25 best WWE Intercontinental Champions of all time

13. The Rock

Just like Don Muraco, The Rock was also a two-time Intercontinental Champion, but unlike Muraco, The Rock used his reigns as a stepping stone to bigger and better things, ultimately becoming one of the most popular WWE superstars of all time. After having his first match at the 1996 Survivor Series pay-per-view event as part of the team that also included Marc Mero, Jake “The Snake” Roberts and Barry Windham, who was using that awful gimmick of The Stalker at that point, The Rock, who was still going by Rocky Maivia at the time, quickly found success as he defeated then-champion Triple H on a Thursday night episode of Monday Night RAW (I know it doesn’t make any sense but just run with it) less than three months after his debut. He held the title for 74 days, defeating Triple H in the rematch at In Your House 13 and also winning his WrestleMania debut against The Sultan, which was one of the numerous gimmicks of Rikishi. He lost the title to Owen Hart on the April 28, 1997 edition of RAW and shortly after suffered a knee injury against Mick Foley, which is probably the best thing that ever happened to him.

He came back in August of 1997 as the character we know him as today, speaking in the third person and throwing insults around and everything else that comes with watching Dwayne work. Owen Hart and Stone Cold Steve Austin a couple of times before The Rock got back into the title picture and he got a chance to win it from Austin, which obviously kicked off one of the biggest rivalries in history, at the DX In Your House event but Stone Cold beat him pretty quickly. The next night on RAW, Vince McMahon ordered a rematch but seeing as Austin was on a path that led him to the WWE Championship, he forfeited the title and just threw in a river. So The Rock’s second IC title win wasn’t the greatest thing in the world (it was entertaining though) but him taking over The Nation of Domination that same night was pretty solid and the 265 days he then spent as Intercontinental Champion were very good as well. After battling Faarooq for a while, he once again got into it with Triple H, which led to a fantastic program which saw The Game win the title back at SummerSlam in 1998.

The Rock would go on to win the WWE Championship just a few months later at Survivor Series.