Original Plans For Surprise Intercontinental Title Change In 2019

It would be a different way to go. While not the top championship in the company, the WWE Intercontinental Title has one of the deepest and more important legacies in all of wrestling. The title has been considered the workers’ title for most of its forty plus year existence and holding it is quite the honor. One surprising wrestler claims he was supposed to join the list.

Every now and then, you find a pairing in wrestling that just works. Two people are put together and find some success that wouldn’t have been expected. That was the case with Bobby Lashley and Lio Rush, who fit together incredibly well with Rush as the annoying hype man and Lashley as the unstoppable monster. It worked well enough for Lashley to become Intercontinental Champion, but it was almost the other way around.

According to Fightful.com by way of Ringsidenews.com, Rush was scheduled to defeat Finn Balor to win the Intercontinental Title. This did not wind up being the case as Rush never won the title, though Rush does not remember why it was not the case. Rush was involved in a handicap match with Lashley where Balor defeated them to win the title and later challenged Balor for the title on the February 25, 2019 Monday Night Raw. Rush was released from WWE as part of the April 15 roster cuts.

The two worked well together. Check out Rush and Lashley’s teamwork:

Opinion: This is hardly a ridiculous idea. Look at Sami Zayn as the Intercontinental Champion. He is presented as someone who can take care of himself but mainly hides behind Cesaro and Shinsuke Nakamura. Is that really so different than the idea of Rush holding the title while Lashley is right there? It makes sense and I could see WWE going in the direction, though it’s a bit odd that Rush can’t remember why it didn’t happen.

Would you like liked to see this? Will Rush ever wrestle for WWE again? Let us know in the comments below.

Thomas Hall has been a wrestling fan for over thirty years and has seen over 50,000 wrestling matches. He has also been a wrestling reviewer since 2009 with over 5,000 full shows covered. You can find his work at kbwrestlingreviews.com, or check out his- Amazon author page with 30 wrestling books. Get the latest and greatest in professional wrestling news by signing up for our daily email newsletter. Just look below for “GET EXCLUSIVE UPDATES” to sign up. Thank you for reading!