FanPost

Roman Reigns and the WWE have failed each other:

Roman Reigns and the WWE have failed each other:

At some point fans who like Roman Reigns and want him to be the top star in WWE need to admit the problem is not creative but simply the man himself. This is not a hate piece on Roman Reigns, on a personal level I am sure he is a good family man, hard worker etc and on a professional level he has shown vast improvement within the ring, year on year (Reigns 2016 ten times better than 2015 Reigns who was ten times better than 2014 Reigns). Roman Reigns as an in ring performer compared to John Cena in 2004/2005 is like comparing HBK at his peak with the Great Khali. John Cena was a terrible in ring performer back then. Reigns’s in ring work is not the problem, Cena rose to the top in a period when the roster had HBK, Angle, Rey Mysterio, Edge, Jericho, Christian, Shelton Benjamin, Eddie Guerrero etc. So the argument that fans are only rejecting Reigns because other wrestlers are better than him does not hold true.

Roman Reigns has received the most protective booking of any performer in recent history maybe even dating back to Brock Lesnar in 2002. There is nothing wrong with this. It is good planning on behalf of the WWE. The WWE should protect and support those who they consider to be franchise players. Even with the protective booking Reigns had received he is still not a top star, let alone a megastar on the Cena/Rock/Austin/Hogan etc level. Let us look at the favourable booking (which again there is nothing wrong with, they should be supporting those they considered to be the future).

The Shield:

Debuts as part of the Shield, Reigns got to learn from Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins and all the top guys they competed against from Randy Orton, Daniel Byran, Sheamus, Kane, Undertaker, Big Show, Y2J, Cena and Evolution to name but a few top guys they wrestled and defeated. The Shield was kept undefeated for nearly a year; they were booked strongly and rarely lost even after their first defeat. Reigns was presented as the star performer, he got the hot tag and ran wild. Reigns got to break the record for most eliminations in the 2014 Rumble match and eliminate Rollins and Ambrose. Again there is nothing wrong with this.

After the Shield finished their feud with Evolution (in the two matches Reigns scored the win by pinning Batista and eliminating the final man HHH) they were then broken up. This is where fans think the WWE began failing Roman Reigns. When in reality this is where Roman started faltering. If the Shield had stayed together bar a repeat feud with Wyatt’s, there was no one left for them to wrestle. They had gone through every one. Rather than have the Shield wrestle mid carders and lose their steam. The WWE broke them up at the height of their popularity and success. If they had waited and then broke them up, fans who like Reigns would blame Reigns losing his popularity when they became singles stars on WWE putting them back in the mid card after wrestling and defeating main eventers.

Post Shield Reigns:

Fans who like Reigns blame the WWE for not handling his first few months right after the Shield split. They point to his keeping of the Shield entrance and ring gear and being pushed straight to the main event as to why his popularity dissipated. The WWE allowed Reigns to keep an over entrance and his ring gear. If they had changed it fans would blame the change in his presentation as to why he lost his popularity. The WWE placed him straight in the main event unlike Ambrose and Rollins because they wanted fans to know this guy was special. He was more important than the other two. This is why Reigns is in with Cena and Orton for the first couple of months after the Shield break up. The WWE was presenting him as a star on their level. If they had waited and placed him in the mid card, fans of Reigns would blame the WWE for squandering his popularity and merely presenting him as another mid carder rather than as a star straight out of the blocks.

The Injury

Roman Reigns popularity did not suffer a major blow due to his hernia injury. He was already losing his reactions. This why is he was being placed in the opening matches on raw early on in his singles run because the opening match usually has good heat. Roman fans point to the satellite interviews as a major flaw in the WWE’s handing of him. But the WWE did the Reigns interviews via Satellite to remind fans of Reigns, they did not want Reigns to slip from people mind’s. When Austin got his neck surgery they had interviews between him (in a neck brace) and J.R. to let people know how he was getting on. The WWE treated Reigns as top star during his injury and heavily hyped up his return. Compare the way they treated him during his injury and his return to their treatment of Daniel Bryan. Again there is nothing wrong with this, the WWE did the right thing because for them Reigns is a franchise player unlike Bryan.

Post Injury leading into Royal Rumble:

Outside of chaotic situations Reigns did not get good reactions, period. Reigns strives in chaos but all individuals succeed in chaos, the hard part in getting reactions from doing basic things like promos and simple matches. Reigns fans point out the WWE hurt him with terribly written promos. There is no doubt that those were terribly written let alone terribly said promos but those promos are what the WWE considers to be required for a top guy. Look at the WWE's portrayal of Sheamus as good for evidence of this. He was an inferior Irish version of John Cena. The Cena type character is what they want from their top good guys. The reason why Randy Orton was never the top guy was because he either would not or could do comedy. Reigns may make a fine number 2 or 3 top guy as a silent badass, but that does not fit the WWE mould for a top guy.

