10 Reasons Randy Orton's Slow Face Turn Is Best For Business

Randy Orton has been one of the top stars in WWE since becoming the youngest World Heavyweight Champion in history at SummerSlam 2004. As part of the same developmental cohort that produced John Cena, Brock Lesnar and Batista, Orton was a huge part of the WWE's main event plans throughout the first decade of the 21st century. Over the last year, however, Orton has stagnated. As part of the Authority stable led by Triple H and Stephanie McMahon, Orton had an underwhelming run as the first WWE World Heavyweight Champion after unifying the two world title belts at TLC 2013. Since losing the straps to Daniel Bryan at WrestleMania XXX, Orton has felt like a peripheral part of that group, especially since the shocking breakup of The Shield and the rise of Seth Rollins as one of the top heels in the company. WWE has done a terrific job in recent months of portraying Randy Orton as a man becoming increasingly frustrated with his standing. He has been shown to be more and more jealous of Seth Rollins every week, seeing his time in the WWE spotlight fading away despite the fact he's only 34 years old. On the November 3 episode of Raw, the storyline culminated as Orton received a brutal beating at the hands of his former comrades. He had delivered an RKO to Seth Rollins and even struck his boss, Triple H. This led to Triple H giving the order to finish Orton off, followed by a brutal Curb Stomp from Rollins onto the steel steps. This allows Orton to take time off to film action movie sequel The Condemned 2: Desert Prey. He will return as a red hot babyface act with a real score to settle, which could bring back some glory to his career. WWE has done a great job of building Orton's face turn and it opens up a tonne of opportunities for the creative team going forward.