Roman Reigns is one of the most electrifying superstars in the WWE Universe. His miraculous rise after The Shield broke up has to go down as one of the most controversial comebacks of all time. Reigns, who is also known as “The Big Dog” has had to go through a lot before he was main-eventing with WWE superstars like Brock Lesner, Randy Orton, and Triple H. Let’s take you through the origin of the superstar and see how he has comeback from all the lows in his life.
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Early Life and Football Career
Heer is the last and rare unseen pic of Roman Reigns in his childhood with Hulk Hogan and his dad.😘😘#10yrsofRomanReigns pic.twitter.com/PycN9aY1pz
— ROMAN REIGNS TRENDS™ (@BigDogTrends) August 19, 2020
Reigns was brought up in Pensacola, Florida and is a part of the most renowned wrestling family ever. He grew up playing football and spending time with his cousins, Jimmy and Jey Uso and was an athletic child. He got into sports at a young age, and unlike several WWE superstars, wrestling was not Reigns’ essential goal growing up. He was a football player, initially and was his team’s best player in high school, playing his initial three years at Pensacola Catholic High School and his senior year at Escambia High School. He had 120 tackles, 12 sacks, and 6 forced fumbles as a school senior on his way to being crowned Defensive Player of the Year by the Pensacola News Journal. This strength drove Reigns to sign with Georgia Tech and was a low maintenance player as a rookie, prior to turning into a starter as a sophomore and was named in the 2006 All-ACC First Team. Reigns didn’t have the size and inclination to take his football to the necxt level though and while he signed for the Minnesota Vikings after not being chosen in the 2007 draft, he was released by the team soon after. Following a short stretch with the Jacksonville Jaguars practice squad, Reigns was released once more and later made his way to Canadian Football League with the Edmonton Eskimos. He had a sum total of just nine tackles and no sacks in five games with the Eskimos prior to being released from there too forcing Reigns to retire from professional football completely.
Life after Football
When football failed to work out for Reigns, he decided to become a full-time professional wrestler. He was prepared by his dad, Sika Anoa’i, and his uncle, Afa Anoa’i, who made up the incredibly entertaining Wild Samoans tag team partnership that existed during the 80s and 90s. He was of course gifted with an extraordinary wrestling foundation because of his family. In addition to the fact that he has the Wild Samoans as his dad and uncle, and the Usos as cousins, he has a lot of different family members who made names in the business. The lineage of wrestlers included cousins Umaga, Yokozuna, Rikishi, and obviously, the biggest of them all, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. So, there’s surely a case to be made that Reigns was destined for life in the ring and it was always in his blood.
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Reigns signed an agreement with the WWE in 2010 and was appointed to their less compelling and less engaging NXT: FCW, Florida Championship Wrestling. Reigns was known by the ring name Leakee at that point and started ascending through the ranks. Like any amateur, he had to take on plenty of losses on his way up in the wrestling universe. His first match was a Battle Royale that was won by Alex Riley, and he would follow that with various singles losses. He lost to Richie Steamboat, Idol Stevens (Damien Sandow), Wes Brisco, Leo Kruger (Adam Rose), and Shad Gaspard before finally getting a win over Fahd Rakman. That was the turning point he needed and from then on, Reigns hardly lost any singles matches as he was being prepped to become a major WWE star. One of his most outstanding accomplishments in FCW was his FCW title match against Leo Kruger and the journey into that match – which had him contest a triple threat match against his future team – Shield, Dean Ambrose, and Seth Rollins on his way to the title. Roman Reigns proceeded to win that match but went on to lose to Kruger in the week after that. “Leakee” then collaborated with Mike Dalton, presently known as Tyler Breeze, to win the FCW tag team championships and overpowered Corey Graves and Jake Carter (Vader’s child) to win a title.
The Shield
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The Roman Reigns we know today is nothing without the Shield. According to CM Punk, the original team of Shield was supposed to be of Seth Rollins, Dean Ambrose and Kassius Ohno, but the WWE board decided to add Reigns instead of Ohno. Things could have been very different had that stuck. The Shield had their problems and weaknesses but soon made a name for themselves and had fans backing them all the way, prompting some to even believe that The Shield were the best ever, surpassing the NWO and even Evolution. They went through WWE ranks rapidly and were perhaps the most engaging in WWE TV from 2012-2014. When Rollins finally turned on his teammates, Reigns started his rise to the man we know today.
The Rise of a Champion
Following Rollins’ betrayal, Reigns would momentarily keep partnering Ambrose, prior to leaving on a singles run and given a shot at a world title clash. Subsequent to winning a Battle Royal, Reigns was given an opportunity for the empty WWE World Heavyweight Championship at Money in the Bank, but was dominated by John Cena. His second consecutive pay-per-view was at Battleground in July, where Reigns competed for the title, this time in a deadly four-way battle with Cena, Kane and Randy Orton, which Cena again won. Following that encounter, Reigns started a long battle with Orton, which culminated at Summer Slam in August, which Reigns won. On October 26th, on Raw, Reigns then defeated Alberto Del Rio, Dolph Ziggler and Kevin Owens in a lethal fatal four way to turn into the number one contender for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. In a turn of absolute fortune, Seth Rollins injured his knee handed over his title the next day, which meant the crowning of a new champion. Reigns took the opportunity with both hands and crushed Big Show in the first round, Cesaro in the quarterfinals, Alberto Del Rio in the elimination rounds and Dean Ambrose in the finals at Survivor Series on November 22nd to win the WWE World Heavyweight Championship.
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The next year, following several incredible battles, Reigns surrendered the title and took time away from Raw, revealing that his leukemia had returned following 11 years of secretly fighting it. On February 25, 2019 however, Reigns made his return to Raw, announcing that his leukemia was gone and received a huge ovation from the crowd. The next week on Raw, Ambrose helped Reigns and Rollins from another assault by the League of Nations, played out their iconic move and officially reunited for the third time. At Payback, Reigns then won a triple threat match over Wyatt and Strowman to win the Universal Championship which he has now been holding for 163 days at this point and it appears to be practically inconceivable for any wrestler to take the Championship away from the Big Dog.
Roman Reigns’ life has surely taken a mesmerizing route to fame. From a failed football career to being Leakee, to teaming up with Tyler Breeze and then fighting leukemia on his becoming the Universal Champion – this man is here to stay and has proved that commitment and dedication to the craft will be rewarded, even if it takes its own sweet time to be revealed!
[Image Credit: Roman Reigns]
Shashank Iyer