{"id":96930,"date":"2021-08-21T10:00:17","date_gmt":"2021-08-21T14:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/?p=96930"},"modified":"2021-08-12T20:47:35","modified_gmt":"2021-08-13T00:47:35","slug":"finn-balor-wwe-universal-championship-summerslam-2016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2021\/08\/21\/finn-balor-wwe-universal-championship-summerslam-2016\/","title":{"rendered":"5 Years Later: Finn B\u00e1lor Becomes the First WWE Universal Champion at SummerSlam 2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

On July 19, 2016, World Wrestling Entertainment<\/strong> held its 2016 WWE Draft. This was designed to shake up the company’s TV programming, with Monday Night Raw<\/strong> and Friday Night SmackDown<\/strong> boasting unique rosters. One of the interesting wrinkles in this draft was the inclusion of NXT<\/strong>. This meant that wrestlers prominent on the black-and-gold brand could find themselves moving to the main roster. Stephanie McMahon<\/strong> and Mick Foley<\/strong><\/a>, Raw’s Commissioner and General Manager respectively, shook things up in a major way when they selected Finn B\u00e1lor<\/strong> as their third draftee. Little did fans know that this would set a major chain of events into motion leading to SummerSlam 2016<\/em><\/strong> and the Universal Championship.<\/p>\n

\"Finn<\/p>\n

Finn B\u00e1lor vs. Seth Rollins, SummerSlam 2016<\/em> \u2013 An Introduction<\/strong><\/h2>\n

By this point, Dean Ambrose<\/strong> was the reigning WWE World Champion. SmackDown’s Commissioner, Shane McMahon<\/strong>, and General Manager, Daniel Bryan<\/strong>, smartly selected Ambrose as their first draft pick. This left Raw without a world champion to call their own. In response, Raw introduced their own top title: the WWE Universal Championship. It was also announced that the first Universal Champion would be crowned at SummerSlam 2016<\/em> in August. Seth Rollins<\/strong>, who was the first overall pick, immediately advanced. On the July 25 edition of Raw, two fatal four-way matches were scheduled; the winners of those matches would meet in the main event to determine Rollins’s SummerSlam opponent.<\/p>\n

The first of these four-way matches saw the debuting Finn B\u00e1lor emerge victorious against Rusev<\/strong>, Cesaro<\/strong>, and Kevin Owens<\/strong><\/a>. Later in the show, in the second four-way bout, Roman Reigns<\/strong> overcame Sami Zayn<\/strong>, Sheamus<\/strong>, and Chris Jericho<\/strong>. The stage was set: between B\u00e1lor and Reigns, who would go to SummerSlam<\/em>? Would it be Reigns, who was one of the top stars in WWE even back then? Would B\u00e1lor shock the world his first night on the main roster? In what was an incredibly competitive encounter, B\u00e1lor emerged victorious, picking up a clean win over \u201cThe Big Dog.\u201d With this, B\u00e1lor punched his ticket to the Universal Championship match at SummerSlam 2016<\/em>.<\/p>\n

In the weeks leading up to SummerSlam, Rollins and B\u00e1lor confronted one another on numerous occasions. Rollins regarded himself as an innovator, such as becoming the first NXT Champion, a title B\u00e1lor would go on to win as well. B\u00e1lor retorted, saying that he earned his spot at SummerSlam while Rollins was handed his opportunity. Rollins continued to provoke B\u00e1lor, tauntingly beckoning his opponent’s well-known \u201cDemon King\u201d persona. Said body-painted persona made its first main roster appearance on the August 15 episode of Raw, one week before SummerSlam<\/em>. B\u00e1lor laid out Rollins, making it clear that a Universal Championship for \u201cThe Architect\u201d wasn’t a certainty.<\/p>\n