2. Roman Reigns, WWEs Bridesmaid
That actually is what JBL called Roman Reigns multiple times before, during and after the TLC match Sunday night. Reigns has had multiple title shots this year, falling short nearly every time. The only time he was successful, his reign lasted just 5:15 before Sheamus knocked him off the pedestal. Fans can argue about whether this is damaging to Romans long-term prospects as a top guy (the Lex Luger effect of being screwed out of title reigns and thus being known as a choke artist), but when the announcers openly point out your shortcomings, then its a problem. This isnt like Daniel Bryan in 2013-14, where the undersized wrestler was being held down by the Authority and constantly being screwed over in pursuit of the world title. In that case, fans were rabidly behind him before the mega-push started. In this case, Reigns is being pushed like hes an underdog being held down, but fans havent bought in and thus they arent buying it at all. Calling him the companys bridesmaid just draws more attention to this problem, which shows how tone-deaf WWE really is right now.
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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