Why Seth Rollins’ New Challenge Could Make Him a WWE Legend

For those that haven’t noticed, Seth Rollins is much different in 2017 than he was in 2015.

2 years ago, he was the privileged child of Triple H‘s and Stephanie McMahon’s Authority. His gilded path would make him WWE Champion, but his smarmy, cowardly personality made him something much more valuable: he was WWE’s top heel.

Today, Rollins has handed that baton to The Miz, but it’s no demotion for the Kingslayer. Instead, it’s a rare opportunity.

Rollins has already proven that when WWE needs it, they can count on him to be a top level bad guy. Think of it as Rollins beating a level in a video game. But now he’s onto the next level, and if he can trump this, then he joins an esoteric group of wrestlers who can get over as both a heel and a babyface.

Some wrestlers never get over – it’s not an easy thing to do. Some can only be heel and others can only be faces. But only the best can do both. Hulk Hogan was Hollywood Hogan. The Rock did it. So did Eddie Guerrero, Triple H, Shawn Michaels, Bret Hart, Stone Cold, and Edge. John Cena too, but he instead of having good and bad cycles, he does both nearly every night.

And now Rollins is making his attempt at this rare duality (as is Charlotte on Smackdown). In a recent interview with Sporting News, Rollins opened up about what this new task has been like”

“I think it’s been a nice, organic change in my character. We had an opportunity … I could have been a babyface when I came back but it didn’t feel right at the time. Then we had stuff going on with Finn Balor’s injury and stuff like that. It felt from a television perspective watching it back and thinking back on it, it felt like a good, slow burn as opposed to all of a sudden I flipped the switch. People will say what they want about it but I think it’s gone well so far. I think it’s only going to get better as we keep moving forward. It’s something I haven’t done on the main roster since I’ve been up here. I haven’t been a good guy since NXT.”

Does Rollins miss being a heel? Admittedly, a little:

“Sometimes I watch our bad guys, our heels, and see how much fun they’re having, being goofballs. Man, I miss that. It’s a new challenge, especially in 2017 to be a babyface in professional wrestling. I’m trying my damnedest and, hopefully, we’ll keep moving forward and keep things going in the right direction.”

It’s become hip to say the heel/face dichotomy is dead in WWE. But Rollins thinks that it is still vibrantly alive, it’s just shifted:

“You can certainly make the argument that the days of classic babyface and classic heel are dead and gone. But at the same time, I still think there are possibilities for very strong protagonists and strong antagonists in a traditional sense. You look at someone like a Daniel Bryan, pretty much universally loved, I still think there’s a place for it if it’s done right and it can be very exciting if done the right way.”

Rollins babyface run has sputtered for parts of 2017. However, now that he looks to be aligning himself with Dean Ambrose his crowd responses are starting to significantly improve. At this rate, we should expect Rollins to “get over” as a babyface. He’s done nothing but achieve since he’s arrived in WWE so we’d be fools to start doubting him now.