Many questioned this year whether WWE's one-off champion vs. champion matches at Crown Jewel were a waste of time. Rollins' win over Rhodes was anything but.
So it turns out the famous Paul Heyman swerve at WrestleMania 41 was just the beginning, as Saturday night Seth Rollins earned yet another scalp on his quest to be the single most dominant heel in the WWE landscape.
Going into this year's Crown Jewel event, some of us here at Uncrowned debated whether the special champion vs. champion matches were a waste of time. But the culmination of this weekend's main event, in which Rollins scored a — relatively — clean victory over his wrestling soulmate Cody Rhodes, made a strong case as to why they matter.
“I am no longer just the greatest of my generation: I am the greatest of all time,” proclaimed Rollins, after aggressively grabbing the microphone from WWE’s Cathy Kelley.
Even adjusting for the usual wrestling hyperbole, you have to admit Rollins looks mighty powerful right now. Just look at the run he’s been on since WrestleMania: Assembling WWE's most fearsome faction since The Shield, before pulling off another scene-stealing heist to snatch the World Heavyweight Championship — and now winning the Crown Jewel title too.
Given the underhanded way in which he won the World Heavyweight title, there was always a hint of a question mark over Rollins’ credentials as champ. His victory over Cody Rhodes has finally put that to bed — particularly given that he got the job done without any interference from Bron Breakker, Bronson Reed or Becky Lynch.
It may have been a bit of a gut punch for Rhodes, particularly after all the work he has put in as WWE’s “quarterback,” but WWE correctly judged that Rollins needed this victory more. At the end of the day, the only way to build a heel champion is to let them steal joy from the good guys.
Needless to say, a victory over the Universal Champion (and the man who beat Rollins three times back in 2022) gives Rollins a big stick to wave back on “Raw,” where he's been working hard to position himself as the top dog.
Like others, I’ve had my issues with the repetitive endings on “Raw,” which usually involve various members of The Vision. But Saturday's match in Perth was a reminder that Rollins is more than capable of getting the job done on his own. It made him look even stronger than he did after his big victory over CM Punk, Jey Uso and LA Knight back at Clash in Paris. The idea that anyone will be dethroning him as champion any time soon certainly looks remote.
So where does WWE go next with Rollins? The good news is they appear to have several options. The first move: Building toward a star-studded WarGames match pitting The Vision against a looser version of Roman Reigns’ Bloodline. Winning that match would be another massive boost for the World Heavyweight Champion.
Does that eventually lead toward Rollins vs. Reigns at WrestleMania 42? The hints we’ve had from Heyman — speaking in his capacity as one of WWE’s most senior creatives, rather than his on-screen character — seem to imply that’s still the plan. Given the history between Rollins and Reigns, it’s probably the longest-running rivalry in modern wrestling and it would be a tragedy not to pull that trigger.
Then there’s the intriguing question as to whether Rollins will face a threat from his own faction — perhaps from a mutinous Bron Breakker. Everyone knows that Breakker is regarded as a future WrestleMania main-eventer. One way to make that happen would be for Breakker to turn on Rollins, perhaps with the assistance of Heyman.
That isn’t going to happen any time soon, but I wouldn't be surprised if it remains the play in the long run. We’ve already seen WWE drop a few hints about the tensions within “The Vision.” How many other storylines are building that kind of long-term intrigue right now?
Until then, Rollins can enjoy his pedestal as WWE’s new double champion. While the showboating works well for his character, no one can deny that Rollins has put in one hell of a shift over the past few years. Winning that second belt felt like a genuine personal triumph for the man behind the character.
As for whether he really is "the greatest of all time," we can put that one down to hyperbole. But is Rollins in the greatest stretch of his WWE career so far? I think we can answer that one in the affirmative.
Category: General Sports
