Top 20 worst world title changes in wrestling history

3. Shawn Michaels def. Bret Hart: Survivor Series 1997

Remember a few entries ago when I said that Bret Hart should have learned his lesson? This is obviously what I was talking about. To this day, the Montreal Screwjob stands as the most controversial night in wrestling history and the sad thing is that it all could have been avoided. But it didn’t and the wrestling world is actually better for it.

We all know the story here. Bret Hart had signed a massive deal with WCW and was leaving WWE after 12 years. The problem here was that Bret was the WWE Champion and Vince McMahon obviously wanted him to drop the belt as I’m sure he feared another Alundra Blayze/Madusa incident. Okay, no problem. Hart was set to face his archrival, Shawn Michaels at Survivor Series in Montreal and he would just drop the title there. Okay, now there’s a problem. Hart despised Michaels. Once friends, the relationship between the two had gone sour and Hart said that there was no chance in hell that he would lose in Canada to Shawn Michaels. He had no problem dropping the title but he wasn’t going to drop it to HBK. He said he would surrender it on RAW or drop it to someone else. But not that guy and not that night. That didn’t sit very well with Vince.

Vince tried everything to get Bret to agree to drop the title in Montreal but Bret wouldn’t do business so Triple H (he was advising even then) told Vince to do business for him and that’s exactly what happened. Match starts, match continues, Shawn locks Bret in the Sharpshooter, Hebner calls for the bell and we get a new WWE Champion.

I do have to give Shawn credit for looking surprised and angry but he did make sure to grab that belt on his way out, didn’t he? It was a bad situation but some good did come from it. Without the Montreal Screwjob, we likely don’t get the Mr. McMahon character, meaning we don’t get the feud with Austin and maybe we don’t get the Attitude Era at all. It’s crazy to think about but it’s true. And honestly, I’m going to go on record here and say that I’m on Vince’s side in this whole thing. Bret knew what it was like to go through someone not wanting to drop the title to him before leaving the company and then turned around and did the exact same thing. So yes, I really do believe that Bret really did screw Bret.