5 of Randy Orton's best babyface moments in his WWE career

Randy Orton is a WWE Superstar who divides opinion more than most others. In his 15-year WWE career, The Viper's time as a heel has often been praised, but his stints as a babyface have often been criticised for being boring.

Funnily enough, Orton's comments last week on Edge and Christian's Podcast show us that he hates being a babyface just as much as the hardcore base of the WWE Universe hate him being one. We know Orton is a natural heel and that's what he should be most of the time,

Despite his babyface character being lacklustre sometimes, I do believe Orton has had some great moments as a protagonist. In this feature, we take a look at Orton's five best moments as a babyface.

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#1 Orton turns on Legacy - 2010

Near the end of 2008, Randy Orton formed the heel faction known as Legacy, with Cody Rhodes and Ted DiBiase Jr. (let's forget about Manu). Orton was the leader of the group, mentoring Rhodes and DiBiase, who he used as his henchman.

The group made a lot of sense, because the three men were all third-generation Superstars, and had that in common.

In 2009, Orton won multiple WWE titles with the help of Rhodes and DiBiase and they feuded famously with the McMahons and Triple H, and the trio obviously became successful very quickly.

However, tensions would soon arise within the group in late 2009 and at the start of 2010, as mistakes by Rhodes and DiBiase cost Orton some of his matches. This angered Orton, and eventually after the Elimination Chamber 2010 in February, Orton turned on them during a six-man tag team match, DDT-ing Rhodes and RKO-ing DiBiase.

This was a big moment because it was Orton's first face turn since 2004 and it was the start of what would become a three-year face run. At the time we were all very excited to see "The Viper "make the change from villain to hero because he had been a heel for so long at that stage.

#2 Becoming WWE Champion after a Six-Pack Challenge at Night of Champions 2010

Orton won a stacked match to become WWE Champion

When Randy Orton started his three-year babyface run in February 2010, WWE needed to be quick about making his babyface character look just as strong as his old heel persona did, and a big championship victory sounded like the right idea to legitimise Orton as a face.

Even though Orton turned face whilst holding the World Heavyweight Championship for a month in 2004, Orton had never won a major title as a babyface.

In the summer of 2010, Sheamus was WWE Champion for the second time after winning the gold at the Fatal 4-Way PPV in a Fatal 4-way match with John Cena, Edge and Randy Orton. Leading up to SummerSlam, Orton entered a singles feud against the Celtic Warrior after winning a triple threat No. 1 Contender's match, Edge and Chris Jericho the two men who Orton faced and defeated.

Unfortunately, at the SummerSlam show, Orton failed to win the championship after only beating Sheamus by DQ when the Champion purposely hit a low blow on Randy.

However, all hopes for The Viper's first big championship victory as a babyface was not lost. Orton was included in the WWE Championship Six-Pack Challenge Elimination match at the Night Of Champion's PPV a month later with Sheamus (c), Chris Jericho, Edge, Wade Barrett and John Cena. After Jericho, Edge, Cena and Barrett were eliminated, Orton and Sheamus were left to fight it out again.

When Sheamus went for a Celtic Cross after Orton kicked out of a Brogue Kick, Randy climbed down, hit an RKO and became the WWE Champion. There was a huge fan pop as Orton won and it cemented the start of Randy's new side in the most impressive way possible.

#3 2011 Feud with Christian for the World Heavyweight Championship

In 2011, Christian won the World Heavyweight Championship after his real-life best friend Edge, one of the greatest WWE Superstars of all time, had to vacate his title and retire due to neck problems.

Despite Christian being so close to Edge, this curse was his blessing, because after so many years of being deprived of a World Championship reign, WWE knew that fans would love to see "Captain Charisma" avenge his best friend's real-life misery. Therefore they cashed in on a money-making opportunity by making Christian the World Heavyweight Champion at the Extreme Rules PPV by defeating Alberto Del Rio in a ladder match.

However, Christian lost the title after only two nights, in a match on a SmackDown against the man at the centre of this article, Randy Orton. This was thought of as a bad move on WWE's part, especially because fans had waited so long to see him become a World Champion, and to have his first World Title reign be so short was a bit of a joke.

The feud that would take place between Orton and Christian was so amazing that it made their bad move look good. Let's talk about the feud of the year below.

Both Orton and Christian were faces as the feud began, but Christian turned heel by attacking Orton with the World title belt after he was Special Guest Referee for The Viper's title match against Sheamus on an episode of SmackDown.

At the Over the Limit PPV in May, Orton retained his title against Christian in what was a great match with both men at their best, specifically Orton, who has been accused of sometimes being lazy in the ring. Then at Capital Punishment in June, the same result was witnessed.

Fortunately, the feud continued despite Orton beating Christian two times in a row. At Money in the Bank, the stakes were raised, because the stipulation was added that if Randy Orton got disqualified, Christian would win the Championship (i.e, no champ's advantage). And, this came in to play, as when Christian spat in Randy's face just as an RKO was coming, Orton lost his temper and low-blowed Christian, and Christian won the title as Orton was disqualified.

This was great because it furthered Christian as a heel who will resort to the nastiest tricks possible in order to win and it furthered support for Orton.

The blowoff PPV match in the feud then took place between the two at the second biggest PPV of the Wrestling year, SummerSlam. Orton was vying to get the title back, whilst Christian was trying to do anything and everything to keep it away from the Viper's grasp, without any morals. This time, the match at Summerslam was going to be No Hold's Barred, and now Christian was the one who had no champion's advantage.

