Is Seth Rollins Reckless?

Hi, I’m Justin Watry. You may remember me from such classic columns as March 2012’s “WWE WrestleMania 28: Sheamus Should Defeat Daniel Bryan in Less Than a Minute” and October 2015’s “WWE NXT: Bobby Roode, You’re Next.”

Reader Feedback

Starting in October, I will be doing ‘reader feedback’ only once a month. Going to scale back on all the junk. If you have a question or comment and want a response, now is the time!

ENVYotb73: Seriously…you didn’t honestly say Colts in the superbowl, right?

Big fan of Andrew Luck. I trust the team will win a Super Bowl at some point, so why not this year? Too easy to just say the Packers or Patriots every year. Yawn! Now that you have ripped my prediction, please tell me YOUR Super Bowl pick. We can re-visit this conversation in February 2017. Fair?

AG Awesome: Ummmm, no. Anything could have happened in the Punk fight. Nobody had seen Punk in an actual fight and Gall hasn’t been around all that long to truly gauge his skill level. Yes, it was well established that Punk had issues during sparring but that isn’t the same as an actual UFC PPV fight against someone being paid to fight you. Unless you came from the future (and maybe that would explain the hair) it is IMPOSSIBLE to know what would happen. And how are you able to speak for everyone in Milwaukee? Is it a small town?

Most of your comments are logical, so I will be kind to you here before moving on from the CM Punk/UFC 203 circus. I spoke to somebody I trust from Roufusport in Milwaukee about his training (and wrote about it back in July). He was going to lose and lose handily…and he did. Everybody was well aware of this, despite the transparent hyped up promotion put forth by UFC. Good for the outspoken fighters and media members who called this entire thing the joke that it was. There are more details on this from yours truly (on another website). If you wanted to buy into the dream and hope against hope Punk would be able to muster up some kind of threat, then that is your choice. I knew what I knew, and the whole world saw that last Saturday. Foolish and silly for anybody to STILL be arguing otherwise.

Aaron Earlie: Dean Ambrose is the perfect example of fans getting it WRONG. Roman Reigns was also, but that’s the other side of the spectrum. Where do they go with Dean? Does he feud with Corbin? No more Wyatt I hope. A heel turn for him or Randy? Someone that Cena can beat? Dean Ambrose is damaged goods. He is way too hit or miss and his fans will turn on him quickly. I think the guy has the ability, but what can he do to really branch out. In all honesty, Dean Ambrose, 2 time IC Champ, US Champ, MITB Winner, and WWE Champ hasn’t even broken out of his shell yet. I’m no fan of his, but his upside can be tremendous once he figures it out.

Agreed. Heck, I was already hoping for Dean Ambrose to drop the WWE World Championship at Battleground against Roman Reigns or Seth Rollins. I sensed danger two months ago that this wasn’t going to last. The Summerslam filler against Dolph Ziggler was just for him to extend his title reign another month, but the writing was on the wall – too late to salvage this run. He will find his groove again.

AnInternetToughGuy: You suck almost as much as CM Punk’s MMA skill set.

Well, I’m still here years later, so I must not be THAT bad. Nice username though, made me laugh.

Royberto: “– Oh boy, The Miz and Daniel Bryan have another face to face moment right before the IC Title match. Gotta love those reports of them backing away from being on screen together…”

Well, those “reports” you speak were based on comments from Daniel Bryan himself.

1. The two have been consistently linked together on television since the initial Talking Smack promo, so facts win out in this case. Not Bryan and not reports.

2. No offense, but Daniel Bryan is not somebody I am trusting right now, especially with his thoughts on WWE – the company he blames for keeping him out of the ring even though he has openly lied to them and admitted to hiding the truth about his health. Sorry.

Is Seth Rollins Reckless?

It all started with the Curb Stomp.

