Paul Heyman: Cesaro Is Roman Reigns From A Few Years Ago; Right Guy, Right Place, Wrong Time

Paul Heyman knows all about Cesaro.

The two men were aligned following WrestleMania 30 after Cesaro won the Andre The Giant Memorial Battle Royal. The partnership quickly flamed out as Heyman was still aligned with Brock Lesnar, who had just broken The Undertaker’s famous streak.

Now, they are back together, but on opposite sides as Cesaro is chasing Roman Reigns and the WWE Universal Title.

“Cesaro is ready, willing, able, and the audience is willing to accept Cesaro stepping into the spotlight,” Heyman told DAZN. “The bad news for Cesaro is he’s exactly what Roman Reigns was a few years ago, which was the right guy in the right place at the wrong time. Cesaro is at the top of his game. He deserves the spotlight. That is one magnificent athlete. I think Cesaro was the right guy in the right place at the wrong time before in history, and that’s when he was with me because the reason Cesaro was put with me was not to make Cesaro a main event player. It was the day after WrestleMania 30. It was the day after Brock Lesnar conquered the streak. With Brock Lesnar taking a hiatus, we needed a platform from which Paul Heyman could advocate my client, Brock Lesnar, (who) conquered The Undertaker’s undefeated streak at WrestleMania. The biggest box office that WWE could accomplish was the rematch between Brock Lesnar and The Undertaker. Whether that took six months, a year, or a year-and-a-half, which ended up taking, that was absolutely the undisputed, uncontroverted match to go to. In order to build it up, you needed the advocate repeating those words ad nauseum, ‘My client Brock Lesnar conquered The Undertaker’s undefeated streak at WrestleMania.’ But what reason that I have to be on television without Brock Lesnar available to show up on Mondays.”

Heyman continued by discussing his partnership with Cesaro following WrestleMania 30, saying, “By having Cesaro, I had an excuse to be on television. So that was Cesaro’s role. Cesaro was a supporting player in the ongoing saga between Brock Lesnar and The Undertaker. That’s unfortunate for Cesaro. But in terms of big box office, that was his role. Now years later, Cesaro is ready for a title run. While I love having him on SmackDown and can’t imagine what Raw could offer Smackdown in terms of a trade, Cesaro’s only hope of being the champion of a brand is to go to Raw because he’s not taking a title away from Roman Reigns. He’s just not. It’s not going to happen. Now, Cesaro wants to set his sights on the Intercontinental title, and I happen to like the champion Apollo Crews. Cesaro has a fighting chance there. That’s an interesting matchup. But there’s no one that’s at Roman Reigns’ level right now. No one.”

Reigns is coming off a successful defense of his WWE Universal Title against Daniel Bryan on the April 30 episode of WWE SmackDown.

Cesaro is set to battle Seth Rollins on Friday’s episode of WWE SmackDown.

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