Why Roman Reigns' Legacy Has Grown as WWE Struggles with Strong Storylines in 2025

WWE has not had the strong creative year in 2025 that it has in the two or three years that preceded it. A lack of engrossing stories and a John Cena heel story that has not hit as strongly as the initial turn did has bogged things down while the abrupt end of Jey Uso's World Heavyweight Championship reign did little to help matters.

The struggle to find a red-hot story at the top of the card has only served to strengthen the legacy of the Bloodline saga and the man at the center of it, Roman Reigns.

The second-generation star, formerly known as The Big Dog, emerged from a hiatus amid the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 as a narcissistic, self-indulgent Tribal Chief, seconded by the manipulative Paul Heyman.

Reigns surrounded himself with family members as his bloodline, insulating and protecting his reign as the undisputed WWE universal champion.

The high drama that accompanied the promotion's overarching story, including Jey Uso's pursuit of independence, Jimmy Uso's torn allegiances, the quiet and calculating demeanor of enforcer Solo Sikoa, and the fragile ego of The Head of the Table, not to mention to emergence of "Honorary Uce" Sami Zayn, allowed the story to play out for as long as it did without becoming stale or inconsequential.

Fans ate it up, sparking big business for WWE and a handful of stars beyond Reigns who could help carry the company forward.

Triple H inherited that story when he assumed the role of WWE chief content officer. Was he instrumental in Jey's main event singles push? Absolutely. Did he strap the rocket to Sikoa and make him the focal point of SmackDown for the better part of 2024? He sure did.

Still, like any new writer who takes over in the fourth season of a hit television show, he did so with characters that Reigns and Heyman had fleshed out and near perfected in the three years before.

The Tribal Chief did not need the two-time Booker of the Year, as voted on by the Wrestling Observer Newsletter readers, to elevate his star.

As he noted in a pre-WrestleMania 39 interview with Ariel Helwani, "high tides raise all ships" and Reigns was that tide, positively affecting nearly every wrestler his character and story touched.

So strong was the story that even The Rock dusted off a pair of trunks and returned to the squared circle to be part of the action.

Reigns and Heyman made that possible. Their commitment to the story, to bettering both their own on-screen presentation and those of the names around them, helped carry WWE to another boom period and made historic revenue and attendance possible.

While the story has not remained as strong as it was following Reigns' loss to Cody Rhodes at WrestleMania 40, its impact on the company is still felt every Monday and Friday night.

Rhodes returned to the company in 2022 as a buzzworthy babyface, but the two-year rivalry with Reigns elevated him to an entirely different level. Zayn is the purest babyface in professional wrestling and that can be traced back to the time he spent in The Bloodline and the platform he had to express himself, something he had not really done to that point in his WWE run.

Jey is arguably the most popular babyface on the roster and won the World Heavyweight Championship at WrestleMania 41, something few would have believed possible considering his spot as a tag team specialist for his first decade with the company.

Sikoa headlined premium live events and Jacob Fatu, a late arrival in the story, is poised to become one of the top stars in WWE for years to come.

Even Reigns' opponents, like Kevin Owens and Drew McIntyre, saw their prominence on the shows heightened exponentially.

For that, Reigns and Heyman have earned a victory lap. That their on-screen partnership disintegrated at WrestleMania 41 and will inevitably lead to The OTC seeking revenge against his Wise Man, as well as Rollins, Breakker and Bronson Reed, only accentuates the long-reaching effectiveness of the storyline.

As WWE struggles to reach its previous creative heights under Triple H, Reigns' legacy stands as a major contributor behind pro wrestling's renaissance this decade.