It shouldn’t be that hard to have Roman Reigns drop one of his titles without losing

Here are three quick ideas on how Roman Reigns can drop the WWE Championship without losing a match.

WWE apparently has itself a Roman Reigns dilemma.

Reigns is in the midst of the best run of his career, one that has seen him ascend to become WWE’s unquestioned top star. A big part of his current mystique is his dominance as champion: Reigns has held the Universal Championship for more than two years, and added the WWE Championship in a winner takes all title match against Brock Lesnar at WrestleMania 38.

[lawrence-related id=831]

For the continuing aura of the Tribal Chief/Head of the Table, having both of WWE’s most important men’s titles on him is great. For business at next year’s WrestleMania? Not so much.

Two championship matches are better than one. Particularly with WrestleMania remaining a two-night event, it would be ideal to have the Universal and WWE Championships up for grabs in different bouts.

That brings us back to the dilemma, and a tweet from WrestleVotes that got the wrestling world talking this week.

There’s definitely a balancing act here, as WWE wants to split the titles while keeping Reigns as strong as possible. Ideally, that means he doesn’t lose, maintaining his ridiculously long streak of competing without being pinned or submitted.

[lawrence-related id=9211]

But is it really “complex”? Not really, as WWE has several options, from tried and true wrestling tropes to slightly more involved methods of moving one championship to someone else.

The simple answer: Just book a Triple Threat match

Fightful’s Sean Ross Sapp got right to the point here on Tuesday.

Three-way matches are wrestling’s most reliable “have someone lose without losing” mechanic. There’s still an issue because of the two titles, but there is precedent for having these kinds of matches where championships are won on each fall.

So let’s play it out. At Royal Rumble, Reigns ends up booked for a Triple Threat against two contenders. Could be Drew McIntyre and Karrion Kross. How about Kevin Owens and Seth Rollins? There’s time to figure that part out, but the key is that the match is two falls, with the WWE Championship awarded on the first fall and the Universal Championship on the second.

The other handy part of a Triple Threat is that there are no disqualifications, so anyone needed can be involved. For our purposes, that means Reigns’ eventual WrestleMania opponent (dare we dream, The Rock?) can intervene and somehow have him occupied while one of his two contenders pins the other. Presto, new WWE Champion.

An enraged Reigns returns to the ring and runs roughshod over both of his foes. He eventually pins one of them and retains the Universal Championship. This accomplishes everything pretty cleanly: The titles are separated, whoever took Roman out of play can feud with him at WrestleMania, and the Royal Rumble winner can challenge the new WWE Champion.

Most importantly, Reigns didn’t lose, a fact he can remind us of for two-plus months until WrestleMania arrives.

The slightly more creative answer: Paul Heyman machinations

Though Paul Heyman never doubts his Tribal Chief, WWE has done a nice job of making him sweat certain situations. For example, leading up to SummerSlam, Heyman was concerned about the toll that a Last Man Standing match against Lesnar would take on Reigns and tried to persuade Austin Theory to promise not to cash in his Money in the Bank contract at the event. That’s good, believable stuff.

So why wouldn’t Heyman have a plan to prevent Reigns from losing both titles if the unthinkable happened? Liam Happe of DAZN thinks he would.

Happe is right, because Theory’s briefcase is the ultimate tool for something like this. The assumption is that because Reigns has both championships, the MITB contract allows the holder to challenge for both.

But that’s not necessarily the case. Would someone as smug and self-assured as Theory even read the contract? It would be a great gotcha moment for Theory to cash in to make a title bout into a Triple Threat match, have him or someone else win (again, Reigns doesn’t have to be pinned in this scenario), think they’ve claimed both titles and then have Heyman say, “Nope, sorry, you should have read the fine print.”

And at the end of the day, whoever it is still has one of the world titles, so that’s not a bad consolation prize.

The even more creative answer: Borrow a page from boxing

Because of the multiple world championships in boxing and the internal politics between the sanctioning bodies and promoters, there have been plenty of times when a champ simply dislikes the idea of fighting a mandatory contender so much that they take a different fight instead. Generally, it’s because they can make more money facing another opponent, and sometimes they also feel the mandatory contender is beneath them and a waste of their time.

This is an idea that can easily be borrowed for Reigns’ situation to have him drop a championship without losing — or in this case, without wrestling at all. Let’s say WWE officials decide to spice things up by naming separate No. 1 contenders for the WWE and Universal Championships. Then the man in line for the WWE Championship becomes someone Reigns wouldn’t want to fight … Jey Uso.

Reigns would expect Jey to stand down, but he surprises his cousin by saying he wants to step up and take his shot. The Bloodline beats Jey down and kicks him out of the group.

But Reigns still won’t fight him, because he feels Jey isn’t worth his effort, which is the ultimate slap in the face. WWE declares the belt vacant and Jey faces the next person in line to crown a new champ. Reigns and Heyman are enraged but there’s nothing they can do.

Roman can continue to belittle the WWE Champion even after they win it, noting that no one beat him for that title and he simply let it go, the Universal Championship is the “real” championship, etc. That gives Jey or whoever beat him some work to do to restore the other title to its proper glory in the eyes of all, which is fun story fodder in its own right.

These are just a few quick ideas, and it’s likely Triple H and the creative team will consider many more. The point is that while there is some thought that has to go into it, it’s not really that difficult to envision heading into WrestleMania 39 with Reigns as Universal Champion and someone else as WWE Champion, all without Roman ever having to have his shoulders pinned for three.