Five Of The Greatest Wyatt Family Moments

Extreme Rules: The Horror Show will be home to the Swamp Fight between Bray Wyatt and Braun Strowman, with Wyatt looking towards his second Universal Championship in the Summer. However, before Wyatt and Braun started feuding, we had the Wyatt Family.

This anomalous family of unusual bearded men was one of the creepiest factions back at the start of the last decade. With strange gimmick matches and main event storylines, the Wyatt Family was the top team under the Shield at the time.

This means they must’ve had some great moments during their tenure. Let’s take a look:

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5. The Ring of Fire Match

Wyatt may be remembered for being on the losing side of most of his feuds. He had the unforgivable one with John Cena at WrestleMania 30 – before getting his redemption at ‘Mania 36. He even lost the rivalry against Chris Jericho in 2014. Despite this, when the Wyatt Family debuted on the July 8 edition of Raw in 2013, they sent shivers down the crowd’s spine, as they were in the presence of a what should have been a big deal.

Everything about them was intriguing and terrifying at the same time! The creepy vignette before the entrance, the eery theme song; which is made even more amazing with the Fiend remix. Also, the lantern and the sheep mask “followers”. Everything about this team was gold. This was furthered with their first rivalry against Kane.

Kane may have been well past his prime at the time, however, he still had the star presence as the demon. Wyatt defeating Kane in a Ring of Fire Match at SummerSlam 2013 set him up as the next demon. He sent Kane to hell in his own gimmick match and was ready to tear down the whole roster.

Unfortunately, this didn’t happen and Wyatt was rather used to cut a chilling promo, only to keep letting down his word. Nevertheless, the beginning of the Wyatt Family was setting them up for an epic future.

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4. The Moment Wyatt Family met The Rock

Well into forgettable Wyatt Family feuds, they had their shortest but greatest WrestleMania moment as a unit.

WrestleMania 32 saw the horrifying confrontation between the Wyatt Family and The Rock. The Grandest Stage of Them All isn’t electrifying until the Rock graces the world, however, on this night, the Wyatt Family defused the spark and decided to go face-to-face with “The Great One”.

This led to Rowan losing to The Rock in six seconds, which was the last match we saw The Rock in. Maybe Rowan should have had a pet rock instead of a spider to commemorate this.

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3. Daniel Bryan joins The Wyatt Family

Daniel Bryan had his last encounter with Wyatt at Royal Rumble this year but beforehand, he had a fantastic ‘Take Them Out From The Inside’ ambush.

2013 saw Wyatt try to lead a new sheep into his herd by recruiting Daniel Bryan into the Wyatt Family. If you have a beard you fit the criteria so Bryan put the coveralls on to “Follow the Buzzards”.

Even though Wyatt, Harper and Rowan believed they had Bryan controlled, we all knew this was a smart game plan to betray Wyatt and get a one-up in their feud.

This was one of the most notable Wyatt Family feuds during their run and for good reason. It was entertaining, creative and it gave Bryan an incredible moment with Bray Wyatt inside the steel cage. Fantastic story-telling which was done in a similar fashion with…

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2. Randy Orton Joins The Wyatt Family

Another alumni member of the Wyatt Family is “Greatest Wrestling Match Ever” winner, Randy Orton.

The Wyatt Family was close to falling out during the 2016 Brand Split. They already lost Braun Strowman to a dominate single’s run on Raw and Wyatt and Harper were the only members over on Smackdown Live. This was until Wyatt believed he had Orton hypnotized and in his hands. This was such a fascinating story which led right up to Payback 2017.

During this run, Orton and Harper weren’t getting on well – due to jealousy on Harper’s behalf. Despite this, Orton and Wyatt won the tag team titles before handing them over to American Alpha.

Dissension started to show roots for the ‘new’ Wyatt Family when Orton won the Royal Rumble. I’d rather have had roles-reversed and Wyatt winning the Rumble (his career could be in a totally different place if so), however, the story kept on writing itself.

Wyatt won his first World Championship at the following PPV, Elimination Chamber, and knew he had to face Rumble winner, Orton.

Now ‘The Viper’ came clean about his plan when he burned down the house of Bray Wyatt. This could be noted as the forerunning reason for the rise of ‘The Fiend’.

After this, Orton defeated Wyatt at WrestleMania 33 to win the Championship. They then met in a cinematic match known as ‘The House of Horrors’ to end their feud. During the latter half of this rivalry, magic and witchcraft got more involved in Wyatt’s gimmick which wasn’t the character of Wyatt that should’ve been portrayed. Nevertheless, Wyatt’s first WWE Championship was a big moment for him and it resulted in the end of the Wyatt Family to date.

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1. Wyatt Family vs The SHIELD

It is disappointing to see that there aren’t any significant moments to discuss about Braun Strowman’s run in the Wyatt Family, which was too short-lived. All of the best moments happened before the ‘Black Sheep’ joined the family or after he left. For example, the greatest Wyatt Family moment against the SHIELD at Elimination Chamber 2014.

More often than not, WWE screw up their tag team’s – more specifically, they haven’t managed to do factions right for years. However, they captured lightning in a bottle when they put their two biggest stables against one another. Wyatt Family was wreaking terror around the WWE and the SHIELD was dominating the division as Hounds of Justice.

Finally, we saw them fight in 2014, which was such a satisfying feeling to see the two best teams explode. This was before Wyatt’s single run went down the drain. It was even before Roman Reigns was getting booed. This was a classic brawl for the ages and if you haven’t seen it, then check it out right now:

 

If Wyatt’s career didn’t go to complete shambles, then ‘The Fiend’ wouldn’t exist, but it is easy to identify that each story Wyatt is in, the stories are more creative because they have one of the most imaginative storytellers working on it.

The cinematic match between Wyatt and Strowman is bound to be exciting and may turn out to be another bizarre travel through time similarly to the Firefly Funhouse Match. If I was booking this, I’d have Strowman get lured back into the fold and become part of the props in the Firefly Funhouse. With Wyatt leading him on as a puppet once again.

It would also be very interesting if one day, Harper and Rowan rejoin the WWE, with more experience and star-power to reform a mega-powerful Wyatt Family.

Would you like to see the return of the Wyatt Family eventually? Or rather keep the nostalgia alive for these great moments?  Let us know on Twitter!

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• Bray Wyatt
• BRAUN STROWMAN
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