WWE News: Recent Injuries Reportedly Holding Finn Balor Back From Huge WWE Opportunities
WWE Superstar Finn Balor recently came back after sustaining a terrible shoulder injury that took him months to come back from, and now it looks like this and another injury may hold WWE back from pushing him the way they’d like. Finn Balor worked a match with Jinder Mahal on WWE RAW last Monday. It was a match in which Mahal’s job was to basically make Balor look good, as it was Balor’s first WWE RAW match since August of 2016.
During the match with Jinder, it appears that Mahal landed a hard elbow shot to the head of Finn Balor. It looked nasty when Jinder hit it, and Balor was legitimately knocked out from the blow for a few seconds. He even landed limp and face first to the mat. He managed to wake up in time and would end up ending the match with his finisher. A day later, it was found out that Balor had suffered a concussion. The timetable for it was unknown, but it appeared to be minor.
That said, WWE is taking precautions. They have already removed him from all upcoming live events, but that does not mean he will miss WWE RAW. He is set to take part in a rivalry with Bray Wyatt, but since Wyatt is busy with Randy Orton through WWE Payback in a few weeks, Balor has time to rest the concussion and be ready to go by the time he would work with Wyatt. For now, he will not wrestle, but a WWE RAW promo is not out of the question.
WWE had big plans for Finn Balor the day he walked into the door for WWE RAW and joined the main roster. He was a huge name for the WWE NXT brand and had been killing it for over a year there. He became so popular that WWE Chairman Vince McMahon wanted him to be called up back in 2015, but Triple H convinced his father-in-law to let Finn stay on the yellow brand a while longer to help build it up and come to the main roster a little while later.
When he did, fans were ecstatic to see him. He was picked No. 5 overall and by the WWE RAW brand. WWE decided to put the new WWE Universal Championship on him and was going to see how he would work as the top face of the brand, replacing Roman Reigns for the entire fall period. With the championship on his shoulder, he was ready to go. Sadly, a powerbomb from Seth Rollins into the barricade caused Finn’s shoulder to come out of place.
This crazy guy put the shoulder back in seconds later and continued with the match. Sadly, he tore a couple of things and needed surgery, causing him to miss a lot of time. Now with the concussion coming back, his injuries are becoming a bit of an issue despite both being freak injuries anyone could have gone through at any time, injury prone or not. Even John Cena has missed long periods of time due to injury.
On top of that, Roman Reigns missed most of the fall of 2014 with a sports hernia issue, yet WWE had him win the Royal Rumble when he came back and main event WrestleMania 31 against Brock Lesnar for the WWE World Championship. Sometimes, injuries do not matter as long as WWE wants to use you. If they like you, things will get done. However, that may be different for someone like Finn Balor who is much smaller that Reigns or Cena but is very over with WWE fans.
Dave Meltzer noted on his Wrestling Observer Radio show that these injuries could cost Finn Balor in the eyes of the WWE, saying the following.
“[Finn Balor] showed up and he had the shoulder surgery, and then in his second TV match back he gets hurt again, so it’s like..I hope he doesn’t get hurt one more time because you don’t wanna have that thing in Vince’s head that you’re injury prone. It doesn’t kill you because Vince had that thing in his head about other people and they still get pushed to a degree. But it does temper him from going all the way with somebody.”
At the end of the day, Finn Balor could be affected financially as much as he would be physically if he continues to get hurt. Both of these injuries are considered to be freak ones that few could escape in the end. Again, several top guys have been hurt and things have gone fine. However, these injuries have happened earlier in Balor’s career on the main roster. That may be why there are so many problems. Had these injuries never happened, WWE may have different thoughts on Balor.
There certainly would not be any sort of thought on whether they should push him or not. However, WWE will not push someone they fear won’t be around. It is like any other job, in that if they cannot trust you, they won’t allow you to advance in the company. WWE has to know they can rely on talent to be around, and if they cannot, they will never use them the way they may be worthy of being used. Finn Balor can escape that issue if he stays healthy for a while.
[Featured Image by WWE]
