however, he is the youngest on this list.