Dean Ambrose's Recent Losses Create Opportunity for Great Story of Redemption

Dean Ambrose keeps falling to his biggest foes. If WWE uses that trend correctly, it will be the precursor to the rugged, wild-eyed brawler celebrating triumphantly in the biggest moment of his career.

Failure improves the taste of success. Fans saw that with confetti sticking to Daniel Bryan's bruised body at WrestleMania 30 and with Sami Zayn welling up after he finally snatched the NXT Championship from Adrian Neville's hands.

Ambrose needs that type of moment. For now, he's busy suffering significant losses aplenty.

Yes, he has looked valiant in defeat. Yes, there are certainly explanations for most of those defeats, from Bray Wyatt sneak-attacking him at Hell in a Cell to Seth Rollins using a briefcase shot to the dome to get the win at SummerSlam. 

Still, the L column of The Lunatic Fringe's win-loss record is starting to fill up. It's making Ambrose look more like a failure than a formidable force.

The latest setback came on Monday's Raw when Wyatt withstood Ambrose's rabid energy and tossed him into the back of an ambulance.

That wrapped up that feud with Wyatt clearly ahead. Per CageMatch.net (link contains SmackDown spoilers), Ambrose went 1-4 against Wyatt overall. That follows him going 0-6 against Rollins during their feud.

Having Ambrose sink to this point, to struggle so much, creates a narrative opportunity.

As we saw with both Bryan and Zayn, failing can lead to a babyface engaging with the fans, to pull them in and set up an emotional ride out of a hole.

In 2013, The Authority kept knocking Bryan off his feet. Triple H stripped him of the WWE World Heavyweight Championship after Night of Champions. Bryan failed to win the title back at Battleground, lost to Randy Orton thanks to a superkick from former mentor Shawn Michaels at Hell in a Cell and capped off the year by falling to The Wyatt Family at TLC.

Had Bryan gone on a winning streak instead, kicking Orton until he saw stars and bringing down Wyatt, his victory at WrestleMania would not have created such a large lump in our throats.

Instead, defeating Triple H and then both Batista and Orton felt like Bryan's breakthrough moment. It was a beaten, limping warrior somehow overcoming every obstacle in front of him. Watching Bryan hold those titles, one couldn't help but be filled with joy.

Jonathan Bachman/Associated Press

Defeats helped set that up, just as it did with Zayn on his road to redemption.

Before NXT Takeover: R Evolution, Zayn kept ending matches on his back, watching another man celebrate. Cesaro, Tyler Breeze, Adrian Neville, Tyson Kidd and Titus O'Neil all owned victories over him.

WWE then built a story around Zayn looking to make up for all those failings. He retraced his steps, defeating Breeze, pinning Kidd and knocking off O'Neil before facing Neville again.

In their title match at R Evolution, it looked as if Zayn was going to fail again. With the referee knocked to the mat, he considered using the NXT title as a weapon, and while he hesitated, Neville nearly pinned him.

Instead, Zayn did what he couldn't do in the past—win on the big stage.

WWE.com staff named that bout the second-best match of 2014. A huge part of its appeal was how invested fans were in Zayn's journey. Winning that match meant he would taste glory that so long eluded him. Losing would have been like someone slashing all of his tires, as fans were forced to watch the air drain out of him.

The clash wouldn't have had that same emotional weight had he not been mired in such a slump beforehand.

This is the same kind of compelling climb WWE needs to make with Ambrose. Having him lose his next feud or two with no purpose is just going to make him look ineffective. There has to be rejoicing at the end of his story or else it's just a depressing tale of ongoing stumbling.

Let him win the WWE title from Rollins months from now. Or else, let him counter this string of losses with a number of big wins against heels and babyfaces alike, notching a victory over John Cena at SummerSlam, for example.

Credit: WWE.com

A hot streak after losing series against both Rollins and Ambrose suddenly has more power.

Going that route makes all his recent defeats the building blocks of his crowning achievement yet to come. It takes fans on a ride with him as he sinks to rock bottom and claws his way back upward.

WWE may not be thinking that far ahead, but it should. A stretch like Ambrose is experiencing right now can either be a way to whittle down his reputation or the gunpowder stuffed into the fireworks.

A story of redemption lights those fireworks before they explode under the spotlight as part of Ambrose's biggest celebration to date.