10 years later, The Shield reflects on their one-of-a-kind run as WWE's Hounds of Justice.
At WWE Survivor Series 2012, the world at large was introduced to Seth Rollins, Dean Ambrose, and Roman Reigns. The trio would become known as The Shield and tear through most of WWE's established roster at the time. Names like John Cena, The Undertaker, Daniel Bryan, Randy Orton, The Big Show, and more all fell at the hands of the Hounds of Justice and along the way, the three individuals that comprised the group began building Hall of Fame-worthy legacies of their own.
Now, ten years later, while much has changed all three individuals still hold that time in their careers close to their hearts.
Speaking with Sports Illustrated, all three men reflected on that special time in their careers. Seth Rollins reflected on the training session with Roman Reigns which allowed him to see they possessed a similar mindset.
“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,” Rollins added. “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 reflected on realizing very early into the run that if they worked as hard as they possibly could, they were going to be the standard-bearers in WWE for as long as they wanted.
“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,” Reigns says. “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, formerly Dean Ambrose, is the lone member of the trio that is no longer with WWE. Even still, he looks back on those days very fondly and says the intense aura of the locker room forced all three of them to create The Shield's signature work ethic, Something that he's proud to say all three of them still possess.
“Looking back, it was like we were kids,” Moxley says. “The first few months of The Shield were fucking intense. It was a different time back then. We weren’t necessarily welcomed with open arms by everybody, but we didn’t give a fuck. We were going to push the pace and have good fucking matches. Before long, everybody wanted to start working with us.”
As of this writing, all three men are holding singles gold in the wrestling industry with Jon Moxley and Roman Reigns holding the top prizes in WWE and AEW respectively. Seth Rollins challenged Roman Reigns for the WWE Universal championship at the Royal Rumble in 2022 in a match that was steeped in callbacks to their time together. Ultimately, because of the disqualification finish, Seth Rollins is one of the only individuals to not be defeated by Roman Reigns during his run as The Tribal Chief.
Seth Rollins recently spoke about his relationship with Roman Reigns saying that he just doesn't know if he can be the top guy in WWE as long as Roman Reigns exists. Meanwhile, he said that he and Jon Moxley still keep in touch. Read more here.
