10 Things WWE Wants You To Forget About Samoa Joe
5. He Was The Samoan Joe That Fans Wanted
It's over eight years since a Samoan named Joe made his main roster WWE debut at the 2012 Survivor Series.
That particular Samoan Joe is Roman Reigns, of course, and WWE spent so many years trying to cement Reigns as their poster boy babyface, ala John Cena, Steve Austin, Bret Hart, Hulk Hogan and the other top 'heroes' who Vince McMahon's promotion has at times based so much of their product around.
In the case of Cena, Big Match John proved that it's truly tough to have a crowd universally pulling for a wrestler these days. And for Roman Reigns, the Big Dog found it even tougher than Cena to win over audiences who forever felt Roman was being forced down their throat.
Reigns is clearly fine these days, with his Head of the Table schtick one of the absolute best in the industry right now. But during those days when audiences were largely rejecting Roman, there was a spell where WWE finally had fans naturally clamouring to see a Samoan Joe kicking ass and taking names.
Unfortunately for WWE's plans, that Samoan Joe was indeed Samoa Joe.
As mentioned elsewhere, WWE never fully ran with the Samoan Submission Machine as a dominant main event star during his time with the company. But man, just imagine what Samoa Joe could've achieved if afforded even a small semblance of the energy and unflinching effort that went into Reigns' push.