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Roman Reigns Vs Brock Lesnar: The WrestleMania Rematch Nobody’s Asking For

By Quinn Gammon

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Roman Reigns vs Brock Lesnar for the WWE Universal Title is the rumored WrestleMania 34 main event, and fans are going absolutely mild for it.

If there’s one thing that should be apparent after Survivor Series, it’s this. Roman Reigns and Brock Lesnar are the biggest and strongest dudes in WWE. That is allegedly the primary focus point of the Raw brand leading into WrestleMania 34. Roman Reigns and Brock Lesnar are to be booked and portrayed as bulletproof, leaps and bounds above the rest of the Raw roster.

This point was emphasized at No Mercy, when John Cena more or less unleashed the full concentrated power of the sun on Reigns, only to lose to one Superman punch and a Spear, while Braun Strowman was summarily humanized after losing to only one F5.

At Survivor Series, WWE Champion AJ Styles met a similar fate. While The Beast Incarnate was able to absorb all of Styles’ best offense, including a Phenomenal Forearm, the springboard 450 Splash, and the Calf Crusher, the Phenomenal One was left counting the lights after just one F5, albeit after taking a hellaciously one sided beating for a good portion of the match.

Meanwhile, Roman Reigns managed to be the only guy rejected by the audience during the epic war between The Shield and The New Day, proving that not even a Shield reunion will get people to cheer for the guy who’s supposed to be the new face of WWE.

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All of this booking is leading somewhere, of course. The highly rumored, increasingly probable WrestleMania rematch between Brock Lesnar and Roman Reigns, for the Universal Championship.

A marquee title match that absolutely nobody is clamoring for. If such a match goes down, it’s only logical that Roman Reigns win and be crowned the new Universal Champion, hence both men being booked to look ungodly strong.

The problems with this scenario are numerous. Booking competitors in this way, for an extended period of time, comes at the expense of the rest of the roster.

Samoa Joe and Braun Strowman, who are incredibly over with the crowd and are definitive main event talents, were both essentially fed to Brock Lesnar and defeated with little fanfare.

In the case of Roman Reigns, the WWE’s mindset is that any reaction trumps no reaction and so they’re happy with the incredibly mixed reception that their top babyface gets. Still, who can forget the sight and sound of the WWE Universe loudly rejecting the conquering hero Reigns when he dispatched Triple H for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship at WrestleMania 32? While a loud reaction of any kind does beat none at all, it’s not good business sense for your top babyface to continually be rejected by such a large portion of your audience.

Despite the WWE’s insistence to the contrary, the people booing Reigns are not a vocal minority, nor are they simply booing him because it’s cool. To a big part of the WWE Universe, Roman Reigns represents the corporate choice. In the eyes of the audience, he wasn’t ready when WWE strapped the rocket onto his back. That he’s unquestionably ready for the big time now is a moot point. By strapping that rocket onto him prematurely, and refusing to take it off, WWE alienated a lot of fans who weren’t ready to accept him, and with each attempted “coronation”, those same fans will boo and turn their noses up at Reigns even more out of sheer principle.

That being said, Reigns is being done no favors with the current booking. While he did eat the pin in the Fatal Four Way at SummerSlam, don’t expect him to look like anything less than Samoan Superman in SWAT gear on the Road to WrestleMania.

Even more concerning is the approach of the Royal Rumble. Roman Reigns and the Royal Rumble go together like oil and water. So synonymous is Roman Reigns with heat at the Rumble that he was entered into this year’s contest at No. 30 specifically to ensure Randy Orton got a major babyface pop for eliminating him. Your top babyface on Raw, ladies and gentlemen.

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The closer we get to WrestleMania 34 in New Orleans, the more inevitable this rumored title match between Reigns and Lesnar seems to be. The question is, how many coronations will WWE give Roman Reigns before admitting that maybe, just maybe, something in this game plan needs to change.

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