2016 PWI Top 500 with Roman Reigns as #1? Check out my list.

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My name is Aiden Cherry, and I’ve been watching wrestling since 2007, when I was flipping thru channels and was greeted by Kane (in a burger king costume) chokeslamming then World Heavyweight Champion, Edge. Wrestling is an art form that gets you invested in characters and stories, and it’s an art form that needs to be shared. That’s why I’m glad to be writing for The Wrestling Classic, so I can share my love for professional wrestling with you.

A few weeks ago, PWI released this year’s top 500, and the internet simultaneously nose-dived thru the nearest window. This was the result of seeing that The Big Dog, The Guy, The Antichrist of Wrestling himself, Roman Reigns had landed himself a spot on both the magazine cover and #1 spot.

“He’s nowhere close to #1.” “How much did WWE pay them?” “The guy that made the list was high.”
All of these statements/questions are legitimately things I’ve seen online in reaction to Reigns seizing the number one spot. But what they all failed to realize is that PWI’s list isn’t based on in-ring skill alone. The list is based on several different categories: championship wins, in-ring ability, prominence is one’s company, and win-loss record.

Knowing this, I decided to see if The Guy with the wettest hair had earned that spot at the top of the list. So five word docs, multiple days, and about ten thousand google searches later, I’ve made a list basd on PWI’s categories.

Unfortunately, I made the list using only the current WWE main roster, as while I do watch other promotions, I don’t watch them enough to fairly compare them to WWE’s roster. So for all I know, Kenny Omega, Matanza, or Jay Lethal may rank above my number one spot when using the same criteria.

To make this list, I ranked the entire main roster (as of 9/8/15) in championship wins, win-loss record, in-ring skill, and relevance within WWE TV. I gave the top guy in each category a 1, the guy after a 2, and so on (if he had no championship wins, he got a 15 in that category). I averaged their four numbers, and ranked them with the average number to get the final order (lower the number, better the ranking). Due to the system I used to rank them, some guys tied, and will be displayed on the list like this:
Name 1/Name 2- average #
The list will have the name, followed by the average number they got from the four categories. Also, guys that were injured for part of 2016 are a little disadvantaged because of the win-loss category.

45. Jinder Mahal – 40
44. Konnor – 38.75
43. Erick Rowan/Viktor – 38.5
42. Bo Dallas – 38.25
41. Big Show – 37.5
40. Rhyno – 35.25
39. Mark Henry – 35
38. Darren Young/Kane – 33.75
37. Fandango – 33.5
36. Goldust/Titus O’Neil/Primo/Epico – 33.25
35. Curtis Axel – 33
34. R-Truth – 31.75
33. Sin Cara/Aiden English – 30.5
32. Mojo Rawley – 29.75
31. Braun Strowman – 29.5
30. Jack Swagger – 28.75
29. Enzo Amore – 28
28. Tyler Breeze – 27.75
27. Big Cass – 26.75
26. Brock Lesnar/The Miz – 22.5
25. John Cena – 22.25
24. Dolph Ziggler – 21.5
23. Luke Gallows – 21.25
22. Randy Orton – 21
21. Zack Ryder – 20.75
20. Jimmy Uso – 20.5
19. Baron Corbin – 20.25
18. Neville – 19.75
17. Sheamus/Jey Uso – 19.5
16. Kalisto – 19
15. Bray Wyatt – 18.75
14. Karl Anderson – 18.25
13. Jason Jordan – 17
12. Chad Gable – 16.5
11. Apollo Crews – 15.75
10. Cesaro/Finn Balor – 14.75
9. Seth Rollins – 13.25
8. Xavier Woods – 12.5
7. Sami Zayn – 11.75
6. Dean Ambrose – 11.25
5. Chris Jericho – 11
4. Kofi Kingston/Roman Reigns – 10.75
3. Big E/Rusev – 10
2. Kevin Owens – 6.25
1. AJ Styles – 5.5

What do you guys think? Do you think this list is more efficient than the PWI list when it comes to the WWE roster?