Vince McMahon very nearly killed LA Knight's career by turning him into "Max Dupri," but Triple H's intervention has helped make him into one of WWE's top Superstars.
He had one heck of a 2023 and 2024, teaming with John Cena at Fastlane and competing in two Undisputed WWE Universal Championship matches against Roman Reigns. Many fans felt he deserved even more and, while his popularity hasn't waned, he wasn't given the Jey Uso treatment.
Talking to CBS Sports, Knight looked back at this red-hot era of his WWE career and admitted that his feud with The Bloodline came with mixed fortunes.
"I think it took me in a few different directions," he acknowledged. "Optically, in a way, it elevated me. It also kind of set me back a little bit to where I had to do a bit of a rebuild in the winter and spring time of last year. I think that's by virtue of how it was set up and how it was done. Ultimately, Crown Jewel was a nice payoff so that was pretty good."
Knight later won the United States Championship when he beat Logan Paul for the title at SummerSlam. That run was good, not great, and the site put it to him that having to share SmackDown with new Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes perhaps didn't help.
"What is the right timing?" Knight wondered. "Nobody knows. Should it have happened earlier? Yeah, probably, in my view. At the same time, it is what it is."
"The first one wasn't enough for me. The first one got taken away from me..." he said of losing the title to Shinsuke Nakamura. "I don't feel like I got every little bit out of it that I needed and wanted to. So we need to go back and do it again.
"Let's get ourselves to WrestleMania... I want the world championship. I want the WWE championship. That has to happen a handful of times before it's all said and done," Knight concluded.
Has WWE missed the boat when it comes to LA Knight? In some ways, it does feel like the company failed to capitalise on his momentum but there was simply no way he'd be the one to end Reigns' historic title run.
Now, with many fans frustrated at Jey Uso's Road to WrestleMania, it will be interesting to see what role Knight plays at the Show of Shows, especially with him once again the WWE United States Champion.