25 best WWE Intercontinental Champions of all time

19. Jeff Hardy

Jeff Hardy may always be known as more of a tag team specialist and one of the biggest risk-takers in WWE history but he had quite a run as a singles star and held the Intercontinental Championship on four different occasions, totaling 327 days. He won it the first time on an April 2001 episode of Smackdown by defeating Triple H after he, Matt and Lita had battled The Game, Stephanie McMahon and Stone Cold Steve Austin the previous night on RAW. Austin and Steph weren’t around and Matt came out to blast the Cerebral Assassin with a chair, thus allowing his brother to hit the Swanton Bomb for the win. Unfortunately, the first reign wouldn’t last long as Triple H would win it back four days later on RAW.

Jeff would win the European title but lost the unification match to Rob Van Dam and would spend three years away from WWE after being released in 2003.

Upon his return to the company in 2006, Jeff was given a nice push and won his second Intercontinental Championship about six weeks into his comeback, beating Johnny Nitro on RAW after failing in his first couple of attempts. He would hold the title for five weeks before dropping it back to Nitro but would regain it just a week later in the rematch. This reign would last 98 days with Hardy successfully defending his title on numerous occasions until running into the Samoan Bulldozer, Umaga, who took the title from Hardy on RAW, the same night he was announced as Mr. McMahon’s representative in the “Battle of the Billionaires” match at WrestleMania 23. After a failed attempt at regaining the title that summer, Hardy finally got past his bigger opponent in September, winning the belt for the fourth time and holding it for more than six months before dropping it to Chris Jericho, mainly due to the fact that he got suspended for 60 days for his second violation of the Wellness Policy.