Royal Rumble 2015:

Reigns fan’s point to the bad booking the Rumble 2015 as to why Reigns was booed. The reason why WWE had Big Show and Kane destroy and humiliate everyone fans loved was to get Reigns cheered they knew fans would be irate with Big Show and Kane’s dominance at their age. But it failed. Imagine how much worse a reaction Reigns would have gotten that instead of it coming down to Reigns, Show, Kane and Rusev it was Reigns, Ambrose, Bryan and Wyatt.

The Build to Wrestlemania 31 and Wrestlemania itself:

Listen to crowd reactions leading to Wrestlemania its deadly quite aside from the last week were Reigns was heavily booed. The WWE had Heyman cut promo’s putting Roman over, as being better than Hogan and Austin, as being the greatest of all time etc except for Lesnar. In the match with Lesnar he kicked out of more finishers and took more of a beating then Cena at Summerslam and even Undertaker at Wrestlemania 30. Reign’s fans said that his beating at the hands of Lesnar would win his critics over because it showed that Roman was not just some kind of corporate choice but a real badass as well. But the beating did not work, Reigns was still not over.

Post Mania to Bray Wyatt:

They placed Reigns in a feud with Big Show (a man who the crowd is so tired of they chant please retire at) in order to try and get Reigns good reactions. The WWE kind of succeeds. The fans of Reigns say he needs a blood feud to get over so the WWE gives him one with Wyatt. The WWE tries to get Reigns good reactions by repairing him up with Dean Ambrose and re doing the Shield versus Wyatt’s again to try and get Reigns cheered. Again by and large Reigns struggled for reactions in his feud with Wyatt. When this feud ends Reigns finally win’s the title but while doing so is booed at Survivor Series. The WWE have Sheamus cash in, a man who they have ruined and have made a black hole for entertainment. They hope fans will feel sympathy for Reigns and cheer him over Sheamus, again it kind of works but it is mainly silence in the weeks leading into TLC. The go home show to TLC might have well been in an empty area. It was scary how quite it was.

TLC 2015 and getting over:

At TLC the crowd chanted for John Cena a man who not even on the card. That will tell you how over Reigns was. Reigns’s fans said it was because he did not have a true Heel to work against. They say it is hard to cheer for Reigns when he is facing Sheamus and the League of Nations, who Reigns can singled handily defeat. So the WWE gives him a true heel to feud with HHH. Reigns destroys HHH and gets huge cheers and the next night the legendary Vince McMahon himself appears to feud with Reigns and it works. In Philadelphia a city he was booed out for winning the Rumble earlier in the year, he is cheered for winning the title by Vince. Here lies the problem the crowd reactions are not for Reigns but are against Vince and HHH. Slowly but surely Reigns’s reactions died out again. Listen to his pops in the Raw’s leading to the Rumble. They are okay but not mega star level.

The Rumble 2016:

At the Rumble in his home state he was booed out of building. The WWE did everything in their power to get him cheered, they put him in at number 1, they had the League of Nations sneak attack him from behind so he needed to go to back to recover. Reigns the defiant babyface returned to save his title, the crowd booed. He fought HHH the number 1 Heel yet the crowd cheered wildly when HHH eliminated him. The WWE sacrificed Dean Ambrose to Hunter to try and get boos. Rather than have the final two be Reigns and HHH because they knew Hunter would get cheered for defeating Reigns.

Conclusion: The WWE and Roman Reigns has failed each other.

The WWE has used protective booking for Roman Reigns since his debut: 1) be it in the Shield, 2) being pushed as a main eventer when the Shield broke up, 3) keeping the popular Shield entrance, 4) winning the rumble, 5) taking a worse beating then Undertaker and Cena and yet making a huge comeback before Rollins screwed him against Lesnar, 6) a reunion of Reigns Ambrose partnership, 7) feuding with terrible league of nations, 8) feuding with Vince, HHH and Steph. Despite all this favourable booking the real fundamental problem for Reigns fans is, not even the fact that he is not a draw in sense of tv ratings, nor attendance nor merchandise (despite having merchandise being tailored made for kids by being a rip off the spider-man logo) but he lacks the "it" factor required to a star. No matter how well Reigns is booked long term he never stays "over" with the crowd. He is not the next John Cena, Reigns is a better wrestler then Cena was when he got his big push but he does not have a 10th of Cena’s charisma. John Cena at least got massive reactions in 2004/5/6 etc, they have been mixed but at least there was a reaction. Unlike Reigns who most of the time comes out to little or no reaction. Roman Reigns may be great man, may have a great look but a good man and a great look does not make a star.

The WWE has not failed Roman Reigns in its booking of him, instead the WWE has failed him by selecting him to be "the top star" a position he is not fit for.

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