3. Can Reigns Win Over The Fans?
If last weeks live crowd is an indication, Roman Reigns could be slowly turning the corner with fans, garnering a stronger positive reaction than he has in some time. Its tough to buy him as an underdog when hes overcome nearly every obstacle, but Reigns had fans rallying behind him on Raw. Can he keep them on his side? The challenge Roman faces is that he clearly has been on the cusp of the mountaintop for some time now, but he never really has had the strong backing of fans in the way that Daniel Bryan did during his underdog run of 2013-14. Instead, a series of speedbumps and machinations (and a Money in the Bank briefcase cash-in) have kept Roman from reigning over WWE. That sometimes can work to get fans to support you, but it also can backfire. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2kKxQtYKP0 If WWE is hellbent on making Reigns a future champion and insisting that it be as a good guy, the company needs fans to buy in to Roman, or else they just are going to have John Cena 2.0, without the tremendous merchandise sales.
Scott Carlson
Contributor
Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.
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