Not the controversy of recklessness or anything drastic. Just the question of Seth Rollins and his wrestling. Why was the move suddenly banned? Was it due to Seth Rollins? Could the move be too dangerous? If it was due to the PG rating, how did it get approved of in the first place years ago? This was not a major story by any means, but it was in the months to come…

John Cena’s Broken Nose – I don’t think anybody needs a refresher of what happened here. John Cena and Seth Rollins had a match on RAW in the summer of 2015, and well…one high knee later from the WWE World Champion, the Doctor of Thuganomics had a broken nose and a nasty looking face for a few weeks. Here is how Seth explained it on Talk Is Jericho, transcribed by FoxSports:

“That was really bad. Dude, he looked gnarly. I felt so bad. It was just a knee, we were trading shots and I threw a high knee just for some separation so we could get to whatever the next thing we were doing was and for whatever reason … look, John’ll be the first guy to admit he’s a clumsy fella. He’s not a graceful individual. When he’s not sure about stuff, for his own protection, a lot of times he’ll put his body into whatever you’re doing. When you’re throwing punches at him or forearms, he leans a little bit.”

“It was just one of those things where we talked about it, first time I had really tried it, it wasn’t something that we went over. The timing of it was… call it perfect or imperfect, whatever you want. And I wear kneepads, too, a pretty thick kneepad, and I felt that thing, heard it through the nose. Just a pop and a crunch. He went down and I was like ‘oh no, this is no good.”

Yeah, it wasn’t good. Accident or not, it was indeed a straight knee to the nose. Like a pro, Cena handled it with class and didn’t appear to hold any ill will towards Rollins. Nor would one expect him to. He is ‘the man’ in the industry; no way would he make a big stink about it, at least publicly. There has been NO reports or rumors of any sort of backlash over this incident. The show rolled on…

Sting Retires – Look, for all intents and purpose, Sting retired at WrestleMania 31. Like Mick Foley often says he really retired at No Way Out 2000, it was the same here. Ric Flair? WrestleMania 24. Nothing after that. For The Stinger, now at age 57, was he really supposed to be out there wrestling Seth Rollins for the WWE World Championship at Night of Champions in September 2015? Probably not. Was the near senior citizen in the best shape to be wrestling a guy in his prime nearly half his age? Probably not. Taking a freakin’ powerbomb into the turnbuckle as well? Probably not. Still, it happened, and as history tells us, it jacked up Sting’s body, so much so he collapsed in the squared circle, and the two went right to the finish. Months later, the veteran announced his retirement at the WWE Hall of Fame ceremony.

As noted above, Sting was retiring. Whether then or soon, he had his full career, won titles and was more than ready to hang up the boots. Like Edge. Like Stone Cold Steve Austin. Even if Night of Champions ended without incident, the writing was on the wall. WWE HOF spot and a retirement speech was up next. For Seth Rollins and his reputation though, the questions began. Why was this move even being done? Could Rollins have been more gentle? Who approved that spot? Was it even approved? Did he cause a legend to retire? HOW DARE HE?!?!

Well, leave it to the icon Sting himself to defend Seth Rollins:

“The biggest pleasure. I’m honored. After 30 years and working with some of the best and some of the greatest, [Rollins] is, I’m telling you, he’s got to be the best I’ve ever worked with. I mean, this guy has it. And I think he’s just scratching the surface on what he will do. I’ve never seen somebody as talented. He’s working two [matches] on Raw, two [matches] on the pay-per-view, he’s involved in every other segment and it’s physical. He’s got guys coming from every angle. There’s a lot on his plate. He’s carrying a lot, and he’s handling it. He’s proven he can do it. I’m just glad I had a chance to work with him. He’s the kind of guy who could be in there with a broomstick and make something very interesting happen, a match that people would love somehow.”

Admittedly, that quote came from WWE’s official website, but he has said the same elsewhere too, even going as far as to say the injury was HIS fault. Not Seth Rollins’ at all.

“Really, I can’t say enough. He poked his head in the ambulance and said, “Man, I’m so sorry. I don’t know what happened.” I said, “Seth, don’t worry about it. It’s not your fault.” And he, for 15 minutes, he said, “I just wanted to tell you what an honor it was, what a pleasure. I can’t believe I had a chance to get in the ring with you and work with you. I was you for Halloween when I was a kid.” He was on and on about it, but man, this young guy, he doesn’t have any idea how much I appreciate being able to work with him.”

Sting is always this way. That is why he has such a great reputation with fans and those in the business. Lying or telling the truth, Sting took fault and didn’t say a single negative word about Seth Rollins.

