Roman Reigns allegedly “had enough of the creative” in WWE when he took his 2020 hiatus

While appearing on Rick Rubin’s Tetragrammaton podcast, Paul Heyman talked about Roman Reigns’ hiatus from WWE during the spring of 2020…

“He’s not exposing himself to this pandemic that we don’t have a grasp on how severe it can be quite just yet and at the same time, he’s had enough of the creative. These things are running concurrently. The feud rivalry story with Baron Corbin over dog food and the infamous sufferin succotash promo had weighed on him enough to where he said, ‘I’ve had enough. I’ve reached the cap. I can’t go any further. As the big dog I’ve peaked. and as an athlete, I haven’t peaked as a performer. I’ve barely scratched the surface. I have so much more to offer and since I’m taking time off, I’m not coming back as the same person.'”

“So Vince [McMahon] calls me in the middle of August and he says, ‘We’re gonna take you back into television. I’m thinking, ‘Oh, oh. He’s gonna make me a commentator and Jim Ross isn’t here. What is a commentator in 2020? How can I be disruptive? How can I be evolutionary in the process? How can I redefine this role because I don’t just want to settle in and do what’s been done already. Even by me, I want to do this differently. I said, ‘Okay, well, what do you got in mind?’ He says, ‘I’m going to put you with somebody.’I’m thinking, ‘Has he read my contract?’ I said, ‘Well, you know Vince, the options are kind of limited in that.’ I’m trying to tiptoe into a delicate situation here where I’m about to butt heads with him. I’m thinking Ronda is pregnant. Brock [Lesnar]’s not coming back with Saudi down. He’s certainly is not putting me with Roman and he goes, ‘I’m envisioning Roman Reigns with Paul Heyman.’ I’m thinking, ‘Oh my God. He’s gonna pull the trigger on this. He would never pull it with Cena. He would never have allowed [John] Cena to come to the dark side.” (quotes courtesy of WrestlingNews.co)