Shocking news out of this week’s WWE Raw with the announcement that WWE Universal Champion Roman Reigns will be stepping away from the wrestling world to focus on his battle with Leukaemia. Raw kicked off with Reigns making his way to the ring with a look on his face that hinted that this was not a regular appearance for the WWE Superstar and soon revealed that to be the case as he ‘pulled back the curtain’ with some personal information firstly with the mentioning of this real-life first name Joe. This is something that may not sound like a big deal to most but the acknowledgement of a real-life persona outside of the WWE Universe is not something that happens within the actual show often at all and was a telling sign that some important news was about to come.
Roman Reigns would go on to explain that he had previously fought Leukaemia back in 2008 but that the illness had recently come back for the 33 year old as fans in the arena turned their pantomime cheers and boos into real-life gasps. The wrestler from the legendary Anoa’i family went on to say “I’m not going to lie, I’ll take every prayer you can send my way but I’m not looking for sympathy, I’m not looking for you to feel bad for me because I have faith” and would later say “I want to make one thing clear: By no means is this a retirement speech because after I’m done whupping leukaemia’s ass, I’m coming back home“.
The heart wrenching segment would come to an end as Roman made his way up the ramp to be joined by his brothers in The Shield, two men that have been alongside Roman throughout his WWE career in both storyline and real-life. Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins would initiate their trademark fist bump with Roman with emotion running high as Ambrose looked blankly into the packed arena and Rollins could not stop the flow of tears down his cheeks. A truly emotional moment that will go down in the history of the WWE.
We at Rebellious Noise would like to extend our prayers to Roman Reigns and the rest of the Anoa’i family at this difficult time and thank them for all of the great memories in the WWE so far, we are in your corner for this one Roman.