Fans Will See Less of “The Tribal Chief” at House Shows

Roman Reigns is working a limited schedule–at least that’s the report from Dave Meltzer who revealed the current undisputed world champion just signed a new WWE deal with a lighter work week. With Reigns holding the WWE and Universal Championships, that means the WWE Universe will see less title defenses, which again raises the question why Roman has both belts. Speaking on Wrestling Observer Radio, Meltzer observed:

“It’s not it for him, but the situation is that he got a new deal and the new deal is for far less dates. So, he’s not going to do be doing — I don’t know how many house shows he’ll be doing, but it’s going to be far less house shows than he is doing now.”

H/T Ringside News

The new deal shows just how much the WWE values Roman Reigns but it also poses the question whether the WWE has another Brock Lesnar like champion, i.e. one who makes limited appearances and limited title defenses. One of the advantages of putting the Universal Championship on Reigns was that the fans got to see him defend the title more often than Lesnar did during his heel run:

Up until recently, Reigns was a fixture on SmackDown, with title defenses on the blue brand as well as at the WWE’s premium events. However, that hasn’t been so since Reigns unified the WWE and Universal Championships. If Roman Reigns is working a limited schedule, it’s downright baffling why the WWE opted to unify the belts as fans on RAW and SmackDown could see less of the world titles than they have in a long time.

While WWE defenders might argue that limited title defenses will make the world title more prestigious, that wasn’t the case when Brock Lesnar held the title. Some might argue Reigns’ absence will give the WWE’s undercard more opportunities in the spotlight but this would be a dramatic shift from the way the WWE has handled its undercard, especially its continued failure to build new stars.