While this year’s Survivor Series War Games match was, on its surface, a battle between two different versions of The Bloodline, the last minute addition of CM Punk to the team captained by Roman Reigns reframed the narrative. The story largely came down to Punk and Reigns as uneasy partners, bound by being two of the most successful Paul Heyman Guys.
The unlikely duo did wind up successfully coexisting, but it nonetheless returned a spotlight to the concept of Paul Heyman Guys and who among the celebrated cast of elite stars The Wise Man has helped along the way really is the best. We’ll never have a definitive answer, but it is interesting to compare the top contenders.
Bully Ray
Bully Ray is probably the most surprising act to appear on a list of the most successful Paul Heyman Guys, but when one stops to think about it, it’s both pretty remarkable what the former Bubba Ray Dudley has accomplished and how unlikely his story was had Heyman not put him in a position to succeed.
Though Bully Ray never had a main event singles run in ECW, he was nonetheless one of the promotion’s top stars, a heatseeking missile who drew nuclear reactions from the live crowds. Moreover, the opportunities afforded to him in ECW laid the foundation for his legendary run with D-Von Dudley as one of the greatest tag teams of all time, across ECW, WWE, TNA, and elsewhere.
It was in TNA where Bully Ray realized his full potential, booked as the leader of the Aces and Eights faction, world champion, and the definitive top heel in the promotion for the better part of the year. While he never broke out in WWE, this run proved what he had inside of him as a talker, worker, and wrestling mind, making good on everything Heyman had seen in him from back in their days in Philly together.
CM Punk
CM Punk was an indie darling but ran into a brick wall after signing with WWE. Upper management didn’t see a lot in him, but Paul Heyman did.
Heyman’s role running developmental at that point set him up to work closely with an eager Punk who sat under Heyman’s learning tree while further honing his craft. Against the odds, The Straight Edge Superstar did rise to prominence on the main roster in time. He did some of his best work as a long-reigning WWE Champion, with Heyman serving as his Advocate. Though Punk never needed a mouthpiece, Heyman certainly added to his presentation.
Punk’s resume since first collaborating with Heyman speaks for itself. He is, to date, a two-time WWE Champion, three-time WWE World Heavyweight Champion, WWE ECW Champion, rare two-time WWE Money in the Bank winner, and two-time AEW Champion. It’s a record that places him among wrestling’s most accomplished stars of his generation.
Roman Reigns
Roman Reigns was Vince McMahon’s final hand-picked face of WWE, but it wasn’t until Reigns dropped the white meat babyface persona The Chairman had saddled him with and turned heel alongside Paul Heyman that he broached God Mode.
His positioning as the top babyface placed Reigns as a regular rival to Brock Lesnar, which gave him his first opportunities to collaborate with Heyman. Things went to an entirely new level when Heyman and Reigns formalized their partnership though, with the duo collaborating closely behind the scenes just as Heyman played The Wise Man on screen for Reigns and his Bloodline faction.
Since partnering with Heyman, Reigns enjoyed a historic three and half year reign as WWE Champion that cemented his place as the face of the company and probably the tip-top star of his generation. That’s not to mention that Reigns just won his second Survivor Series War Games main event and the smart money has more world title glory, WrestleMania main events, and other elite accolades in front of him.
Brock Lesnar
Brock Lesnar was an exceptional amateur wrestler and one of the few talents to succeed at the highest levels of pro wrestling and MMA alike. While The Beast’s real life combat credentials have little to do with Paul Heyman, his WWE journey was largely molded by his relationship with his advocate.
The generally accepted story is that most of the people advising Lesnar early in his career encouraged him to work like a standard big man who worked a slow pace, hit power moves, and never left his feet. Heyman saw bigger things in taking advantage of Lesnar’s natural speed and agility to lead to The Next Big Thing he’d become. Add in Heyman as a necessary mouthpiece and Lesnar became one of the biggest stars WWE has ever seen.
Stone Cold Steve Austin
The year was 1995 and nobody believed in Steve Austin. Austin had been let go from WCW out of a combination of his attitude issues and injuries, combined with a new focus on established imports from WWE. As for WWE, while they would end up signing Austin, it was for the explicit purpose of being a mechanic who could put over stars they were actually invested in in good technical matches.
It was Heyman who put a live mic in Austin’s hands and, in so doing, paved the way the way for the Texas Rattlesnake fans would come to know and love as Stone Cold Steve Austin. Like he did for many others, Heyman gave Stone Cold an opportunity to experiment and spotlight his strengths. Yes, Heyman would also manage Austin in WCW for a spell, and back him up as part of The Alliance in 2001, but it was Austin’s ECW run that permanently branded him as a Paul Heyman guy, and he went on to some of the most explosively successful years in pro wrestling history.