AJ’s “Million Dollar” Ideas

With the resurgence of the Million Dollar Championship, this has me thinking. What would be an actual way to make this work other than getting heat on LA Knight from attacking a legend in Ted DiBiase and continuing a feud with Cameron Grimes? There are a decent amount of ways for the Million Dollar Championship to create some ideas for it’s revival of the typically meaningless championship.

Million Dollars for Nothing

One massive way if you want to portray LA Knight as possibly the top heel of NXT it is quite simply, have him not care of it. We don’t typically see “destruction of championships” in the current era of professional wrestling. The best portrayal of someone not caring for the championship they hold has been Tetsuya Naito and the IWGP Intercontinental Championship. He used to toss the belt high in the sky with no regard for it and resulting in the championship belt chipping, getting scuffed and even at one point, broken in the gold side plating due to throwing it. Why? He got his first G1 Climax Main Event snubbed from him because of the Intercontinental Championship being newer and held by the two best of New Japan at that time in Shinsuke Nakamura and Hiroshi Tanahashi.

Something not seen on WWE Television in a good amount of years is disregarding the Championship. LA Knight is already money on the microphone, mint in the ring and looks like… well… A million dollars. He doesn’t need a championship to show that off, he can do it with his charisma and charm alone and after losing the chance to become a number one contender for the North American Champion, why should he care for this title. A program after doing away with Cameron Grimes might show the cocky powerhouse have himself above the championship. It’s a long shot but, it’s something that can be tempted with since fans have been thinking things are “stale”.

Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is

Now the opposite of the first idea is actually instating the championship as an official championship, almost like making it the workhorse championship. We usually hear the “workhorse championship” moniker with the WWE Intercontinental Championship. For everyone that thinks LA Knight is just a jerk or too cocky to the bubble that has only seen LA Knight and not Eli Drake or Shaun Ricker, this way could show the crowd he can actually go and could even have him slowly transition to a babyface role down the line. Granted, the current tag team champions in MSK and North American Champion, Bronson Reed are doing good as babyface champions, the top prize is still in the hands of a chaotic and destructive Karrion Kross with the NXT Championship.

Maybe showing that Knight can go and build himself as the one that can turn heads and take the NXT Championship away from Kross possibly. Doesn’t have to be LA Knight, of course, if he loses it to Cameron Grimes or someone else down the line, they can show they can step up to Kross since there seems to be no end in sight of his reign.

…that is unless they want to go with the next idea.

Buy Your Way To The Main Event

The main roster already has their version of getting a potential championship opportunity with the Money In The Bank briefcase. Why not make the Million Dollar Championship an equal to that? Yes, I’m talking about the Million Dollar Champion, who was in TNA/IMPACT Wrestling doing something with the championship to the current NXT Champion, also a former TNA/IMPACT Wrestling talent doing a TNA/IMPACT idea, especially with Samoa Joe taking a slight managerial role in NXT and one of the bigger named alumni of TNA/IMPACT Wrestling.

I’m talking, of course, of Option C.

Option C, for those they may not know, was an idea made by the Hogan times of TNA when then X Division Champion, Austin Aries, wanted to vacate his championship so in exchange he can have a match against the World Heavyweight Champion, who at the time was Bobby Roode in the company’s longest reign with the championship. It helped put the X Division Championship in it’s premier match type with Ultimate X Match, which are always exciting and Austin Aries would defeat Roode to be World Champion in the main event.

Now that I explained, it’s simple for this. You want to make the card special for this type of an idea? The champion exchanges the Million Dollar Championship, after defending it for an amount of time or an amount of matches, for an opportunity to face the NXT Champion… make the event War Games or one of the TakeOvers before a Big Four for the Main Roster. You will have all eyes on the championship match and if it’s at War Games, the sole survivor or surviving team can have a true claim to the championship. The Million Dollar Championship becomes a fixture in NXT for a “Million Dollar Opportunity”.

The Gold Brand Grand Slam

You can already guess what I mean by this but if not, allow me to explain. 

Since 1992, anyone who has had a reign with the World, Intercontinental, a Tag Team and either United States/European Championship (depending on the format and era) is deemed a Grand Slam Champion. Shawn Michaels was the first one to do so and it’s been somewhat of an impressive feat in each major wrestling company since. Since Bayley won every women’s championship in WWE, she was called the first Women’s Grand Slam Champ with Charlotte, Asuka and Sasha Banks following suit. NXT however, is different.

Not counting the Cruiserweight due to the limitations of maintaining a weight of 205 pounds, NXT proper (since not many can go to the UK right now) realistically has three championships among it’s ranks. The NXT, The North American and Tag Team Championships and there are only two wrestlers with the title of NXT Triple Crown Champion, Johnny Gargano and Adam Cole.

With a fourth title to come into the mix, that might tempt the forever cocky Adam Cole to go for more gold or maybe even Johnny finds his Way to a championship reign. The ongoing saying since the attitude era is, “Everyone wants to be the next Shawn Michaels.” What better way then doing something that HBK did on then WWF programming and winning the four championships to make yourself the NXT Grand Slam Champion?

Those are my fun little ways to actually put eyes on the Million Dollar Championship. Often the “joke” championship, it can do a lot in the confines of NXT and make something out of nothing. Maybe I’m just being hopeful, maybe I’m just being a dummy (YEAHHHH!) but hey… we want to try to make wrestling exciting, right? Gotta do as our saying says. “Always Use Your Head.”