How the WWE Can Make a Huge Star Out of Erick Rowan

Hello everyone and welcome back to Talk Wrestling World, I hope you are all well and good! The two thousand and sixteen brand split last year was one of the best moved the WWE could have made. Separating the roster in half with one set working Monday nights over on RAW and the other sporting the blue brand on Tuesday nights over on Smackdown LIVE we were able to see stars such as the Miz, Baron Corbin, Bray Wyatt, Naomi, and Braun Strowman to name a few rise to the top after finally being given the opportunity to compete at a higher level and position on the roster they had always truly belonged in. Almost a year later and several more changes have been made; the Superstar shakeup a couple of months back being one of the biggest changes. With Monday night RAW introducing the likes of Alexa Bliss, Bray Wyatt, Dean Ambrose and The Miz to its roster the blue brand suffered several huge loses and its roster did appear much smaller and far less prestige. Since the superstar shake up we really have seen a change in the dynamics. Fans had previously labeled Smackdown LIVE the A show with the weekly product providing much more gripping and entertaining work with the overall show being put together far better. However, even I have to admit that at the moment I am most certainly enjoying the work from Monday Night RAW a little more. However, saying that, they men and women of Smackdown LIVE continue to impress with strong character development and pushes for stars such as Carmella and Jinder Mahal  looking promising for the future. Keeping that in mind I wanted to focus on Smackdown LIVE this month and in today's blog post we are going to be doing just while also remaining on the topic of superstar pushes as I tell you why Erick Rowan should be the next WWE superstar to receive a big singles push. If you have been following me for long enough you will know that I have pretty much always been a huge Erick Rowan fan and while I have previously had my doubts on a singles run for him I honestly do believe that if the WWE invested enough time in him they could be onto something pretty damn strong here. As always any recent blog posts will be linked bellow and you can let me know what you thought of today's post by leaving a comment at the end or by dropping me a tweet over at @TezangiVictoria.

If you have been following me for long enough you will most certainly be aware of the fact that I am a huge Erick Rowan fan, I have been pretty much from day one. While he isn't the worlds most popular WWE superstar he has always been someone that has grabbed my attention and someone I most certainly have been interested in. Not to mention that I have a major crush on the guy.... completely irrelevant. Throughout his career Rowan has failed to truly standout and fans have never really considered him to be someone worthy of investing time and money into and turning into a bog main event star. However, he has had several standout moments and there has never been any denying the fact that he does have a great deal of potential. Rowans best work to date has been his in ring tag team stuff with Luke Harper. While the pair were never given the opportunity to take over the tag team division and unfortunately were never able to hold onto the tag team championships they competed in a number of standout matches against the likes of the Usos which truly did show both men to poses great talent and worthy of a push within the tag team division. Looking back it really is such a shame that the company never truly jumped on board with these guys and given them the big push the most certainly deserved. Now, recently I have spoken about both Luke Harper and Erick Rowan a great deal both here on my blog and over on twitter. With Bray Wyatt now competing for Monday night RAW the former duo have been left with pretty much nothing going for them and as I mentioned in my Backlash review both guys appear to be a little lost on the roster and in  need of something that allows them to find a place on the roster that works. I have mentioned that I would honestly love it if they got back together and worked as a tag team again. It wouldn't have been the most difficult task writing them back together and once they had been pared back up again they really could have been the dominant tag team the Smackdown LIVE tag team division is desperately in need of. I will be talking about Harper and Rowan as a team in a future blog post so do make sure to look out for that. Now, with the WWE clearly not having any plans on reuniting these two as duo any time soon we have to take a look at their singles careers. In the past both men have struggled to go at it alone. Despite having all the talent and a decent following they just couldn't stand on their own two feet. No storyline or feud really worked and just like we are seeing now, they were lost in a roster.


Before I get started on how I would book Rowans push and the storyline I would focus on over the summer I wanna tell you little about why I think Rowan should get a push. I have expressed in the past the fact that personally I have always been a bigger Luke Harper fan and while he is clearly the better in ring performer of the two I honestly do feel as though there is plenty the WWE could do with Rowan. Now, building him as a star worthy of a push is going to be difficult. Rowan isn't a man that has a huge following and his odd booking over the years has put him in a strange position. However, he has an interesting and captivating look and the fact that there is so much potential there makes him someone I want to see the WWE invest their time. He's the one superstar they wouldn't have to work very hard on in terms of making his push feel as though it makes sense. We have seen the WWE take a risk with superstars in the past, for gods sake, Jinder Mahal is the WWE champion, anything is possible. While I don't believe Rowan will be a future world champion there's something there and I strongly strongly believe they could be onto something real special if they just dedicated the time to him and a gripping storyline.

