Highlights

• Honky Tonk Man's record-setting reign as Intercontinental Champion was overrated and lacked quality. The length of his reign does not reflect its actual worth.
• Honky Tonk Man was not WWE's first choice for the Intercontinental Champion and was seen as an odd fit for the role. He only became champion because Butch Reed messed up his opportunity.
• Honky Tonk Man's feuds and matches during his reign were underwhelming. His opponents were not of high caliber, and he relied on cheating or cheap finishes to win matches. The poor match quality affected the prestige of the title.

For nearly four decades, the Honky Tonk Man was the longest reigning Intercontinental Champion of all time, and much of his legacy in the WWE is built around that. With Gunther recently breaking his record as the longest reigning champ ever, it is now time to stop pretending that the Honky Tonk Man’s reign with the gold was even remotely good. The length of the run with the gold doesn’t reflect on its quality, and when looking back at the time Honky Tonk Man spent with the title, it is safe to say it is one of the most insanely overrated of all time.

Honky Tonk Man Wasn’t WWE’s First Choice To Be Intercontinental Champion

The Honky Tonk Man was never a top tier performer, and putting the “workhorse” title around his waist was a little bit of an oddity for sure given that he never had a classic match. In fact, it was never in WWE’s plans for him to be champion in the first place, with him stepping into the role due to WWE wanting the belt off Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat. Butch Reed was supposed to get this spot, but as noted in an interview with Slick on the 80s Wrestling Podcast, “Butch messed it up. I can’t put it on Vince. I can’t put it on Pat Patterson. I have to put it solely on where it lies. Butch messed it up. Butch was the kind of guy that he didn’t care. He didn’t have a ride to a town, he would just sit in the lobby until somebody said, ‘Well c’mon, I’ll take you.’ There would be things like that he would do and so they kind of grew sour on him. I really regret it because he would have been a great champion and a great performer.” (H/T WrestlingNews.Co)

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Honky Tonk Man would win the Intercontinental Title on an episode of WWE Superstars, winning the belt in just 3 minutes in an incredibly underwhelming title change. He cheated his way to victory, and this set a precedent for the rest of his stint with the belt. From there, Honky Tonk Man was only supposed to be a transitional champion, but due to Jake Roberts’ substance abuse issues, Honky kept the belt. The fact that WWE never planned for Honky to have such a ridiculously long reign just goes to show that he wasn’t the right fit for the role in truth.

Honky Tonk Man’s Feuds Were Underwhelming

The most notable feuds of Honky’s reign included rivals such as “Macho Man” Randy Savage and Brutus “The Barber” Beefcake, but neither of these were all that good. Matches with Beefcake were completely underwhelming, and even though the content of the feud wasn’t awful, it didn’t set the world alight. In terms of his matches with Savage, they all ended in countout, disqualification, or just downright cheating.

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Honky got through his title defenses exclusively like this, not winning matches clean against the majority of his opponents, who included Bruno Sammartino, George “The Animal” Steele, Hillbilly Jim, and more. The overall caliber of his opponents weren’t exactly great either in truth, which made the manner of wins even less impressive. If this happened in today’s WWE, fans would no doubt lose all interest. This went on for over a year and it was very jarring. The belt lost some prestige due to the poor quality of matches and cheap finishes. This “legendary” reign was not even close to being worthy of that description.

The Match Quality Of Honky Tonk Man’s Intercontinental Championship Reign Was Bad

When it comes to the legacy of Honky’s IC Title reign, it didn’t exactly benefit anyone either. In fact, his loss of the gold just went to show how poorly he was viewed by WWE, as he lost in 30 seconds to The Ultimate Warrior at SummerSlam 1988. Warrior beating Honky was a nice moment, but it didn’t feel like an especially special victory over an unbeatable champion, it was more of a “thank god that’s over” feeling.

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If you compare Honky’s reign to most, it falls below in quality. Looking at Gunther’s record-breaking reign, which includes classics and five-star matches against top names in Sheamus, Drew McIntyre, Rey Mysterio, Matt Riddle, Chad Gable, Braun Strowman, and Shinsuke Nakamura, it tells you all you need to know about the enormous difference in quality. There are so many champions with reigns of less length such as The Miz, Chris Jericho, Shawn Michaels, Bret Hart, and even Santino Marella had a more entertaining run with the belt than someone who is supposedly amongst the greatest champs. He was such a weakly booked champion who could hardly win a match properly, and even for a heel champion, it just wasn’t very good.