At WrestleMania 39, Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens brought the latest chapter of The Bloodline saga to a close as they defeated The Usos to capture the Undisputed WWE Tag Team Championship.
The seeds for the match were planted months ago when Zayn managed to persuade Roman Reigns to allow him to join The Bloodline alongside The Usos, Paul Heyman, and Solo Sikoa.
At Survivor Series WarGames in November 2022, Sami Zayn finally won over the last member of the faction who was yet to accept him, Jey Uso, by taking out Owens with a low blow and a Heluva Kick during the WarGames main event. This allowed Uso to hit a Splash on KO to secure The Bloodline’s victory.
However, Zayn’s place in the group was already under threat as Reigns himself began to distrust him. This eventually led to a “test” of his loyalty at the Royal Rumble. After The Tribal Chief defeated Owens to retain the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship at the event, The Bloodline brutally assaulted KO, but when it was Zayn’s turn, he instead attacked Reigns with a steel chair, ending his association with the group much to Jey Uso’s dismay.
The following weeks saw Zayn attempting to recruit Owens to his cause while Jey Uso’s loyalty to The Bloodline was under suspicion. Things eventually settled with Zayn and Owens reuniting while Jey reaffirmed his commitment to The Bloodline, this set The Usos and KO and Zayn on a collision course for WrestleMania 39.
In the main event of WrestleMania Saturday, Owens and Zayn were successful in ending The Usos’ dominance of the tag team scene in WWE by defeating them for the title to a rapturous ovation from the crowd, giving a fairytale ending to this part of their story.
Sami Zayn sees The Bloodline storyline as WWE’s version of ‘The Sopranos’
At the post-show press conference, Zayn discussed the events of the past few months that led to the tag match, claiming it could point to the future of storytelling in wrestling.
“One of the things that I take a lot of pride in with this story over the past year is that I do think it transcended the classical kind of wrestling storyline, for sure.
“I actually think because of its effectiveness, I think it could be a glimpse of what storylines going forward, if not achieve, will at least aspire to, in my opinion.”
The new Tag Team Champion then went one further, comparing the storyline to the classic crime drama, The Sopranos.
“Much like you saw with television, how it kind of evolved to the golden age of television in the 2000s with HBO and things like that and more complex and layered characters, so to do this story — if I may be so bold as to offer a comparison — it’s almost like ‘The Sopranos’.
“It is to WWE what ‘The Sopranos’ was to television, if I may be so bold as to make that comparison.”
H/T to Wrestling Inc. for the above transcription.