Building Rowans Character

We start things off by taking a look at how we would build up Rowans character. At the moment we can see the WWE are trying to work on something and appear to be going in a certain direction however, there is a lack of consistency and no one really knows anything about him or what he is all about. Now, I want to keep a certain degree of mystery to Rowans character. I don't want to all of a sudden through Rowan into something that exposes him completely and forces him to adapt a whole new change to his in ring persona. Instead we would take several months to really work on telling the story of Erick Rowan. Since his arrival in the WWE he has been apart of a faction that sees him follower a leader, that leading being the focus point and the only superstar of the trio we really know anything about. While Bray may be on the RAW roster right now he will continue to play apart in this story and the character development of Erick Rowan. As we have already touched on, we have seen parts of Rowans character during his singles run in the past. He's worked as a baby face but struggled to get over the fans due to the lack of story but during that time we got to see a little insight into the mind of Erick Rowan. He came across rather likable and almost childlike and this is something we would really focus on in my story. Throughout this push we see a real dark side to Rowan; he's beat downs, attacks and performances in the ring showcase him to be a dominant monster but the hints of remorse, regret, and upset after a loss confuses us as fans because we actually start to feel a little sorry for him. We begin to realize that this was once a good man manipulated and controlled by Bray Wyatt and now going at it alone he is struggling to pick a side of his character to portray almost too lost to turn back. Another element I want to focus on is the deranged side of his character. We see him constantly just doing weird things, being in the wrong place at the wrong time, walking around the arena and in through the crowds during matches, wondering around backstage, every time we see him of course wearing one of his iconic masks. I'm also going to focus on his liking for Renee Young. Don't worry my story won't end in Renee Young being revealed as Sister Abigail and she won't all of sudden start wrestling but she will play a big part in the character development of Erick Rowan. In the past we have seen him pay extra attention to her and we have seen Renee completely freaked out by his actions and this is something I want to see more of. Developing a obsession with Renee he switches up between being rather gentle and kind giving her gifts to going back to being just plain weird, bursting balloons in her face as he did on a recent episode of talking Smack. The balloon thing is something that will also come into play eventually as I will go into more detail a little later on. Over the next month and a half we see Rowan in the background of Renee's interviews, he himself is being interviewed by Renee and when Young isn't interviewing he asks where "she" is not exactly saying her name. His obsession with blondes develops as he starts to mimic those actions upon the other blonde female talent on the roster. Handing out balloons to the likes of Natalya and Carmella (this allows a brutal squash match between Rowan and Ellsworth to take place on an episode of Smackdown LIVE). Throughout the next six months we really do start to learn about Rowan and while all these little things may not be to everyone's taste they give more depth to Rowans character and sets up what will go down at the Summer Slam pay per view later on.

Erick Rowan VS Luke Harper

Now, we all watched it, we saw, Luke Harper VS Erick Rowan at the WWE Backlash pay per view this past Sunday was nothing special. It was a rather boring match with nothing to it what so ever and it honestly just felt like a filler. However, I do believe that they are capable of delivering a fantastic match that could impress us all but what they need is a good story. There was no effort made in the build up to their Backlash match and so it didn't feel like anything I or anyone should be paying attention to. There was no reason given to us to feel emotionally invested in this match. Now, in my little dream booking world we keep the feud going between these two but the in depth storytelling is what will make this so different to what we have already seen. We can expect the fact the Wyatt family will not be getting back together or at least anytime soon and so its now time to start finally telling the story of these guys and answering some of the burning questions the WWE universe have had for years. The focus point of this storyline is Rowans hurt and anger towards Luke Harper for splitting up the family. In promos and segments and interviews we hear Rowan vent his frustrations and upset over the split of the Wyatt family, the only family he had ever truly felt apart of and again apart of us actually feels sorry for him. Resting the blame completely on Harper Rowan is driven by the thought of revenge however deep down he does still want his family back. We see them collide a few times on Smackdown LIVE both in the occasional singles match and tag team action where they constantly pitted against one another however Rowan forever struggles to pick up the victory and get the upper hand. We do however see him getting better in the ring. In between competing against Harper Rowan able to pick enough momentum for him to remain a talking point. He's matches against other superstars on the roster show him to be completely dominant. Focusing more so on the story between the former "brothers" throughout the build up of their inevitable big pay per view match we learn more about them and their history as part of the Wyatt Family. We learn about the sacrifices they made, the torture they endeavored, and their lifestyle. Heated confrontations break out between the two as Harper is aware of the fact he was manipulated and has a strong hatred towards Bray and his previous lifestyle wanting to leave it in the past, while Rowan on the other hand continues to see Bray as his Savior and that lifestyle as something that saved him. The pair just cannot agree on everything and it creates more tension between them. One thing that continues to pop up during their feud is Sister Abigail. Its the one mystery that remained unsolved. We constantly see Rowan attempt to talk about her but he is shut down by Luke every single time being told not to talk about her, you can't mention her name or even being shoved or hit by Harper to stop Rowan from talking about Abigail. Erick's obsession with her is something that consumes him and we can see now the link between his obsession with her and his obsession with Renee Young and the rest of the blonde female talent. During an interview with Renee Rowan calls her Abigail and walks off and the confused look on Renee's face after says it all.

