Match Spotlight: Sami Zayn Vs. Roman Reigns, WWE Elimination Chamber 2023

The WWE Elimination Chamber Premium Live Event has become the trademark final stop on the road to WrestleMania, but the event does sometimes suffer from feeling a bit inconsequential due to the WrestleMania plans already being set in stone. Outside of the Chamber match (or matches) that determine who gets a shot at the champions that weren't picked by the Royal Rumble winners, a lot of the matches can be a bit formulaic as WWE doesn't want to rock the boat so close to the biggest show of the year. However, that isn't what happened in 2023.

The road to WrestleMania 39 has gone down as one of the most celebrated periods in WWE's recent history. The company was experiencing a fresh boom period thanks to Paul "Triple H" Levesque taking over the creative direction of the company from the "retired" Vince McMahon. He already had a lot of good will from his time booking "WWE NXT" and fans were excited to see what he could produce on the main roster, resulting in boosted ticket sales, TV sales, and overall interest.

Leading the company in the main event scene was The Bloodline Saga. Roman Reigns was no longer "The Big Dog" and had reached his final form as the "Tribal Chief," and along with The Usos, Solo Sikoa, and Paul Heyman, The Bloodline dominated every aspect of the WWE main event picture. Then Sami Zayn came along, the always beloved Canadian who eventually became an honorary member of the group thanks to his devotion to Reigns, and the fact that Jimmy Uso took a shining to him. Jey Uso would eventually warm up to Zayn as well and Zayn went from being a puppy-like cheerleader to an official member of the group.

Things got tricky towards the end of 2022 and the beginning of 2023 when Reigns feuded with Zayn's long-time friend Kevin Owens. After being pushed around by the "Tribal Chief" to take down his friend, Zayn snapped, hit Reigns with a chair at the 2023 Royal Rumble, and the wheels were in motion for a showdown between Zayn and Reigns.

That showdown would come at the 2023 Elimination Chamber Premium Live Event in Zayn's hometown of Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It was one of the biggest matches WWE could book at the time, and given Zayn's popularity, there was genuine belief from fans that Zayn could put an end to Reigns' then 902 day run as the Undisputed WWE Universal Champion. Since this year's Elimination Chamber show is right around the corner, let's wind back the clock a few years to shine a spotlight on one of the best main events in the history of the event, Roman Reigns vs. Sami Zayn for the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship.

Every once in a while, WWE lands itself in a situation where the biggest story in the company ends up in the exact place it needs to be. It happened with John Cena and CM Punk in Chicago, it happened with Cena again when he went to the Hammerstein Ballroom to face Rob Van Dam, and it happened here. There is not a single person inside the Bell Centre that was routing for Roman Reigns. No matter how much work he had put in across his 900+ day run as the "Head of the Table" in WWE, the fans in Montreal wanted to see him get what had been coming to him for months.

You can feel the anticipation through the screen when the bell rings, even after all of the time that has passed since this match went down. The crowd going through waves of excitement, love, hatred, every emotion imaginable just waiting for these two to finally lock up, and when they do, it's absolutely brilliant. Zayn is at his best when he is the scrappy underdog fighting against the odds, and the odds don't get any bigger than the "Tribal Chief," especially when he cuts Zayn off to start his great heat segment. Reigns starts mouthing off to anyone that can hear his voice, he takes Zayn right up to his wife and kids to say "I don't want to hurt your man, but he deserves this." The rest of the fans in the front row are seething as Reigns just swaggers his way through this part of the match. When people use the word "aura" to describe someone, Reigns in this part of the bout is what they mean.

The crowd naturally comes unglued when Zayn starts mounting a comeback, to the point where even the moves that have never put anyone away like the Blue Thunder Bomb and the Sunset Flip Powerbomb produce genuine leap out of your seat moments. It's almost as if the crowd is willing Zayn on, and after both men kick out of each other's finishers, which is a gripe of mine that has just become the norm in wrestling these days, it's anybody's ball game.

Then the referee goes down and you know what's coming by now. Here comes Jimmy Uso to help his cousin out, but Jey Uso is the one to hesitate, causing even more descension in the family that would become important later down the line. The steel chair from the Royal Rumble makes an appearance, and this time it's Zayn who takes a hellacious amount of punishment, and is eventually put down with a Spear as Reigns retains his crown. Some might call it a flat finish, but those people are the ones who genuinely thought Zayn was going to win when the vast majority of people knew he wasn't. Does it need to be over 30 minutes long? Probably not, but it's one of the best "Bloodline" matches from this period. 

While Sami Zayn might not have known it in the moment, but he ultimately became the reason why The Bloodline fell apart. Roman Reigns' treatment of Zayn made Jey Uso see the light, which led to Jimmy Uso siding with his brother, which resulted in the entire faction crumbling beneath everyone's feet.

To put it simply, The Bloodline Saga is one of the greatest storylines in WWE history and is probably more responsible for the boom period WWE would go on to have in the 2020s than anything else (yes, even more than Vince leaving). With that said, it can't be understated how interest in the story just dramatically dropped once Zayn was no longer a part of the plot. I'm not saying Sami Zayn is the reason for WWE's most recent golden period, but he was the final piece of the puzzle for The Bloodline and the stories that went with it. 

Zayn would reunite with who else but Kevin Owens, who came out to make the save at the end of Elimination Chamber 2023 as The Bloodline looked to beat Zayn down even more. While there were people with genuine arguments for Zayn being the one to dethrone Reigns, Zayn did get a big moment of his own alongside Owens as they dethroned The Usos for the Undisputed WWE Tag Team Championships in the night one main event of WrestleMania 39. To this day, it's the only time the tag straps have had the honor of closing WrestleMania, and those belts were given that platform thanks to the work Zayn and The Usos did in the months leading up to it.

Reigns controversially beat Cody Rhodes in the other WrestleMania 39 main event, but the cracks had already began to show in The Bloodline, and by Money in the Bank in July, the group had a civil war on its hands. Jey was finally able to get out from Reigns' spell and actually handed the "Tribal Chief" his first pinfall loss in three-and-a-half years, earning him a title shot at that year's SummerSlam. As we all know, Reigns would beat Jey at SummerSlam in another match where people thought that would have been the perfect time for Reigns to drop the titles, especially considering the entire saga would fizzle away by the end of 2023.

Fortunately, The Rock would inject some life in the saga at the start of 2024 when Cody Rhodes came back for another shot at Reigns, but that is a match spotlight for another time.