Daily DDT
Fansided

Roman Reigns’ Underdog Booking Has No End in Sight

By Rob Wolkenbrod

facebooktwitterreddit

Roman Reigns may not be seen as an underdog among fans, but WWE disagrees and will continue to for the future.

WWE programming is in a chaotic state. Ratings set an all-time low almost every week, the booking of Raw has been poor and the ability to get Roman Reigns over as a top babyface has been a failure.

Since losing to Seth Rollins at WrestleMania 31, WWE has built Reigns back to where he was before the Show of Shows. It took wins at WWE SummerSlam, WWE Hell in a Cell and more to get him back on top.

ALSO ON DAILY DDT: WrestleMania 32 Card Projections 5.0

More from WWE

However, the underdog tag has been applied to Reigns this fall, and it has done him nothing among the fans.

WWE has been lazily trying to book the former Georgia Tech football player like Daniel Bryan from late 2013 to 2014. The odds would be stacked against him and fans believed that he wouldn’t go over because of the backstage perception of him being a “B+ player”. This was partially due to his size and look.

When the Bearded One got entered into the main event of WrestleMania 30, fans knew he would win, but the moment felt genuine because it was the culmination of a long journey.

We’re already heading down that same road with Reigns with how he’s been talked about. What WWE doesn’t realize is it’s not believable because of the former Shield man’s size, look and standing backstage. Fans aren’t naive—most read wrestling news, rumors, and opinionated content online. They have an idea of what’s going on and WWE knows this by now. They probably don’t care, which can be argued as a good thing because they’re not letting fan perception influence things too much. However, this can also be a detriment since the fans opinions are being ignored.

When Sheamus cashed in Money in the Bank and stole the WWE World Heavyweight Championship at WWE Survivor Series, fans didn’t buy Reigns as the underdog. Listen to the crowd reaction and the subsequent playing of his music to drown out the negative response. If anything, it felt like a way of prolonging his journey to the inevitable title win at WWE Royal Rumble or WrestleMania 32.

The portrayal of Reigns as an underdog has been horrible too. Many matches can be seen as evidence of this but the greatest of them all may be last week’s SmackDown main event.

He continues to beat the League of Nations on a weekly basis and did so last night. This begs the question—how is he an underdog?

Going into WWE TLC, many see Reigns being screwed out of the win with Sheamus being assisted by the League of Nations. If so, this would further Roman’s portrayal as the underdog and possibly set up a third match at WWE Royal Rumble. This is where he could win the title since standard match rules would be in place.

More from Daily DDT

While there’s no short-term end in sight for Reigns’ underdog booking, there also seems to be a long-term plan too—keeping him as an underdog.

It seems that WWE is trying to groom him into John Cena’s role as the face, which is fine. This does not mean the character portrayal has to be identical, though, because it doesn’t feel genuine. The long promos of Reigns telling stories about overcoming the odds aren’t doing him any good. Stacking up those odds aren’t doing him any good either, as this was partially what made fans turn on Mr. HLR over the years. There also seems to be a reluctance to turn Reigns heel, even though his reception warrants it and would be beneficial for his career. Cena hasn’t been a heel in over a decade.

Like Cena, Reigns is also being pushed as “the only guy”, which isn’t doing the rest of the roster a favor. They’re all being forced to take a step aside while Roman becomes the only headliner. WWE was at its best when there were multiple Superstars seen as top stars. A great example of this is going back to the roster from 2000-2002.

Next: Reigns Spears Sheamus Through Table (Video)

The booking of Roman Reigns is stale, predictable and questionable. He is a talented performer but until WWE uses him correctly, the backlash will linger with him.

Home/WWE