The Rise and Fall of Kevin Owens

Kevin Owens has experienced a dramatic rise and fall in his fortunes in WWE over the last year. Despite not officially winning the Undisputed WWE Championship, he is currently in possession of The Winged Eagle Championship and is set to challenge Cody Rhodes in what we can only presume will be their final match of the feud at the 2025 Royal Rumble. This time, it will be a ladder match.

So what exactly has been behind the tumultuous rise and fall of Kevin Owens in 2024? Turns out, you have to go back a few years to really understand the dramatic KO situation right now and why things are playing out the way they are.

From being deprived of world title glory to brutal assaults and betrayal, here is the entire context of the rise and fall of Kevin Owens:

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Long-standing issues with The Bloodline

KO has every reason to hate The Bloodline (Pic Courtesy: WWE.com)

Kevin Owens' issues with The Bloodline aren't recent. In fact, he's had a long-time on-and-off feud with Roman Reigns - who he defeated in the 2017 Royal Rumble, thanks to the help of Braun Strowman.

However, in the meetings from the 2020s onwards, it has been completely one-sided in favor of Roman Reigns. When The Tribal Chief was just months into his Universal Title run, he ended the year by feuding with Kevin Owens - whom he defeated numerous times - once in a TLC match, once in a Steel Cage match, and the third time in a Last Man Standing match. All of this happened in a span of just two months, with The Bloodline directly being responsible for Owens not becoming Universal Champion after nearly four years.

This continued in late 2022 and early 2023 when Roman Reigns once again defeated KO at the Royal Rumble - this time with the dramatic moment where Sami Zayn turned on The Bloodline. As fans know, this culminated with a satisfactory ending as KO and Sami Zayn got a measure of revenge against The Bloodline by dethroning The Usos at WrestleMania 39.

However, it was only a measure of revenge because KO never truly got back at Roman Reigns.

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Aligning with Cody Rhodes and the continued war on The Bloodline

In 2024, when Kevin Owens properly aligned with Cody Rhodes, he was fighting a different kind of monster in The Bloodline. Instead of being led by Roman Reigns, it was led by Solo Sikoa, who seized power himself and introduced new members in Tama Tonga, Tonga Loa, and of course, the intimidating Jacob Fatu.

From KO's point of view, it made a lot of sense to align with his friends Randy Orton and Cody Rhodes in their battle against The New Bloodline - and there was no Roman Reigns. However, his comeback was always inevitable.

Whether they beat or lost to The Bloodline, KO remained a loyal friend and stood by Cody Rhodes' side - until things started to change in the summer.

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The straw that broke the camel's back for Kevin Owens

The summer of 2024 saw Roman Reigns return as he helped Cody Rhodes defeat Solo Sikoa. This happened again on the SmackDown on USA Premiere, and it led to Cody Rhodes and Roman Reigns teaming up to face Solo Sikoa and Jacob Fatu at Bad Blood.

This was where we saw that face-to-face segment between Reigns and Rhodes in the Georgia Tech Football Stadium, with Reigns telling his rival that he was in his way "in life."

This was viewed as the ultimate betrayal by Kevin Owens, who voiced his displeasure at Cody Rhodes teaming up with Roman Reigns. He knew Reigns was directly responsible for all the harm done by The Bloodline pre-April 2024 and was the sole reason why Owens couldn't become world champion between 2020 and 2023.

Despite Cody and Reigns winning in the Bad Blood main event, there was an untelevised backstage segment that shockingly saw Kevin Owens turn on his friend Cody and attack him.

While they technically had an Undisputed WWE Title match at Bash in Berlin, it was more of a "friendly competition" type of match. This time, the bad blood was real and Owens took matters into his own hands.

He even refused to accept the idea that he turned on Cody, stating that it was Cody who truly turned on him by teaming up with a man who had made his life a living hell for so many years.

This is what led to the WWE title match at Saturday Night's Main Event and it's what will lead to the ladder match in the 2025 Royal Rumble. Whether this means that Owens will finally rise again or not is yet to be seen, but to many, Owens is very justified in his actions.

Kevin Owens may have taken it a tad bit too far when he brutally attacked Randy Orton, but a surprisingly large number of people agree with his sentiment towards the current WWE Champion Cody Rhodes.