5 Superstars who were one second away from becoming WWE Champion

#4 James Ellsworth almost became WWE Champion

After impressing Vince McMahon with his performance as an enhancement talent against Braun Strowman in 2016, James Ellsworth returned to WWE television later in the year to play a role in the WWE Championship rivalry between AJ Styles and Dean Ambrose on SmackDown.

In October 2016, Ellsworth defeated Styles in a non-title match after Ambrose abused his power as the special guest referee by attacking “The Phenomenal One”. Daniel Bryan, SmackDown’s General Manager at the time, then informed Ellsworth on Talking Smack that he would challenge for the WWE Championship one week later.

The match was full of shenanigans, as you would expect, with Ambrose providing distractions from ringside throughout the 12-minute encounter.

From the 02:00 mark of WWE’s video above, you can see that there was one stage during the match when Ellsworth took advantage of an Ambrose distraction by causing his opponent to fall face-first into the turnbuckle.

Ellsworth followed up with his No Chin Music superkick but Styles was able to just kick out before the 3-count.

In the end, Styles got himself disqualified by repeatedly punching Ellsworth in the corner of the ring. Two months later, the WWE Champion went on to win a rematch in more convincing fashion, with Ellsworth losing in less than a minute.