The match outdid expectations, and it definitely was fitting of a grudge match. When all was said and done, Orton defeated Christian after an RKO onto a pair of steel stairs in the ring. Orton was World Heavyweight Champion again!

Orton faced Christian one last time to end this feud on an episode of SmackDown soon after SummerSlam, beating him again, this time inside of a Steel Cage. It was quite unfortunate that the feud ever had to end, because the WWE Universe loved.

This rivalry was truly flawless, and I think most fans would agree with me when I say that this was Randy Orton's greatest feud in his whole career; even better than his feuds when he was the heel.

#4 Cover star of the WWE '12 video game

Randy Orton know for his bad boy personality even in his real life, it was a really big moment in Orton's career when in 2011, WWE chose him as the cover star of the WWE'12 video game. The Viper has had many controversial moments in his careers, such as backstage tantrums and suspensions, so for him to be picked as the cover star of the video game showed the trust that the WWE put in him as a role model.

Just look at the people who have been the cover stars for WWE since - CM Punk for WWE'13, The Rock for WWE 2K14, John Cena for WWE 2K15, Stone Cold Steve Austin for WWE 2K16, Brock Lesnar for WWE 2K17 and Seth Rollins for WWE 2K18. These are all Superstars that WWE held in high regard at the time of the video game release.

It is a very prestigious role to be given, and WWE obviously believed Orton had become very popular since his babyface turn back in 2010, otherwise, they wouldn't have thought he was a big enough draw to sell the game. Also, it is obviously a role that requires responsibility, especially since kids are the primary market for video games, so that says a lot too.

WWE'12 sold nearly 1 million copies of the game before the end of 2011, which at the time, was a record for wrestling video games. This is a testament to Orton's drawing powers.

This was a huge step in showing that Orton's babyface skills had come a long way in just a year and a half.

#5 His WrestleMania feud with Seth Rollins

Orton's feud with Seth Rollins played out so well for both men

Randy Orton turned heel by aligning himself with The Authority in August of 2013 at SummerSlam, after Triple H and The Viper screwed Daniel Bryan out of the WWE Championship, hence Orton became WWE Champion. Orton eventually lost the WWE World Heavyweight title to Bryan eight months later in the triple threat main event of WrestleMania 30 which also involved Batista.

"The Viper" would soon become the second fiddle in the Authority when Seth Rollins turned his back on The Shield and also aligned himself with The Authority. After Rollins won the Money in the Bank Briefcase in June of 2014, signs of tension between the men were planted within Authority segments by the WWE, because The Authority were now more focused on helping Rollins get the World Title than Orton regain it.

In October of that year, the dislike the two had for one another reached a boiling point, and after Orton, Rollins and Kane won a 3-on-2 handicap match against John Cena and Dean Ambrose on Raw, Rollins attacked Orton with a Curb Stomp. The next week on Raw saw Orton go against the wishes of The Authority as he RKO'd Rollins in revenge for the previous week, which was the start of another face turn by The Viper.

In the coming weeks, The Authority tried to keep on the good side of Orton by granting his request for a match against Seth. Rollins would win the match, but Orton confirmed his face turn after the match by ambushing The Authority.

However, The Viper's ambush was unsuccessful, as Rollins ended up Curb Stomping his head onto the steel steps. This lead to Orton missing five months of action, which was WWE's way of writing him off TV for a few months as he filmed the Condemned 2.

At the FastLane PPV in February 2015, Authority members Rollins, Big Show and Kane won a six-man tag team match against Erick Rowan, Ryback and Dolph Ziggler and proceeded to attack their opponents after the match. The assault was soon stopped though as Orton made his return and pounced on the Authority with RKO's on Kane, Jamie Noble and Joey Mercury, but Rollins quickly escaped the ring to avoid the Viper's venomous vengeance.

The next two episodes of Raw saw Rollins and The Authority trying to get Randy to calm down and rejoin the faction despite all that happened. But Orton only played along with their wishes for a while before finally revealing his true intentions to destroy them by viciously laying waste to Rollins after they faced Roman Reigns in a 2-on-1 handicap and lost.

On the 16th of March episode of Raw, it was made official that Orton and Rollins would face each other in a singles match at WrestleMania 31, much to the excitement of the WWE Universe.

At the event on March 29th, the best wrestling match on the WM card and one of the finest matches of Orton's career saw him defeat Rollins, and what a finish to the match we witnessed! When Seth went for a curb stomp, Randy Orton turned it into a mid-air RKO, which got him a great reaction.

Later that night, Rollins cashed-in his Money in the Bank contract during the Lesnar v Reigns WWE World Title main event and won the title after Curb Stomping Reigns. It was amazing booking by WWE, because he didn't need to beat Orton earlier on in the night as he was going strong anyway when they had him become the World Champ.

Despite WrestleMania ending, the feud known as The Face (Orton) against The Future (Rollins) did not, as Orton won a triple threat number one contender's match to earn the right to a Title match against Rollins at the Extreme Rules PPV. Rollins managed to beat Orton inside of a Steel Cage at the PPV after much interference from The Authority (Kane and J + J Security).

Looking back, this is the last meaningful feud that Randy Orton has had, face or heel. Rollins' style seemed to go along well with Orton and WWE built up to their match at WrestleMania really well with the slow face turn of Orton. WWE creative need to look back at this rivalry too, because they should take their time developing stories like they did in this case more often. Rollins was a great heel to make Orton the popular babyface again.