I saw some folks say that Roman Reigns turned heel on Monday Night Raw this week when The Shield reunited to prevent Braun Strowman from cashing in his Money in the Bank contract and I’m here to tell you, dear reader, that this is an aggressively stupid take. That is not what happened, for a number of reasons, least of all the fact that the idea that a Shield reunion could be construed as a heel turn is downright ludicrous.
Most of all, though, Braun Strowman deserved what he got.
This is a man who spent the entirety of his feud with Kevin Owens straight up terrorizing him for no good reason at all. Strowman launched a campaign of terror not seen in some time, including destroying KO’s car, locking Owens inside a porta potty and then tackling it off a stage, and throwing him off the top of a cage through a table. In the blowoff match between them, he chokeslammed Owens onto the ramp and squashed him in a matter of minutes.
Then, this man tried to play like he was honorable later in the evening when he told Brock Lesnar and Roman Reigns that he was going to cash in his contract “face-to-face.” He’s no coward, you see. Oh, but he was going to do this only AFTER the two beat each other up in their title match. The only reason he didn’t actually end up going through with this is because he himself got beat up while standing around waiting for the match to end.
So, of course, he tries playing the same angle on Raw this week and patiently waits for Reigns and Finn Balor to tear each other up before making his way out. In fact, he used his entrance as a distraction while Reigns had the advantage, which damn near helped Finn, the much smaller opponent whom Strowman has had his way with in the past, win the title. Reigns came back and won anyway.
Strowman then gets in the ring and kicks Reigns to knock him down before giving the briefcase to the referee to cash-in.
How the hell is this man the babyface in all this?
What happened next was not a heel turn. It was Reigns’ old friends, Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins, showing up to ensure their guy didn’t get screwed out of the title he spent years chasing by a big monster who was trying to take advantage of him. They didn’t put him through a table with a triple powerbomb because they’re bad guys.
They did it because Strowman deserved it.