Universal Champion Roman Reigns was recently a guest on Corey Graves' "After The Bell" podcast, The Big Dog opened up about his new, heel persona, as well as what it's been like to work alongside Paul Heyman. That's generated a huge amount of attention for SmackDown, and arguably a highlight in WWE right now.
Reigns becoming a "Paul Heyman Guy" has been awesome so far, and it sounds like this alliance - and a heel turn - is one that the Universal Champion has wanted to make a reality for some time now.
"This is something I wanted to do. It was an opportunity to be able to connect a lot of dots. It was a bit of a lure as well to get me back in, but for me, I didn’t want to just show up and walk different and talk different. I wanted a whole new presentation and we are going to continue to gradually do that," Reigns explained. "I thought what better way than to align myself with essentially a high powered attorney. If you take the top athlete in the world and mix him with a head mafia boss character, that’s who I am. The mob boss will go out there and do the hit himself but you have to have somebody dotting the ‘I’s” and crossing the “T’s” for you who understands the ins and outs and can add that new layer to the whole character and the personality."
The Big Dog also opened up about Heyman's relationship with his family, noting: "It brings everything full circle. A couple years ago, Paul would come up to me and show me a picture. He would say this is me and your uncle and your cousin. Over the years he has told me some cool stories. It is neat to connect those dots of the paths of my family and his career."
"He will tell you he gives a lot of credit to being left alone essentially, especially back in the day, it was hard to break into this business. It was a tight-knit fraternity, especially back then," Reigns continued. "My dad and uncle gave him the blessing. They said we like this kid, so nobody messed with him. He would drive them and help them out and do things for them. From there, he has always had a huge respect for our family. It’s been really cool to see him go from that young boy all the way to being what he is today and what he did in the middle of his career."
A heel turn for Reigns was definitely long overdue, and it's done his character wonders. It remains to be seen what a returning Brock Lesnar will make of Heyman being aligned with his old foe, but there's currently no word on whether The Beast even has a future in WWE.
Where do you guys hope things go for these two on SmackDown moving forward?