Ted DiBiase Sr. has no issue with never being the official WWE World Champion, as he was never promised a run with the gold.
After a brief run in the WWWF in the late 1970s, DiBiase would return as the Million Dollar Man in 1987 and would remain with the company until 1996.
Speaking during the inaugural episode of his “Everybody’s Got A Pod” podcast, DiBiase spoke about never becoming WWE’s top star. He said,
“I don’t think that I ever heard him say ‘I think you could be the champion… Even the world champion isn’t really the world champion. Because it’s a show. It’s a story. We’re telling a story. For me, the way I always looked at it was if I’m going to be a heel, I’m going to be a top guy. The most important thing is being over and making the crowd hate me as much as I possibly could…I saw where Vince was taking wrestling.
“Getting over for me was more important than having a belt.”
While DiBiase never officially won the title, he did capture the gold in controversial fashion in 1988.
The story was that DiBiase had paid someone to have surgery to resemble referee Brian Hebner (actually played by Earl Hebner) and cost Hulk Hogan the match during a title defense against Andre the Giant.
Andre sold the title to DiBiase, whose reign was later nullified, leading to Ted creating the Million Dollar Championship.