Money in the Bank and Summer Slam

The Money in the bank and Summer Slam pay per view are where things come to an even more interesting and entertaining time. In the build up to Money in the Bank Harper and Rowan face off in a qualifying match witch in the end sees Luke pick up the victory once again however this time there is a different feel. While he walked in and out of this match the favourite and over with the fans we see Rowan completely distraught after his loss. We see him sitting on the mat talking to himself. We here him mutter to himself saying things along the lines of he blew it, this was his big chance, that she would be disappointed, he let her down. The Money in the bank ladder match was his chance to prove himself and make a statement. Harper watching his former ally look so broken actually makes him feel bad and so he attempts to comfort Rowan only to be attacked once again. At the pay per view itself Harper competes and looks to be having an impressive performance and as he appears to be closing in on reaching up to the briefcase out comes Erick Rowan who unleashes complete carnage attacking Harper in the most brutal attack to date. Dragging him backstage we don't see the pair for another week or so. On an episode of Smackdown Harper is dragged out to the ring by Rowan the pair both sporting masks. In the middle of the ring Rowan cuts a very strong promo where he speaks about reuniting his family and how he is almost there.The two superstars however brawl once again after Harper for a while goes alone with Rowans plans but we learn quickly he was tricking him the whole time and when he sees the perfect opportunity he takes out Rowan. We soon find out that the pair will go one on one at the Summer Slam pay per view in a no disqualifications match.
So the Summer Slam pay per view soon rolls around and the Luke Harper VS Erick Rowan is booked for the middle of the show, a little pick me up during the night. Now, this is going to be a huge night for both these superstars. They are given around twenty minuets to compete enough time for them to actually provide an entertaining match that has us all on the edge of our seats. Of course this won't be the wrestling match of the night but the impressive spots, the brawl and the story will be enough to make this at least a standout match to say the least. The closing moments of this is what will have everyone talking the most. As Harper looks to be closing in on a victory the lights in the arena go out and of course we all assume it's Bray Wyatt, while he will most probably be involved in his own story and big match at SummerSlam this pay per view will have both RAW and Smackdown LIVE

superstars competing and so it would make sense. However, instead the one and only, Sister Abigail is in the middle of the ring. The look on Harper's face says it all. Completely stunned Luke is frozen and Rowan of course is able to make his move and pick up the victory from Harper's distraction. After the match Rowan bows down to the blonde figure and we now know this is sister Abigail. It probably will seem weird that sister Abigail would come out to help Rowan and not Bray previously during the night but there are plenty of reasons why they wouldn't go down that road. We could have Bray out of action during this time, he could be attacked backstage (Rowan but of course we do not see the attack). But as the weeks follow we learn that Sister Abigail is ashamed of Bray, he did it all wrong, let her down. Rowan is the only man that stayed Loyal and in return she has chosen him to stand alongside. Now, in the future we can learn about the truth of what happened to her, she could be revealed just a fraud, someone else who manipulated Rowan, or an even darker story sees Rowan manipulate the blonde woman, brain wash her and create a new version of sister Abigail sticking with his plan of reuniting his family. There are plenty of different options but either way I do believe that there is a story to be told and if done right the WWE could present us with something truly gripping and entertaining.

The story has a lot to it. Throughout the build up of sister Abigail's debut we get hints that she could be making an appearance and to be fair we have already seen a couple of hints here and there that this could be an option the WWE go down. Rowan has tweeted interesting pictures over the past couple of weeks that have hinted such and its those tweets and the work we have seen from him recently that inspired me to write this blog post in the first place. Now, I would love to know what you guys think and if you believe we could get something along thse lines and if you would be interested in a story like this or even a push for both Harper and Rowan so feel free to leave a comment bellow or drop me a tweet over at @TezangiVictoria.

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