Injures Himself – Technically, I suppose I should mention this. In late 2015, (still) WWE World Champion Seth Rollins injured himself – torn ACL, MCL and meniscus all in one fell swoop. A compete freak accident. He has done this move a thousand times and MUCH more high risks stunts in and out of the ring. It’d be silly to suggest this was anything more. Like football players who suffer major non-contact injuries or even Triple H in 2001 who hurt himself simply by running and throwing a clothesline, these things happen. Rollins missed over six months of action.

Finn Balor/Summerslam 2016 – Seth Rollins returned to WWE to feud with his former Shield buddies, but it was not too long after that he found himself in a WWE Universal Championship bout at Summerslam 2016 versus NXT newcomer Finn Balor. All was going smooth with the two technicians showing why they belonged at the top of RAW…

…and then action spilled to the outside. One running powerbomb into the barricade later, and we had another injury. Balor tried to pop his shoulder back into place and finish the match (which he did). However, the story was far from over. New Universal champion Finn Balor later said he knew the injury was far more serious than initially thought and explained that he didn’t even want to celebrate after his victory. He knew surgery was coming, which meant vacating his new title belt. A tough break for Balor, and another ‘mark’ on Rollins conspiracy theorists.

In nearly one year, we had a previously approved finisher being banned (for whatever reason), a top star suffering a broken nose, a devastating neck injury to a legend, a messed up knee caused by his own doing, and now a RAW megastar about to be pushed to the moon out of action from an errant running powerbomb. Fair or unfair, all have been linked to Seth Rollins.

*Note: I am not even going to discuss the recent death at Seth Rollins’ training center. Shame on anybody who, in any way, puts blame on Seth Rollins for a young man dying. Best wishes to him and his family.*

Public Perception – The reactions have been all across the board. Everybody from Jim Ross to Taz to Matt Morgan and others have backed up Seth Rollins 100% and not thrown any shade his way. Of course, you also have the usual clowns commenting (like the Harts who don’t even deserve this small mention as it is) and fan conspiracy theorists on this topic. How or why one of the absolute BEST has been accused of being reckless or whatever is beyond me, but I admit it – I have not been trained to wrestle nor do I ever plan to. That is not my place to act like I know.

Seth Rollins is has been pushed to the top from NXT to WWE and has been trusted by the entire locker room for years. There is a reason why he has been called “the man” for so long. Taz puts it better that I could, but it is ridiculous to think Vince McMahon and company would give this guy so much if he was reckless…

That is why I looked beyond the public comments made by fellow/former wrestling personalities. Everybody has chimed in, and whether you agree or disagree with their own personal thoughts, opinions are opinions for a reason. However, what about those who wrestlers who choose to comment on Seth Rollins but remain anonymous? That is what I wanted to know. Therefore, I reached out to about 10 former/current wrestling stars for a comment. Names would be withheld for privacy. Minus a few ‘no comment’ responses and simply being told even the thought of it was ludicrous by a current WWE star, here is what I came up with:

Current TNA Impact Wrestling star: “Rollins is a great wrestler. Bad misfortunes when it comes to those injured working with him.”

WWE NXT wrestler: “Seth Rollins is nothing short of a professional and there isn’t anything in his arsenal that I wouldn’t trust him with.”

One of the biggest names on the independent scene: “If your goal is to present a believable illusion of a fight, you go into it accepting an element of danger. Accidents and injuries are going to happen. They’re inevitable. But if three or four performers suffer injuries at the hands of one particular performer, the time comes to reexamine that performer’s style or move set and adjust accordingly to preserve their colleagues’ safety and their own career.”

Not one person said anything outright negative about Seth Rollins, knowing full well their identity would be kept anonymous. If somebody wanted to unload on him and BURY the guy, they could have. Nobody did. Only that last quote suggested perhaps changing things up a bit. As you likely picked up from the tone of this column, I do NOT believe Seth Rollins is reckless. The man is a top star in WWE and has proven himself a million times over. It reminds me of the Styles Clash from last year when everybody started freaking out over its safety. A few occurrences over the course YEARS worth of experience and hundreds of matches per year without incident? Yet, suddenly he is a bum that has a reckless finishing move. Just silly.

Even so, I want to know your thoughts. Is Seth Rollins a reckless wrestler? Yes, no, or still undecided?

Self Promotion
NFL season is finally here! Colts over Packers is my Super Bowl pick, write that down.

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