If you asked a casual wrestling fan twenty years ago, what they particularly looked for in a ‘top guy’, it is very likely that they would retort with “larger than life” or “big muscles”. However, the modern era is the complete contrary to that. Anyone can get over as the ‘fans choice’ as the guy, meaning anyone whether they are 205 lbs or 250 lbs, if they can connect directly to the core fan base, the fans could christen them as ‘their guy’.
Has WWE’s moreover Vince McMahon’s perspective of the top guy altered in the past two decades? To an extent. Vince clearly prefers larger than life superstars still over talents who put their in-ring work first. Whenever Vince has been forced to change the #1 guy even for a short period, it’s always been to external factors (fan reactions getting out of hand or big stars leaving), but in-time Vince always reverts back to his traditional ideology of what his and consequently WWE’s chosen guy should be.
In the midst of the summer of 2014 – WWE realised that John Cena’s time was slowly winding down and that very soon they would need a replacement. This was naturally a tough ask as Cena’s top flight run of a decade (and counting), had lots of ups and downs, making the x 16-time World Champion in-turn, a polarising figure.
The polarising nature of Cena or Cena’s character rather, would naturally mean the crowd would fail to latch onto the chosen guy with ease; henceforth from the moment WWE made the decision that they needed a new top guy, their backs were against the preverbal wall.
WWE on the backs of Daniel Bryan’s rise to the top of the card leading to a World Title win to close WrestleMania 30, opted not to christen Bryan as their #1 guy (whether that is due to Bryan’s size or because of his injury issues is up for discussion), and instead opted for someone much more traditionally grounded in Vince’s DNA of the top guy. That guy was Roman Reigns. It was apparent that WWE’s new chosen guy would be a member of The Shield.
The Shield’s success on the main roster was down to a their consistently strong booking along with acclaimed six-man tags. It would be erroneous to claim that Reigns wasn’t the most over guy in the trio during their original run; it was clear that the fans wanted Reigns to go to the next level, but how Reigns, or, moreover, how the WWE pushed Reigns to that level was problematic.
WWE on the backs of Daniel Bryan’s rise to the top of the card leading to a World Title win to close WrestleMania 30, opted not to christen Bryan as their #1 guy (whether that is due to Bryan’s size or because of his injury issues is up for discussion), and instead opted for someone much more traditionally grounded in Vince’s DNA of the top guy. That guy was Roman Reigns. It was apparent that WWE’s new chosen guy would be a member of The Shield.
The Shield’s success on the main roster was down to a their consistently strong booking along with acclaimed six-man tags. It would be erroneous to claim that Reigns wasn’t the most over guy in the trio during their original run; it was clear that the fans wanted Reigns to go to the next level, but how Reigns, or, moreover, how the WWE pushed Reigns to that level was problematic.
It was clear that the fans wanted Reigns to go to the next level, but how Reigns, or, moreover, how the WWE pushed Reigns to that level was problematic.It’s clear that Reigns as the #1 babyface talent on the roster isn’t working (as of May 2018). Which is a shame, Reigns PPV and TV matches are consistently good, the only time Reigns seems to have a bad match is if he’s main eventing WrestleMania. This article is in no way anti-Reigns, but the reality call WWE need is that Reigns can be your #1 guy, but not as a babyface (which is a discussion for another time). Seth Rollins’ babyface run began abruptly on the August 29 2016 edition of RAW, when Triple H cost him the Universal Championship. There is no point dwelling on the first 18 months of Rollins’ babyface run as it is common knowledge that WWE did Rollins an injustice by not having The Kingslayer return as a babyface but that’s another documented story for another time.