Roman Reigns’ public choice to pull himself out of a marquee title match on last month’s WrestleMania against Goldberg was a huge story that created a lot of conversation around the WWE superstar. Reigns has twice battled leukemia in his life and that previous condition led to many fans online to speculate that it motivated his call to remove himself from WWE competition during the current pandemic, but the ‘Big Dog’ speaking this week with TMZ Sports had more insight on the decision.”We just had two newborn twins, twin boys. They’re 8 weeks old so I had to make a decision for them.” said the former WWE Champion.
“A lot of people … they think that it was based off of my health and the history of my fight against leukemia. Talking to my doctors and stuff, I actually am fine and my immune system is good. The drugs that I take to fight the leukemia, they don’t attack your immune system.”
Reigns emphasized he was more driven by family reasons to remove himself from the mega-match. “It’s my family, it’s my children, they are my legacy. No matter what I do in this world, my children are gonna be the ones to represent my name and carry our name forward. So I had to make that choice for them, to protect them being so young.”
Reigns also expressed his desire to return to WWE but still feels he needs to be dedicated to his family and his loved ones in this difficult time.”I wanna be out there, I wanna get back to work, I wanna get back to normal but I just feel like I have an obligation not only to my family and myself but to my community.”
“Also, to set the example because at the end of the day, we can do a lot of different things and say a lot of different things but its through our actions that really speaks volume. That’s what I’m trying to do.”
When asked when he feels he might get back into the ring, Reigns stated he “did not know” as the world adapts to the “new normal”, though he added he hoped it would be “very very soon”.
Also during the interview, Reigns talked about the upcoming WWE Network series, ‘The Undertaker: The Last Ride’ which documents what many thought was the Deadman’s final match in 2017 when Reigns defeated him at WrestleMania 33 in 2017.
