Intercontinental Championship: Top Ten Superstars Who Defined The Title

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9. Tito Santana

Mission, Texas’ Santana will go down as one of the best, and hard working WWE superstars to never capture their world title. In his 13 years with the company, “El Matador” wrestled in close 1700 matches, winning more than 1,000 of them (stats via cagematch.net). And quite possibly his best years where when he was wearing the Intercontinental Championship. Between 1984 and 1986, Santana held the title for a combined 441 days and had 31 televised title defenses as he fought off the challenges of men like Don Muraco, Paul Orndorff, The Iron Sheik, Bob Orton, Jesse Ventura, and Tiger Chung Lee.

However it was Santana’s feud with Greg “The Hammer” Valentine between 1984 and 1985 that turned out to be one of the most bitter and popular feuds in the company at that time. Santana’s first title reign came to an end at the hands of “The Hammer” as the Seattle native not only took Tito’s belt, but also sidelined him after targeting Santana’s knee. Valentine would then go on a terrific 285 day run with the title and only ended after Santana defeated him in a bloody steel cage match in Baltimore, Maryland after ten months of trying.

Santana’s second reign was ended by Randy Savage in February of 1986 but Tito remained a very popular member of the mid-card for another seven years before his WWE career ended. Santana will not only be remembered for being a tremendous IC champ, but also a guy who spent his WWE career warming crowds all over the globe for guys like Hulk Hogan, Andre The Giant, and The Ultimate Warrior. A true professional through and through, Santana got his much deserved credit when he was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2004.