WWE's Biggest Mistake With Bray Wyatt Is Obvious

It's hard to believe it's been over two years since Bray Wyatt tragically passed away at only 36 years old, leaving behind a rich and complicated wrestling legacy. Indeed, Wyatt's wrestling career is a tough nut to crack when looking at its totality. All agree that Wyatt was among the most creative wrestlers of the 21st century, an out of the box thinker who always seemed to be trying new ideas or reinventing himself. It's why Wyatt was a captivating performer from the moment he debuted the persona in "NXT," and why fans continued to be interested in him from his "Eater of Worlds" days on the main roster to his WWE Championship run to his time as The Fiend to his brief, final run in WWE from late 2022 to early 2023. Whatever one thought of Wyatt's character or ideas, no one could deny that he was always interesting. The problem, however, was that WWE wasn't always quick to capitalize on Wyatt's creativity. 

A look at Wyatt's career shows that WWE's booking of him was riddled with mistakes. When Wyatt was starting to gain serious momentum in early 2014, he was cooled off via a WrestleMania program with John Cena that saw Cena come out on top of the feud. When he finally won the WWE Championship in early 2017, he lost it to Randy Orton in a WrestleMania match most would like to forget. That goes doubly for Wyatt's 2019 Hell in a Cell match with Seth Rollins, a match that to this day is still considered among the worst matches in WWE history. That's just some of the mistakes WWE made along the way with Wyatt that, if done better, could've enhanced his legacy. But arguably the biggest mistake WWE made with Wyatt was failing to make one simple acknowledgement while he was alive; his familial ties to brother Bo Dallas.

It is easy to forget that, for the longest time, both Wyatt and Dallas, the sons of WWE Hall of Famer Mike Rotunda, were in WWE at the same time. Despite that, they hardly, if ever, crossed paths, with Wyatt staying in his own universe, usually higher up the card, while Dallas, after a successful run as a top star in "NXT," struggled to find his footing on the main roster before disappearing off TV in December 2019 due to injuries, later being released in 2021. Through all that time, it was never acknowledged that the two were actually related. While many didn't pay much mind to it at the time, in retrospect, it feels like a missed opportunity on WWE's part. While Wyatt already had plenty of lore to his name, adding Dallas to it as his brother surely wouldn't have hurt, and given Dallas' lowly stature through most of his WWE run, putting him with Wyatt seems like it would've been nothing but a positive.

Ironically enough, WWE seemed to figure that out, albeit towards the end of Wyatt's life and then after his death. After several years away from WWE, Dallas returned portraying "Uncle Howdy" during Wyatt's own return, a run that was cut off following Wyatt's passing. A year later, Dallas re-emerged as Howdy, leading the Wyatt Sicks stable as a tribute to his brother. Though the faction has had its starts and stops, similar to Wyatt himself, Dallas has found more consistent success with the group, including leading Wyatt Sicks members Dexter Lumis and Joe Gacy to the WWE Tag Team Championships earlier this year. Looking at that, it's hard to argue that it wouldn't have been beneficial to put Dallas and Wyatt together much earlier than they did, or at least even acknowledge that they were related much earlier.