2016 WWE was an interesting time. The Shield had been broken up for a bit, Brock Lesnar had captured the WWE Championship a few times, and the promotion was introducing a new top title to the RAW brand. Finn Balor was selected to lead the new charge, and while his SummerSlam win ended tragically, he considers it a good memory.
WWE kicked off another brand split that year, and with Dean Ambrose taking the WWE Title to SmackDown, the flagship brand needed its own prize. At SummerSlam, Finn Balor faced Seth Rollins to crown the inaugural Universal Champion. Balor had already beaten Roman Reigns, clean, to earn the opportunity, and when he put Rollins down with the Coup de Grace, fans knew that a new era was upon us.
Thanks for the submission!
Sadly, Balor would dislocate his shoulder during the match, forcing him to vacate the title the next day. As a guest of The Masked Man Show, Balor was asked about that moment, and while he’s ready to prove he can still get to the top, he doesn’t look back on that SummerSlam in a negative way.
“For me, it’s a great memory. For everyone else, it’s this what if. For me, I’m an Irish kid growing up in a small town in a country that has no wrestling industry. No wrestling promotions, no wrestling schools, no wrestling, nothing, barely wrestling on the TV. So to have one wrestling match, that was my goal.” [1:43:35-1:43:52]
While that’s all said and good, Balor knows he has an opportunity to do something big at the Elimination Chamber, and not many more chances after that.
Finn Balor knows the clock is ticking on his WWE career
Balor spoke about the recent retirements of John Cena and AJ Styles, and how that one-two punch of legendary departures affected his process as of late. At WWE Elimination Chamber in Chicago this weekend, Balor has an opportunity to get revenge on CM Punk and win his first World Heavyweight Championship. However, if he doesn’t get it done here, there might not be many more opportunities left.
“Seeing [AJ Styles] retire made me realize the clock’s ticking for me, too. The reality is that retirement is just around the corner, and I seem to have had this giant stain on my career for the last ten years with this injury that cost me the Universal Championship. I feel like no matter how hard I try to remove that stain by winning Intercontinental Championships, US Championships, multiple time tag team champions, going back to NXT and winning the championship there, there’s always this question of… what if?” [1:40:47-1:41:27]
Finn Balor is in the best shape of his life, it seems, at 44 years of age. Can he truly turn the clock back and return to the top of the mountain, where he was destined to be all along? Or will we continue to wonder what if?
Edited by Greg Bush