Dean Ambrose's Booking Shows Slow-Burn Approach Is Best Way to Book Talent

When Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins compete for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship this Sunday, it will complete a remarkable journey to the main event for The Lunatic Fringe.

As soon as Seth Rollins single-handedly broke up The Shield, it was obvious that The Authority would groom him to eventual glory.

Roman Reigns was always in line for a push given how he performed so strongly at the likes of Survivor Series and Royal Rumble.

But Ambrose? He looked to be in choppy waters when it came to his chances of becoming a main event start. Yet the WWE has played a shrewd game with Ambrose's booking, and the slow-burn approach has yielded some pretty serious rewards.

Take a glance back at Ambrose's feuds over the last few months. He seemed to be almost lost in the shuffle heading towards WrestleMania and never really felt like a contender in the WWE Intercontinental Championship ladder match at the event.

He hadn't even won on pay-per-view as a solo star until defeating Luke Harper at Extreme Rules, which sums up how slow Ambrose's push was. Yet he was slowly and surely winning over fans with his infectious promo work and his solid matches week after week.

Ironically, it was his feud with Rollins during the latter part of last year that actually confirmed to everyone that Ambrose could work well as a babyface. You only have to think of the moments such as his pranking Rollins over and over again in the middle of the shows while Reigns was being thrown down everyone's throat on a weekly basis.

You only have to look at Reigns' relationship with WWE fans to see how the slow-burn approach is the best way to book talent. Wrestling fans these days are very demanding. If someone such as Ambrose isn't being pushed quickly, there's uproar online and at events.

And in stark contrast to that, Reigns' rapid push to the WrestleMania main event just didn't feel right with WWE fans, which is why his reactions from live crowds were mixed, to say the least. The same was applicable with Batista last year, too. 

Wrestling fans want to see talent working their way up the card gradually, earning their stripes in a variety of feuds and matches before getting a deserved break. That's exactly what has happened with Ambrose and his booking.

There have been rocky moments on the road to this point, and that made it all the more worthwhile when Ambrose was given his break by being inserted into the WWE World Heavyweight Championship picture.

You can almost compare the slow-burn approach Ambrose has gone through with Daniel Bryan's eventual rise to superstardom in 2014. 

Fans appreciate wrestlers and talent being built up over a lengthy period of time. If Ambrose is given a run with the WWE World Heavyweight Championship before Roman Reigns, it will be proof that when it comes to booking talent, the best way is the slow-burn approach.