Watch the Throne: Ranking Every King of the Ring Winner

#4 Edge, 2001 King of the Ring

Cakes and trophies: two things in wrestling which will ultimately spell doom for someone

Edge's King of the Ring crown came at a pivotal point in his career. Two months prior, he and Christian had left WrestleMania X-Seven tag team champions yet again, having survived TLC II and set a new standard for stadium spotfests. There really wasn't much of anything left for the future Rocketstrappers to accomplish as a duo, and both men were gaining enough steam that they could be viable draws as solo competitors.

King of the Ring 2001 threw gasoline onto a spark of jealousy from Christian, who was noticing that Edge was getting the better reactions and more focus from the company; Team ECK (Edge, Christian, and Kurt Angle) made up three fourths of the semifinal round, with the fourth competitor being E&C's muscle on the outside of the ring, Rhyno. As part of his feud with Angle, Shane McMahon finagled the Angle/Christian matchup to ensure that Angle had at least one more match to wear him out before the epic street fight most people remember this show for.

Pictured: Christian showing how "totally okay" he is with Edge being King

McMahon and Christian both interfered in the finals pitting Edge against Angle, McMahon intentionally costing Angle the crown, and Christian seeming to try his hardest to play helper to his best friend but inadvertently distracting the referee from a surefire pinfall; in the end, the Edgemeister was able to prevent Angle from becoming the first-ever two-time King, pinning him after a Shane McMahon spear set up an Edgecution.

His Career After King of the Ring

Again, King of the Ring was the gasoline that, when combined with Christian's spark of jealousy, led to the destruction and downfall of Edge and Christian's partnership. The InVasion storyline that followed this show added new wrinkles, seeing Edge capture both WWF and WCW singles titles, and Christian's envy just continued to boil throughout the summer, leading the future Captain Charisma to betray his best friend and join The Alliance.

King of the Ring both proved the viability of Edge as a singles competitor and provided the storyline justification for it to happen. His split with Christian was cemented with a match at Unforgiven, where Christian took Edge's Intercontinental Championship, and Edge stayed mostly in singles competition from then on, save for short-lived teams with Rey Mysterio (allowing Edge to participate in 2002's highest-rated match), Chris Benoit, and Hulk Hogan, with each man giving Edge another reign as tag team champion.

The breakup that King of the Ring caused helped propel Edge's career forward

Edge was already a highly-decorated tag team champion before King of the Ring, but added dozens more at every level of competition afterward (which could have been even higher had injuries not intervened); King of the Ring brought Edge to a new level and helped transform him into the future Hall of Fame singles star.