Would embracing Roman Reigns make WWE better?

[Boring]

I'm new to this idea so bear with me. Roman Reigns... get use to that name. I don't know all I'm allowed to say, but this guy has had years worth of storyline written in cement for years.

Learning from Cena, the crowd has no clout whatsoever when it comes to what WWE wants. You may say it did with Daniel Bryan, but for me, I think WWE always knows what they're doing and it didn't take fan support to quickly make Bryan a World HW champion, but they created the extra oomph for his WWE title shot...

WWE has always followed a similar formula, a top guy, a few other stars, but in recent years the other stars unless veterans (Taker, Rock, HHH, Jericho) have meant less and less. WWE made Hogan, Savage, Piper, Andre, Heenan, Perfect, Roberts, Rude, Hart Foundation, Rockers, Steamboat, LOD, etc etc legends.

Is it a case of cause and effect in that "fans don't universally like Cena, but that's the best they're going to get" or is it just by chance that WWE never has storylines for it's tag, US, and IC titles?

Truly, when was the last time Ziggler was in a storyline? WWE has become a UFC card where neither the prelims or PPV matches matter until the main event, which is a sucky card to UFC fans.

Knowing WWE, I think the know exactly what they're doing. My opinion is that if fans were more accomodating to Cena, then the whole card all around would be better. They are in a position that Cena is so important that the crowd only cares about him that they have to give extra time to him and make sure he's not upstaged.

With that said, I believe that if WWE fans blindly accept Roman Reigns, for all his shortcomings, that we will then see a more thought-out and entertaining product from WWE.

I don't agree with this, because I know what Reigns offers, but I'm of the mindset that this is how WWE thinks. Reward their failures and they shall reward you. It's a stubborn and thick-headed company, there is no use fighting them.

Thoughts?

 

[Navi]

It really doesn't matter who is in the top spot you are going to have fans who don't think that person deserves to be there for one reason or another. In the case of Cena, he's a fantastic wrestler and lives and breathes the WWE, but he's stale. Nothing about his character has changed in well.......forever. That might be in part because the WWE is scared to change a good thing, he does sell at lot of merchandise, and if it ain't broke then don't fix it.

Roman Reigns is not John Cena, no matter how you many ways you look at him. They have similar builds, but that's the extent of it. He doesn't have yet, the work ethic, mic skills or in ring ability, and he might never have them. He's what I would call a work in progress. How far he progresses his really up to him and his capabilities.

When you say "he has stories written about him in cement for years" that's a bit hard to believe. They haven't been able to get him out of the starting blocks since he went solo after the Shield break up. If you look at his singles record, time off for injury not included, what has he done? The short answer is nothing. He certainly isn't setting the WWE on fire right now. His Shield brethren Rollins and Ambrose are doing that. Just as they did when they were still the Shield.

Before Reigns can be accepted as the top dog he has to show that's he up to the task. So far he hasn't. Part of it is his fault, instead of getting better on the mic he's going backwards. Part of it is the WWE's fault, for not putting him into a feud that has some teeth in it. He's just been sort of roaming around the title picture having skirmishes with Rusev, Fandango and now Big Show. When you compare that to Rollins and Ambrose, he's at the back of the pack and has a lot of ground to cover.

Do I want to see the guy do well? I think we all do. He has the look of a champion, intensity and charisma. Those are things that can't be taught, but they will also only get you so far these days. If he wants to be embraced at the next big thing, he has to show the WWE fans that he is deserving of their time and effort. Otherwise we will look elsewhere.

 

[Jack-Hammer]

I honestly want to see Roman Reigns do well. I think he's done a solid job on his own so far, he gets pretty decent pops and he's someone that has the potential to help carry WWE for the next decade. However, it's fair to say that a substantial percentage of fans simply don't believe that Roman Reigns is ready to be in the top spot. When you look at Roman Reigns and compare him to the other former Shield members, or compare him to Cena, Randy Orton, Daniel Bryan, Dolph Ziggler and a few others, he's just not anywhere close to being on their level when it comes to having that rapport with fans, work ethic or overall ability. I'm not saying that to be hating on the guy, Reigns has come a long way for someone that's only been in the business a handful of years but, in my opinion, he hasn't demonstrated that he has what it takes at this time to be the one to headline WrestleMania XXXI.

Everything Navi said about John Cena especially is true: nobody has had Cena's work ethic, nobody's worked harder in WWE and despite the claims of some haters, John Cena's a damn good pro wrestler that's proven haters wrong time and time again. It's true that he's also stale and a big reason why is because Vince is reluctant to alter the John Cena formula as it currently is. But one thing that Cena continuously demonstrates is a charismatic ability to keep people interested in what he's involved in and I just don't see that in Roman Reigns yet due in large part to the fact that he hasn't had the time to really develop as a singles wrestler. He was only on his own for a few months before getting sidelined with the hernia that put him out of action for almost the entire one-fourth of 2014 and here we are almost ready to kick off WrestleMania season and he's been in maybe 3 or 4 matches since his return?

As I said, I hope Reigns does well, but WrestleMania XXXI, in my opinion, is too soon for him to be in that spot because he's just not there. I can't say for certain if he'll ever truly be "there", but I do believe that he's certainly not "there" right now. So shoving him down people's throats in a mega push that many don't think he's ready for, including some members of the WWE brass if reports are accurate, won't make fans embrace him and it'll only make things harder for Reigns in the long run.

 

[JDHale]

In answer to 'Would embracing Roman Reigns make WWE better?' - yes. It would definitely in terms of watching, especially if his mega push is given the go ahead. The problem for me is I can't embrace him. The reason why I can't embrace him would be how I've watched the product since I was a kid. As a kid I would like any good guy and want all of them to win, but if they went against each other I'd want my favourite out of the two to win. Now I'm 10 years older I still like all the good guys (and a lot of the 'bad guys' too) but I still have an order in who I want to win like as a kid. That means I have Ziggler, Bryan, Orton, Cena, and Ambrose ahead of Reigns. It's a lot harder to 'embrace' a guy if he's is your 6th favourite, and with Cena, Bryan and Ziggler all getting major support from younger fans now, it's hard to see Reigns being embraced by too many kids either.

I know it's not Reigns' fault either but these early comparisons to Cena are damaging him too. As the others suggested, Reigns isn't in Cena's league. No one is, but there are names which are a lot closer in terms of microphone work, match quality and passion for the business. It's all good him being set up to be the next main man, but with Cena still going strong (although his character is stale) there is no way Reigns is near ready. I don't like Vince singling him out as one of those grabbing the brass ring either. It was good of him to get the acting classes whilst he was injured but with that said I've seen no sign of major improvement so far. I mean if grabbing the brass ring is attending some classes with little improvement then Ziggler's a sure fire Hall of Famer with his comedy he does on the side. Miz must be too being as he is an A-lister. I'd rather him give Reigns a target to shoot for then say he's getting it all already, even in his (Rigged) Superstar of the Year speech he seemed arrogant when bringing up him grabbing the brass ring. Good luck to him anyways. I hope he does well and makes the improvements as it would be a lot better to see him succeed then see his career dwindle down as he does have potential.