Media Park wrote:King of the Ring winners since 2000:
Kurt Angle
Edge
Brock Lesnar
Booker T
William Regal
Sheamus
Aside from Regal, this tournament is for the main eventers really.
Gone are the times when an Owen Hart or Stone Cold were "made" after winning the event, and I don't want to see a tournament where someone like John Cena wins just because he's not involved in the title hunt when the tournament comes around.
Give the King a guaranteed title shot (similar concept to MITB) but make it open only to people who haven't held a world title.
Imagine this:
1. Jinder Mahal
2. Alex Riley
3. Drew McIntyre
4. Kofi Kingston
5. Tyler Reks
6. Brodus Clay
7. Hunico
8. Ted DiBiase
There's your eight-man bracket, the finalists will be wrestling in their third match of the night, will look like real stayers, and boom, stars are born.
Or:
1. Cena
2. Christian
3. Randy Orton
4. CM Punk
5. Sheamus
6. Mark Henry
7. The Miz
8. Chris Jericho
This is obviously more star studded, but who really cares?
MP, those guys you listed weren't main eventers at the time they won.
Angle in 2000 - Three months after dropping the IC & European Titles at WrestleMania 16. Hadn't had a world title match at that stage.
Edge in 2001 - Was still in a tag team with Christian. They used his win to ultimately split them up and Edge went on to win his first IC Title later in the year.
Lesnar in 2002 - Only debuted three months prior. Got pushed quickly after his win, into main event of SummerSlam with The Rock.
It used to be a 16 or 32 man tournament, which they could still do easily with the amount of guys around, even without Punk, Cena, Orton, Bryan, Henry etc (the guys in the world title frames). Someone like a Cody Rhodes could benefit massively from winning it.