Brock Lesnar: 15 Most Memorable Moments in The Beast’s WWE Career

Photo Source: WWE.com

13. Defeating The Rock to Win First World Championship, 2002

Brock Lesnar had been pushed like no superstar before him and only five short months after his explosive television debut, he had been propelled to main event status at the WWE’s second biggest annual pay-per-view event, SummerSlam. Not only that, but he was pitted against the face of the company in 2002 and an era-defining superstar in The Rock. Defeating the biggest name in the WWE and becoming world champion would be a huge endorsement of Lesnar as the future of the organisation.

In a compelling contest and Lesnar’s best match in the company up to that point, “The Next Big Thing” became the youngest world champion in WWE history at only 25 years old. He had eclipsed the record held previously by the man he had just defeated, The Rock. Having taken only 126 days since his debut to become world champion, Lesnar had entrenched himself in the professional wrestling history books and had changed the face of the WWE.

Of course, WWE would do their very best to erase this record following Lesnar’s acrimonious departure from the company in 2004. But, Randy Orton’s first World Heavyweight Championship victory at the age of 24 is rarely remembered with as much clarity as the night that “The Next Big Thing” became the next world champion.