Roman Reigns: ‘The Shield Paved The Way For A New Era In WWE’

WWE has only been pushing the new era for a couple of months, but Roman Reigns argues that the new era began when The Shield made their debut on the main roster back at Survivor Series in November of 2012.

In a recent interview, Reigns explained why he feels like The Shield had more of a hand in beginning WWE’s new era than the rise of NXT did.

“It’s not talked about too often because of NXT and how big that product became and just the wave of new talent from NXT. It really shined through. But something a lot of people missed was The Shield is actually kind of the beginning of the new era. We kind of paved the road and took the bumps and made this process a lot smoother for those guys as well.”

All three former Shield members began their WWE journey in the pre-NXT developmental territory known as Florida Championship Wrestling. They were around in NXT for a short time, but they weren’t around when it became the phenomenon that it is today.

Roman Reigns, Seth Rollins, and Dean Ambrose have been dominating WWE’s main event scene for the better part of the last four years, both together as a group, and as individuals. The faction disbanded in June of 2014, and they’ve only reunited once, but it wasn’t a true reunion, as Rollins was a heel at the time, and Ambrose and Reigns were both babyfaces. So the team completely imploded.

There has been a rumor going around that the trio is going to reunite at some point in the near future, possibly at November’s Survivor Series pay-per-view. Of course, one of the three men – Dean Ambrose – is on a different brand than the other two, so a long term reunion would be impossible, unless WWE decided to move Ambrose over to Raw, which probably wouldn’t be the best idea. Now, will they reunite for one night only? It’s possible. Survivor Series is a dual-brand pay-per-view, so WWE could setup a six man tag where the trio gets back together.

WWE has been trying to find a way to get the fans to accept Roman Reigns as the company’s new top babyface, and many feel that a Shield reunion would be the best way to do that. There are also a ton of people who believe that WWE’s best chance at getting Reigns over is to turn him heel, but the boss – Vince McMahon – isn’t too keen on that idea for whatever reason.

All three former members of The Shield are about to compete in Championship matches in the next couple of days. Reigns is going to challenge Rusev for the United States Championship, and Rollins is the number one contender for the WWE Universal Championship. Both men will have their opportunity at the gold this Sunday night at WWE Clash of Champions. Ambrose’s title opportunity won’t be on pay-per-view, as he’s set to challenge AJ Styles for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship on Tuesday’s SmackDown Live show.

As of this writing, Roman Reigns is a heavy favorite to walk out of Clash of Champions as the new United States Champion. His former Shield buddy Rollins is a heavy underdog, and rumor has it that Triple H will once again cost “The Architect” the Universal Championship.

Ambrose isn’t expected to defeat AJ Styles on Tuesday, but he will get another Title opportunity at the No Mercy pay-per-view next month, as the show’s main event will be a triple threat match for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship between Ambrose, AJ Styles, and John Cena.

[Featured image via WWE]