The Story So Far: Jacob Fatu Vs. LA Knight At WWE WrestleMania 41

One year on from his WrestleMania debut, LA Knight will be defending his United States Championship against Jacob Fatu at WWE WrestleMania 41. Fatu will himself be wrestling his first appearance at the "Show of Shows" after debuting as part of Solo Sikoa's Bloodline last year, and will be doing so in his first opportunity at singles gold, while Knight is defending his second reign with the title after recapturing it in March.

"The Samoan Werewolf" earned his opportunity at the title as he seemingly brought his feud with Braun Strowman to a close, winning a Last Man Standing during "WWE SmackDown" after weeks of costing one another respective shots at gold; Strowman had secured his opportunity with a technical win over Fatu, owing to Sikoa and Tama Tonga interfering on behalf of their teammate, leading to a title bout between Strowman and Knight that saw Fatu interfere to take both out. 

It's been a hard-fought journey for Fatu to finally get a one-on-one shot at a WWE champion at "The Grandest Stage of Them All," and despite constant battling between them in their pursuit of the title since the beginning of the year as well as Knight's history with The Bloodline, this will be their maiden singles bout at long last. With that in mind, this is the story so far.

Knight was originally thwarted by Fatu and Tonga in his pursuit of the United States Championship he had lost to Shinsuke Nakamura at the turn of the new year, with them interfering in his rematch and giving him the ill-fabled disqualification win but no title change. 

Knight defeated Tonga in singles action and then teamed with Damian Priest to win a tag bout against the pair of Tonga and Fatu in the following weeks, with Fatu and Knight then entering the Royal Rumble match; Knight was eliminated by the returning AJ Styles, while Fatu was eliminated by his rival Strowman – just a week after their first bout ended inconclusively.

In the absence of Sikoa, Fatu stepped up to pursue the WWE Championship opportunity on the line at Elimination Chamber, but found his feud with Strowman costing him a three-way qualifier to Priest. 

Strowman and Priest teamed up to get the win over Fatu and Tonga a week later and thus continued the yet undecided singles feud between Fatu and Strowman. The next week Fatu was in another three-way against Knight and Carmelo Hayes to determine a new number one contender for the United States Championship, won by Knight as he went on to regain the title from Nakamura.

With Knight once again holding the title, Fatu staked his claim for the next shot alongside Carmelo Hayes, Andrade, and Strowman; Fatu was booked to face Andrade while Strowman would face Hayes, and with Fatu winning the earlier bout Sikoa and Tonga sought to help their teammate out causing Strowman to be disqualified. It was determined instead by General Manager Adam Pearce that Strowman and Fatu were to face one another for the number one contendership, which led to Strowman's victory by disqualification when – as mentioned before – Sikoa and Tonga once again got involved, leading to Fatu costing Strowman the subsequent title shot.

One of the prominent subplots to Fatu's WrestleMania title challenge is his current standing with Sikoa, with whom he was explicitly angry for his abandonment after losing to Reigns in January, and making it clear that he wants to take the reins on his direction. 

To this point, Sikoa has expressed that he is supportive of his enforcer's attempted break out, but in actuality has continued to get involved when he feels the time is appropriate. It's a question of whether Sikoa will truly be able to tolerate that he is no longer the forefront of The Bloodline, or whether he will once again find his desire to help above Fatu's request and potentially cost him again.

On the other hand, this is just the latest conflict for Knight to be entrenched in The Bloodline dynamics, with him fighting against Sikoa since he was challenging for the WWE Championship in 2023. Alongside the likes of Cody Rhodes and Jey Uso, Knight is perhaps one of the more prominent antagonists for both iterations of The Bloodline at this stage. But there is also the question of whether Strowman will have anything more to say about his rivalry with Fatu after barely missing out on the WrestleMania title shot. Either way, all signs are pointing towards some form of outside interference, and time will tell how that unfolds.