It took one victory at the Royal Rumble to become one of the most-vilified WWE superstar on the roster. Roman Reigns was hand-picked to become the WWE World Heavyweight champion at WrestleMania 31 . Brock Lesnar held the championship since the SummerSlam prior to WrestleMania . From that point forward, Reigns was being built as “the guy.”
Reigns has the look, raw charisma and wrestling ability to be able to make it to the next level and rise up the ranks in the WWE. Unfortunately, the WWE Universe isn’t too keen on forcing stars into stardom. They like it when a WWE superstar is created organically, so that they can put them over. Reigns just wasn’t put over by the fans.
If Reigns was superb on the microphone, it would become a different situation entirely. Wrestlers have won over the crowd with their promo ability. Reigns had that chance, but it never came to fruition. As the narrative is told, Reigns did not win the WWE World Heavyweight championship from Lesnar. Seth Rollins cashed in his Money in the Bank briefcase to become the champion.
Reigns found out he wasn’t winning the night before WrestleMania 31 . Like any competitor, he took it as a learning opportunity.
Reigns is still striving to get better, but his efforts have yet to yield results. It’s almost the end of 2015 and Reigns still doesn’t have the WWE championship. Unfortunately, his promos aren’t getting better.
According to WrestlingInc.com, Roman Reigns’ long promo on WWE Raw was not received well backstage.
“There was a negative backstage reaction at Monday’s WWE RAW to the lengthy promo that Roman Reigns cut in the ring. There was a feeling that Reigns’ should not have been given that much time for a promo.”
“On a related note, Reigns cut another lengthy promo at last night’s SmackDown tapings. Like the promo on RAW in Chicago, Reigns was given the “what?” treatment last night by fans in Cincinnati.”
It’s unknown as to why the WWE has Reigns cut another long promo. The unfortunate part about it is that he doesn’t look comfortable cutting a lengthy monologue. WWE stars like Dean Ambrose, John Cena, Seth Rollins and Dolph Ziggler have no issues talking for 10 or 12 minutes. Reigns isn’t as at ease as they are. Still, there is time to get better. Rollins was flat-out struggling on the mic while in FCW and WWE NXT.
Looking where he is now, the work was put in behind the scenes to drastically improve his skills. Perhaps a character change should be looked at for Reigns’ position in the company. As a babyface, Reigns is over. However, unless a WWE champion has a manager, they need to be able to talk for themselves. Vince Russo has commented on what will make Reigns successful, if done properly.
“I would have him go out there, cut a promo just like he was going to cut tonight [on Monday Night RAW] and tell him, ‘Roman, if the crowd starts getting hostile, tell them how you really feel.’ Don’t script him, just let him go and immediately you got the guy over as a heel. Now you got [Dean] Ambrose confronting him, ‘what the hell are you doing? What’s going on?’ and then Reigns saying, ‘I’m sick of it! I’m sick of going out there every week and listening to these people.’”
It’s actually that simple. Reigns needs to turn heel before WrestleMania 32 comes around. The same scenario happened to John Cena several years ago. While he could talk on the mic very well, his character was very stale. CM Punk came knocking at Cena’s door, to which made the 15-time WWE champion liven up and alter his character ever-so slightly. Roman Reigns should win a WWE championship, but not as a good guy.
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