Paul Heyman: Roman Reigns Knew "The Big Dog" Wasn't Working in WWE

Roman Reigns' run as "The Big Dog" from 2015 to 2020 saw him become a four-time WWE world champion and main event WrestleMania for four straight years. But while he was consistently pushed as WWE's top star, fans were consistently split on him being presented as the new face of the company. And while fans repeatedly begged for WWE to change up Reigns' presentation by turning him heel, it wouldn't happen until Reigns returned from hiatus in the Summer of 2020 as "The Tribal Chief." 

In a new interview with Rick Rubin, Paul Heyman discussed the evolution of Reigns' character. Rubin echoed the sentiment of many wrestling fans by saying "The Big Dog" wasn't working and Heyman noted that Reigns felt the same way. 

"...Roman understood the cap of 'The Big Dog' as a personality. Roman understood that the presentation of 'The Big Dog, Roman Reigns,' as much as he could make it his own, was always going to be 'The corporate structure produced this talent, this Superstar, in their vision of the top guy in WWE.' (The audience) could smell it a mile away," Heyman said. "...Roman Reigns always had a vision of something past 'The Big Dog.' But he was still too young."

"But the perception was, I'll tell you as a fan, I really enjoyed The Shield. And post-Shield, I was not into Roman during 'The Big Dog' era. You could feel this inauthenticity," Rubin said. 

"I don't think Roman Reigns would argue with you. I guarantee you he wouldn't," Heyman responded. 

Heyman revealed elsewhere in the interview how Vince McMahon finally pitched the idea to pair up Reigns with "The Wise Man" — "So Vince (McMahon) calls me in the middle of August and he says, 'We're gonna take you back into television. I'm thinking, 'Oh, oh. He's gonna make me a commentator and Jim Ross isn't here. What is a commentator in 2020? How can I be disruptive? How can I be evolutionary in the process? How can I redefine this role because I don't just want to settle in and do what's been done already?' Even by me, I want to do this differently. I said, 'Okay, well, what do you got in mind?' He says, 'I'm going to put you with somebody.' I'm thinking, 'Has he read my contract?' I said, 'Well, you know Vince, the options are kind of limited in that.' I'm trying to tiptoe into a delicate situation here where I'm about to butt heads with him. I'm thinking Ronda is pregnant. Brock's not coming back with Saudi down. He's certainly is not putting me with Roman and he goes, 'I'm envisioning Roman Reigns with Paul Heyman.' I'm thinking, 'Oh my God. He's gonna pull the trigger on this. He would never pull it with Cena. He would never have allowed Cena to come to the dark side."