With WrestleMania season soon approaching, wrestling fans have begun to speculate about which competitor may be the one to face Roman Reigns for the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship at the April 2024 event. Regardless of who challenges Reigns though, WWE Hall of Famer Bully Ray believes a successful title defense from the “Tribal Chief” would cause a noticeable wave of outrage.
“If [Reigns] retains and moves on, I think people will get extremely frustrated with the schedule. Then I think the cracks in the wall will become a little bigger when it comes to Roman wrestling so sporadically and defending so sporadically,” Ray said on a recent episode of “Busted Open Radio.” “Or [WWE] might turn around and say, ‘Well, that championship is the one that gets defended only when absolutely, positively necessary.’ Seth’s [World Heavyweight] Championship, if Seth [Rollins] is still the champion, is [then] the workhorse championship, and that’s the one that gets defended. Maybe they try to elevate that championship … I think that if Roman were to retain at WrestleMania 40, there would be a couple of weeks worth of the vocal minority screaming at the top of their lungs. I think it would last longer than what Cody [Rhodes] fans did for 39.”
As Ray alluded to, Cody Rhodes’ WrestleMania 39 loss to Reigns sparked several weeks’ worth of debate, with some pundits exclaiming their disappointment in the result, while others stood in support of WWE’s booking decision. Following his victory over “The American Nightmare,” Reigns racked up successful title defenses against Jey Uso, LA Knight, Rey Mysterio, and Sami Zayn — the latter two of which occurred at WWE live events. Due to his part-time schedule, Reigns’ title defenses have often been widely spaced out, leading to a significant extension to his reign that now stands at nearly 1,200 days.
