I had a thought as Raw kicked off from…North Caroliiinaaaa: Are they making Jacob Fatu too ill? Is everything the territory is doing making him more of a babyface, which goes against the story they’re telling?
Sure enough, as soon as his music hit and he hit the ring, his name echoed throughout the arena. The people love this man and want nothing but good things for him. They cheered Roman Reigns, of course, but there’s a weird dynamic happening.
For starters, there’s the fact that Jacob got screwed at Backlash and the audience knows that despite WWE not mentioning it. Then there’s everything that happened here that only furthered the point. Roman wanted to call out Jacob but Jacob beat him to the punch. And after some war of words between Jacob, The Usos, and the World Heavyweight champ, a fight broke out because of course it did. That put is in three on one situation.
Roman by himself couldn’t take down Jacob. Jey Uso or Jimmy Uso solo couldn’t do it either. It took three men to put down the werewolf. And they struggled even with that advantage!
How can I not cheer for this guy? How can anyone else in the audience not? There’s a thing in wrestling where the person who fights the hardest and overcomes the most odds usually wins the audience’s adulation. When that same person is battling three people by themselves and not going down easily, that makes the cheers louder.
Right now, Jacob Fatu looks like the coolest dude in the room. He challenged Roman to Tribal Combat, which Roman accepted. I still don’t know where this is going because I just don’t see Jacob acknowledging anyone and kowtowing to his big cousin. In fact, I think doing so at this juncture takes away the coolness he’s cultivated.
I have no clue what’s going to happen and I can’t say I’m on board with every bit of plotting here, but I’m still onboard because of everything happening with Jacob right now. Will WWE capitalize? I hope so. But I can’t say I know what even that looks like.
My minor complaints aside, this was a very fun, swift, and awesome showing for Raw. The crowd carried the energy most of the night and the action in the ring didn’t disappoint. Saturday Night’s Main Event looks like a pretty big show, as does Clash in Italy. Building to two shows at once isn’t always WWE’s strength but they’re pulling it off well.
What say you, Cagesiders? Does Jacob need to defeat Roman for all of this to make sense?
