WWE: Luke Harper Makes His Return At Rochester Live Event

Luke Harper – or just “Harper”, for short – has been out with a left hand injury for a couple of months, but he made his return to the ring on Mar. 9 at a WWE Raw Live Event in Rochester, New York.

Last year, Luke Harper and Erick Rowan shortened their names to just “Harper” and “Rowan” and wrecked havoc on the rest of the WWE SmackDown roster, winning the SmackDown Tag Team Championships at WrestleMania 34 in a Triple Threat match against The New Day and The Usos.

But just as they were building momentum as the tag team to beat on a loaded SmackDown roster, Rowan suffered a torn biceps in August at SummerSlam. The Bludgeon Brothers then dropped the SmackDown Tag Team Championships to The New Day shortly afterwards, and they haven’t been seen together since.

Rowan has been back on SmackDown as WWE Champion Daniel Bryan’s right-hand man, but we haven’t seen Harper on TV. He had some dream matches at NXT Live Events in September and November against Lars Sullivan and Ricochet, respectively, but he wasn’t able to contribute afterwards due to a left hand injury.

However, Harper is back in the ring now, as he returned at a WWE Raw Live Event in Rochester, New York on Mar. 9, just one day before Fastlane. (By the way, Harper hails from Rochester, so this return must have been extra sweet.)

Harper is one of the biggest Twitter teases (cue the “you know what that means?”), and he couldn’t resist teasing the WWE Universe about his match earlier on Saturday.

With a hat tip to Wrestling Inc.’s Robert Gunier, the WWE Universe tweeted out pics of Harper in Rochester, as the former Wyatt Family member defeated Mojo Rawley, who definitely needs to be on television more after cutting a “fire” mirror promo a couple of weeks ago, in his return match.

It will be interesting to see how Harper is integrated into WWE storylines this WrestleMania season, because perhaps he and Rowan could be reunited to help Bryan, who will defend the WWE Championship against Kevin Owens at Fastlane before being truly tested by the on-fire Kofi Kingston at WrestleMania. We also have seen hints of a Bray Wyatt return, so maybe that’s another layer to the story as we ponder Harper and Rowan’s futures together after their intriguing run as tag team champions in 2018.

That said, the fact that Harper returned at a Raw Live Event probably isn’t worth reading into, since, again, the show was in his hometown.

Regardless, it’s awesome to see Harper healthy and back in the ring after his left hand injury, and he is definitely a wrestler the WWE Universe respects greatly.