The Shield Cross The Forbidden Door To Discuss The Group’s Impact

All three members of The Shield have given their thoughts on the group’s impact in WWE, a decade after they burst onto the scene.

At the 2012 Survivor Series, CM Punk defended his WWE Championship against Ryback and John Cena in the main event. However, unbeknownst to the challengers Punk and his wise man of the day Paul Heyman had an ace up their sleeve to ensure that the WWE Title stayed with CM Punk, three aces, in fact, Roman Reigns, Seth Rollins, and Dean Ambrose – The Shield.

For the best part of the next two years the words “sierra, hotel, India, echo, lima, delta” signalled that The Hounds of Justice were on the way to dish out a beating to whoever was on hand to receive it.

All three men have gone on to become world champions in the business, with the group making history at Money In The Bank 2016 when every member of The Shield at one point in the evening held the WWE Championship – with Dean Ambrose the one to escape the event with the gold.

Seth Rollins and Roman Reigns continue to headline in WWE with Reigns ascending to the level of the greats that came before him with a Universal Title reign that has gone over 800 days and shows no sign of slowing down. Dean Ambrose left WWE in 2019 and is now better known as the three-time AEW World Champion Jon Moxley.

Speaking to Sports Illustrated, all three members of the group reflected on the time they spent together in the group with Seth Rollins looking back on a training session with Roman Reigns that allowed Rollins and Moxley to see that Reigns was on the same page as them:

“Mox and I were already on the same wavelength, and that was the moment that showed the three of us were of one mind and one goal. That allowed us to be The Shield. Without that mindset, there is no Shield, and the last ten years look a lot different.”

Roman Reigns added that the trio knew early the value of hard work in the company and says they fought to put themselves in the “right position”:

“Early on, we found out we were going to be the guys for the company that could pull the wagon as far as we wanted if we worked hard enough. If we didn’t step up, someone else would, so we’ve always done everything in our power to put ourselves in the right position.”

Jon Moxley added that the WWE locker room shied away from the group at first but as time went on, there was no denying the talent that The Shield had:

“Looking back, it was like we were kids. The first few months of The Shield were f*cking intense. It was a different time back then. We weren’t necessarily welcomed with open arms by everybody, but we didn’t give a f*ck. We were going to push the pace and have good f*cking matches. Before long, everybody wanted to start working with us.”