Sami Zayn believes he and Roman Reigns could have headlined WrestleMania 39.
The current reigning tag champion had the hottest story leading up to this year’s Showcase of the Immortals due to his involvement with The Bloodline and his superstar-making moment of hitting the Reigns with a steel chair at the Royal Rumble. While he did get his matchup with the Tribal Chief at the Elimination Chamber, he ended up main eventing night one with his good friend Kevin Owens in a tag matchup against the Usos.
Zayn discussed his feud with Reigns during an interview with Mark Andrews. He says that he knows that WWE had to stick to the Cody Rhodes storyline, and was happy that both stories could help elevate the other.
There was a time period going from Survivor Series building into the Rumble and especially right before and right after the Rumble. I 100% thought it could go to me and Roman at Mania and it would be the best story, but that just wasn’t in the cards. We talk about plans, and it’s very hard to have a plan and stick with it, there are all these other variables. A variable pops up, which is Cody’s return. It was a good thing. There was no rejection, he was widely accepted, and they wanted him and they wanted him in the role he came back in. They were happy to see him win the Rumble, they wanted him to dethrone Roman Reigns. The stories even rubbed up on each other, where Cody rubbed up on us, we rubbed up on him, and the whole thing was helping each other. Everybody was lifting everybody. That’s when wrestling is done right. Everyone is elevating one another.
Staying on the subject of The Bloodline, Zayn says that everyone who worked with Roman Reigns got elevated to the next level, a true testament to the current world champion’s work as the top guy.
Obviously, Roman Reigns is the biggest star, but when you put me in there, because it adds a new layer, even if it’s not something you could say out loud, ‘Sami Zayn could elevate the Bloodline’ because they are a top act. I gave it a new dimension. I helped them, but they helped me immensely at that point. Me interacting with the Bloodline and Roman brought my stock up so much. It was a case of the tide rising for everybody. When Cody came back, it was the same thing. He’s a huge a star, I was rubbing up with him. The tide was going up for everybody. That’s what made that eight – nine month period exciting. It was fun to watch the whole tide rise for everybody involved.
Elsewhere in the interview Zayn spoke about Cody Rhodes coming up short against Roman Reigns at WrestleMania 39. You can read his comments about that here.
(H/T and transcribed by Fightful)