Paul Heyman Says RAW Is The B-Show – During a sit-down interview with Ariel Helwani of BT Sport before Survivor Series, Paul Heyman spoke about the non-existent rivalry between RAW and SmackDown. The Special Council for the Tribal Chief Roman Reigns spoke about why he believes SmackDown has blown RAW out of the water. He also speaks about holding no grudges towards RAW for being let go as the Director of RAW in 2019.
“Oh, there’s no rivalry. SmackDown has beaten the living f*** out of RAW. RAW is clearly the b-show, there is no more competition, we won,” Heyman said. “It is, to me, [a feeling] because Roman Reigns is on SmackDown. I have no bitterness towards RAW, if RAW goes sour, it hurts SmackDown, it hurts WWE, it hurts the stock and if the stock goes sour, it hurts me personally. I don’t want RAW to do bad. I wish RAW would do even better and provide stiffer competition to SmackDown because then if some story emerges on RAW that Roman Reigns can draw box office with, we have another opponent.
“The problem with Roman Reigns is not the limit of his greatness, his greatness gets defined as every performance is put forth before the public. The problem with Roman Reigns is we have such a limited number of people who we can actually, viably work with that people will look at and say that’s an opponent for Roman Reigns, that’s someone I’d like to see challenge the Tribal Chief. That’s why Brock Lesnar’s return is so huge because we don’t have five other people waiting in the wings that can automatically step up and be a credible opponent for Roman Reigns.”
Heyman also spoke about WWE deciding to do separate brands with both RAW superstars and SmackDown superstars and why he thinks separating the roster is a smart idea. The former Advocate of Brock Lesnar said if you had no roster split, Roman Reigns and a select few superstars would dominate the main event scene and give no room for young talent to emerge.
“There’s not enough space for new talent to rise if you’re going to have both shows dominated by the same personalities,” Paul Heyman said. “It’s a matter of the amount of time it takes for a talent to resonate and hit with an audience, and how much you have to define that persona and learn about who this person is and why I should care about them, and why I should pay to see them. If you have both television shows dominated by Roman Reigns and The Usos, Paul Heyman, The Bloodline, Brock Lesnar, Randy Orton, Big E, Becky Lynch, Charlotte, Sasha Banks, Bianca Belair… we now have both shows booked. So when do the young stars emerge? How do you get Humberto Carrillo in a decent spot, how do you get Angel Garza in a decent spot… How long will they have to rise to the top? You need these separate and distinct entities so that there’s three hours to fill on a Monday, so that there’s two hours to fill on a Friday.
“If Roman Reigns just dominates both shows, then you have to keep both storylines cohesive so whoever Roman is working with on RAW, the story continues on SmackDown. The top spot is locked up, the top spot on SmackDown is not the top spot on RAW. Big E has his thing going on RAW with whoever steps up to Big E on RAW, and Roman Reigns has his thing on SmackDown with Brock Lesnar or whoever else comes up against Roman on SmackDown. Once you take that main event position and give it to the same two people, three people on both shows, your main event position is now locked up so how do you rise?”
