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Seth 'Freakin' Rollins reaffirmed that a current AEW name was CM Punk's original choice to be in The Shield instead of Roman Reigns. Rollins also explained how the faction was formed.
The 45-year-old former WWE star, Chris Hero (fka Kassius Ohno) is currently in AEW in the role of a producer. He was a part of the Stamford-based promotion from 2012 to 2013 and from 2016 to 2020. CM Punk once disclosed that Hero was his pick for the third member of The Shield back in 2012 when he was in his 30s.
However, Roman Reigns ended up being the third member alongside Seth Rollins and Dean Ambrose (aka Jon Moxley). During a recent interview with Chris Van Vliet, Rollins confirmed that Chris Hero was indeed Punk's choice to be The Shield's third member instead of Reigns but the WWE office liked Roman so the plans changed:
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"The idea was, you know, obviously Punk liked myself and Moxley and I think Chris Hero actually was his pick at the time to be the third guy because he and Chris had a long history. But they really liked Roman, they being the office in WWE, so they weren't sold on Chris yet. Chris hadn't been in developmental as long I don't think as Moxley and myself."
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Seth Rollins further explained how the idea of The Shield came together:
"He had kind of just gotten there, he's a little bit older, but I think they wanted to test him out a little bit and Roman had got there right before I did so it just made sense kind of a compromise, 'We'll give you these two but we're going to take Roman put them in a group, they'll be CM Punk's bodyguards.'" [24:28-25:10]
Roman Reigns' next WWE appearance after RAW's Netflix debut
At the Netflix premiere episode of RAW, Roman Reigns defeated Solo Sikoa in a Tribal Combat match and secured the Ula Fala. After his win, The Rock felicitated Reigns with the necklace. Later on the show, Paul Heyman asked Roman for a date to acknowledge him as The OTC, and Reigns said January 27.
It was also hinted that Roman could be the cover star for WWE's next game, WWE 2K25, during the backstage segment. It remains to be seen what transpires when The OTC appears on RAW on January 27.
If you use quotes from the first half, please credit Chris van Vliet and give an h/t to Sportskeeda Wrestling for transcription.
