Immediately following the match, Sheamus cashed in his Money in the Bank contract and defeated Roman Reigns, ending his first title reign at only five minutes.
Reigns’ World Heavyweight Championship
Reigns regained the WWE World Heavyweight Championship on the episode following the TLC pay-per-view event. He managed to hold onto the title until the 2016 Royal Rumble when Triple H eliminated him from the match. Reigns won the WWE World Heavyweight championship a third time at WrestleMania 32.
In September 2016, Roman Reigns fought Rusev to become the United States Champion at the pay-per-view event, Clash of Champions. His United States Championship title reign lasted 106 days.
In October 2017, Roman Reigns alongside Seth Rollins and Dean Ambrose decided to reform The Shield. In November, Roman Reigns defeated the Miz for the Intercontinental Championship thus becoming the 28th Triple Crown and 17th Grand Slam champion. His reign lasted 63 days as Intercontinental Champion.
Roman Reigns WWE Universal Champion
At the 2018 SummerSlam, Roman Reigns defeated Brock Lesnar for the WWE Universal Championship. In October 2018, Reigns announced that he would be vacating the title because his leukemia had returned after 11 years of remission. Reigns began his hiatus following this announcement in order to seek treatment.
Roman Reigns returned to RAW on February 25, 2019, announcing that his leukemia was in remission again. During the WWE SuperStar shake-up, Roman Reigns was assigned to SmackDown. For most of 2019, he feuded with Shane McMahon, Drew McIntyre, King Corbin and Dolph Ziggler.
At WrestleMania 36, Roman Reigns was set to battle Goldberg for the Universal Championship but he had to pull out of the event due to the pandemic and concerns for his health being immunocompromised from leukemia.
Roman Reigns’ Return to WWE Action
Reigns returned to WWE at SummerSlam 2020 and attacked both Braun Strowman and “The Fiend” Bray Wyatt, at the end of the show. On the following SmackDown, Reigns aligned himself with his new manager, Paul Heyman, turning heel for the first time since 2014.
A week later at PayBack, Roman Reigns defeated Bray Wyatt and Braun Strowman in a triple threat, no holds barred match to become the WWE Universal Champion for a second time.
Reigns then began a rivalry with his cousin, Jey Uso. In his first championship defense at Clash of Champions, Reigns retained the title against Uso by technical knockout. After Reigns viciously beat down Jey, Jimmy Uso threw in the towel. After this, Reigns granted Jey a rematch at the Hell in a Cell event. The match was later confirmed as a Hell in a Cell match, with the added stipulation of being an “I Quit” match. At Hell in a Cell on October 25th, Roman Reigns made Jey quit after attacking the injured Jimmy, thus retaining his title. Due to the loss, Jey was ordered to follow Reigns’ commands and address him as “The Tribal Chief,” thus turning him into a villainous character.
Roman Reigns’ Various Feuds
At Survivor Series in November 2020, Reigns defeated RAW’s WWE Champion Drew McIntyre in a Champion vs. Champion match. He then began feuding with Kevin Owens, after Reigns believed Owens to be disrespecting his family. Reigns successfully defended the title against Owens in a TLC match at TLC: Tables, Ladders & Chairs on December 20.
At the 2021 Royal Rumble, he defended his title again against Kevin Owens in a Last Man Standing match. Reigns then defeated Daniel Bryan at Elimination Chamber and Fastlane pay-per-view events. At this time, Reigns would also feud with Edge, who had won the Royal Rumble match. In the main event of night 2 of WrestleMania 37, Reigns defeated Bryan and Edge in a triple threat match to retain the Universal Championship.
On the April 30 episode of SmackDown, Reigns defeated Daniel Bryan in a championship vs. career match, which resulted in Bryan being forced to leave SmackDown.
Reigns’ next challenger for the championship was Cesaro, whom Reigns defeated at WrestleMania Backlash on May 16. Afterwards, Reigns initiated a rivalry with Rey Mysterio, after Reigns brutally attacked Mysterio’s son, Dominik. Reigns and Cesaro faced off for the championship in a Hell in a Cell match on the June 18 episode of SmackDown, with Reigns as the winner.
Roman Reigns Battles John Cena & Brock Lesnar
On the June 25th episode of SmackDown, while addressing his victory over Mysterio, Reigns was attacked by the returning Edge, leading to a title match between the two at Money in the Bank. Reigns retained the title because Seth Rollins interfered. After the match, Reigns was confronted by a returning John Cena. Over the following weeks, Cena challenged Reigns for a title match at SummerSlam. After initially rejecting Cena’s challenge, a match was made official for the two at the event. Reigns defeated Cena to retain the title at SummerSlam. Immediately after the match Reigns would be confronted by a returning Brock Lesnar.
