Why WWE Was Hesitant About Roman Reigns’ Latest WWE SmackDown Segment and Why They Were Wrong

July 11, 2023, 10:36am

WWE’s latest Friday Night SmackDown opened with a “Tribal Court” segment featuring Roman Reigns, The Usos, Paul Heyman and Solo Sikoa and clocked in at roughly 35 minutes. The segment managed to accomplish quite a bit, once again showing off just how evil Reigns can be in his attempts to maintain power, how justified The Usos are in fighting back against “The Tribal Chief” and how Solo Sikoa might be the true threat to Reigns’ position if he ever decides to push back against his leader. And while it didn’t outright confirm Reigns vs. Jey Uso for the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship at SummerSlam, all signs point to that still happening.

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However, WWE was a bit hesitant regarding the segment as they reportedly feared a promo going that long would turn fans away. Dave Meltzer explained their thought process during the latest Wrestling Observer Radio.

“…there was a lot of concern, you know, debate going in, if going 30 minutes with that segment, you know, 35 minutes was overkill. They did it. And now, with the benefit of hindsight, it wasn’t because the number, you know, grew and grew and grew. And then after that, the rest of the show didn’t do anything special after that. It was just that,” Meltzer said (h/t WrestlingNews.co).

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With the benefit of hindsight, it looks like WWE was wrong to be concerned. According to Brandon Thurston via Wrestlenomics, the show delivered a .76 rating and was watched by an average of 2.56 million people. That’s the best rating the Blue Brand has produced since Christmas Day 2020 and that show famously had an NFL game as its lead-in. Thurston noted that the first quarter hour drew 2.5 million and would actually increase to 3.07 million for the second quarter-hour while the “Tribal Court” continued. It dipped back to 2.7 million for the final of the three segments but was still better than the rest of the show (averaging 2.4 million).

Should WWE do more segments like this? Or did this only work because it was The Bloodline? Tell us your thoughts in the comments!