Why Brian Pillman Never Became World Champion

Brian Pillman was a multi-sport athlete who had a huge upside to him. Before coming to WWF he was a part of WCW where Jim Cornette got to know him well and witness the incredible things he could do in the ring.

Cornette recently opened up about Brian Pillman on The Jim Cornette Experience where he explained how Ric Flair loved working with Pillman and saw great potential in him as well. In fact, Flair wanted to drop the WCW World Title to Pillman.

Brian Pillman had a naturally raspy voice thanks to throat surgeries he required when he was younger. Jim Cornette explained how there were plans to injure Brian Pillman’s throat on television.

The plan was for Pillman to remain silent for a few weeks following his injury when it was finally revealed he had childhood issues with his throat. There were also plans for Pillman to work with his tag team partner Tom Zenk and The Midnight Express for this program as well.

“Over the period of time that we would work the program, [Pillman and Zenk] would get their revenge and finally they would trap us in some type of match [against The Midnight Express] where if they won, they would get five minutes with me or Brian did to get even. We would bombard Zenk before the match, take him out of the equation, but Brian would refuse to give up his chance to get revenge and beat both men and they jerk me in and beat me too on a big show such as a pay-per-view or a [Clash of the Champions].”

Things were about to get very serious for Brian Pillman but Cornette went on to explain how former Executive Vice President of WCW Jim Herd decided it wasn’t a good idea to have The Midnight Express in the angle. He also thought the throat angle would make Brian Pillman look too weak.

“But when we did all of the stuff and taped the interviews and came back and that was right after Ric quit his booker and I had quit the booking committee over this. I don’t think Herd wanted The Midnight Express involved in anything, we know that much. [Jim] Barnett’s reason for advising Herd to ix-nay the whole throat angle and just have regular matches and not show the promos was because it would make Brian look weak and we should save that for when he’s working top guys. Barnett knew Herd wanted to hear that so they never did the angle which would have made him into a huge babyface beating the Midnight Express single-handedly and never had the long program with Flair where he would have the belt.”

If those plans would have gone through things would have been very different for The Loose Cannon, Brian Pillman because he would have had an amazing accomplishment by defeating Ric Flair for his prized Championship.