At Extreme Rules in September, Reigns defeated Finn Bálor. He then successful defended his title against Brock Lesnar at Crown Jewel. On November 8, it was announced that Reigns would face WWE Champion Big E at Survivor Series, with Reigns emerging victorious at the event.
On the December 17 episode of SmackDown, Reigns fired Heyman as his manager because Heyman was once associated with Brock Lesnar. He was scheduled to defend his title against Lesnar at the Day 1 event on January 1, 2022, but the match was canceled as a result of Reigns testing positive for COVID-19.
Reigns Becomes Longest Reigning Universal Champion
Reigns surpassed Lesnar’s 503 day reign on January 16 2022 to become the longest reigning Universal Champion. This also meant that Reigns has the sixth longest world championship reign in WWE’s history. On January 29, at the Royal Rumble event, Reigns defended the championship against Seth Rollins, losing the match by disqualification. But, championships cannot change hands by disqualification, meaning Reigns kept his title.
Later that same night, he interfered in the WWE Championship match between Lesnar and Bobby Lashley, re-uniting with Heyman to cause the upset victory for Lashley to regain the championship. On the February 4th episode of Smackdown, Goldberg made his return to challenge Reigns to a match at Elimination Chamber for the title. At the event, Reigns defeated Goldberg via technical submission to retain the title.
At WrestleMania 38, Roman Reigns pinned Brock Lesnar to win the WWE Championship for a fourth time. He also became the first superstar to hold both the WWE Championship and WWE Universal Championship simultaneously. On the June 17th episode of SmackDown, Reigns successfully defended the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship against Riddle. However, after the match he was attacked by a returning Brock Lesnar to renew their rivalry and set up a Last Man Standing match at SummerSlam. At SummerSlam, he battled Brock Lesnar and with the help of The Usos, he defeated Lesnar to retain his titles. At WrestleMania Backlash on May 8, Reigns and The Usos defeated RK-Bro (Randy Orton and Riddle) and McIntyre in a six-man tag team match.
Reigns Breaks More Records
On January 18, 2023, his Universal Championship reign reached 871 days breaking Gunther’s NXT UK Championship reign of 870 days, giving him the longest reign of any WWE championship since 1988. At the 2023 Royal Rumble, Reigns successfully defended the titles against Kevin Owens for the fourth time.
Reigns successfully retained the titles against Sami Zayn at Elimination Chamber on February 18. At Night 2 of WrestleMania 39, Reigns entered his seventh WrestleMania main event to a symphony of pianos. During the match, The Usos attempted to intervene, however, Rhodes was rescued by Zayn and Owens. Ultimately, Reigns successfully retained the titles against Rhodes after interference from Sikoa.
At Night of Champions, Roman Reigns and Solo Sikoa unsuccessfully challenged Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn for the Undisputed WWE Tag Team Championship. It was on this day that Reigns hit 1,000 days as Universal Champion, the first to do so in over thirty-five years, and only the fifth wrestler ever to accomplish the feat with a world championship in the history of WWE. On June 24, Reigns reached 1,028 days as Universal Champion, passing Pedro Morales’ reign of 1,027 days with the WWE Championship (at the time known as the WWWF Heavyweight Championship), giving Reigns the fifth longest world championship reign in company history.
Reigns’ Reign Ends
Reigns and Sikoa faced The Usos in a “Bloodline Civil War” tag team match at Money in the Bank on July 1. At the event, Reigns was pinned by Jey Uso, making this his first pinfall loss since December 2019. At SummerSlam, a returning Jimmy, who was injured by Reigns a few weeks earlier, betrayed Jey to allow Reigns to pick up the win to stay as champion and the Tribal Chief. A few months later at Crown Jewel, Reigns successfully defended the titles against LA Knight. At Royal Rumble on January 27, 2024, Reigns defeated Knight, Randy Orton and AJ Styles, who Reigns pinned, to retain the titles in a fatal four-way match.
At WrestleMania XL Night 1, Reigns and The Rock won the tag team match against Cody Rhodes and Seth Rollins to enforce Bloodline Rules. On WrestleMania XL Night 2, Reigns lost the title to Rhodes ending his second record setting Universal Championship reign at 1,316 days and ending his fourth WWE Championship reign at 735 days. On the April 26 episode of SmackDown, Paul Heyman informed the WWE Universe that Roman voluntarily withdrew from the 2024 WWE Draft.
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