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Seth Rollins is one of the greatest WWE superstars of the modern era. Having spent nearly a decade on the main roster, he is a Grand Slam Winner, winning multiple championships and even main evented WrestleMania.
Despite being a heel for the majority of his career, The Visionary has grown so popular with the WWE Universe that he is getting massive ovations every night, thanks to his ridiculously catchy theme song and over-the-top gimmick.
While it's easy to forget, Seth Rollins' wrestling career extends beyond WWE. Before that, he was the Ring of Honor Champion and a major part of the independent scene in the late 2000s. Throughout his long tenure, a number of his past opponents have left the sports entertainment giants and currently ply their trade in AEW. Here are 5 current AEW stars that Seth Rollins has wrestled with in the past.
#5. Seth Rollins vs. Adam Cole - NXT Championship Match (Raw, 2019)
This was a forgotten gem on Monday Night Raw back in 2019. At that point in his career, Seth Rollins was the top babyface for his brand, but he was starting to get a mixed reaction from the audience thanks to his botched WWE title run.
Adam Cole, on the other hand, was the top star and main champion of NXT, tasked with leading his roster en route to Survivor Series. For one night only, he defended his title against The Beastslayer in an outstanding match that was absolutely underrated.
Cole has since moved on to AEW and recently returned from a long-term injury. Sadly, this fantasy match-up won't happen again anytime soon.
#4. Seth Rollins vs. Bryan Danielson (Raw 2015, 2019)
Bryan Danielson and Seth Rollins will be forever linked thanks to their association with Ring of Honor. They were both ROH World Champions at different periods and helped bring that style over to WWE.
When The Shield had their debut match at TLC 2012, it was the American Dragon standing across the ring from them as part of the opposing team. From their battles as part of The Shield and Team Hell No, to their sporadic matches against each other on television, it's quite a surprise that they haven't had a proper singles rivalry.
It's such a shame as this could have led to a classic encounter at WrestleMania. Sadly, Danielson's WWE career was marred by injuries that prevented him from competing in more matches with The Visionary. Now that Danielson is in AEW and he's preparing to challenge for the company's top title.
#3. Seth Rollins vs. CM Punk (Raw 2013)
Seth Rollins has made it clear that he is not a fan of former AEW Champion CM Punk. During the WWE 2K23 event over the Royal Rumble weekend, Wrestling Inc's Nick Hausman interviewed Rollins and he made some incendiary comments about the Straightedge Superstar.
"Oh, Philly Phil. Stay away. Stay away, you cancer. Get away from me forever. I don't like Phil. I don't like Phil. He's a jerk. Did we just figure that out? Do we just figure that out? No. Everybody in the room is like, 'Oh no, Did he say that?' Yeah, no. He's a jerk. Come on. We figured it out over there, we knew it over here. I don't want him back. Go do something else. See you later," Seth Rollins said. [H/T Sportskeeda.com]
Despite Rollins' supposed animosity towards Punk, they do share a number of things in common. They were both Ring of Honor Champions before joining WWE and have had major rivalries with John Cena, Brock Lesnar, and Triple H, just to name a few.
But together, they've only wrestled each other in a singles match once in their WWE careers. This was early on in Rollins' run with the company as part of The Shield in 2013, while Punk would quit WWE only a few months later.
#2. Seth Rollins vs. Claudio Castagnoli (WrestleMania 37)
Top WWE Superstar Seth Rollins recently revealed that he has certain regrets about his past rivalry with AEW star Claudio Castagnoli (FKA Cesaro).
The two well-known friends engaged in a brief rivalry that lead to an outstanding match at WrestleMania 37. It was clear that they shared excellent in-ring chemistry, and that night was supposed to be Cesaro's breakout moment.
Sadly, the feud didn't last much longer. Claudio joined AEW and is now part of the Blackpool Combat Club. In an interview with the Out of Character podcast, Seth Rollins expressed a few regrets about the rivalry.
"I had some ideas of what I thought it could be, but it didn’t really take. My point is the Cesaro story had so much, there was so many legs and different directions we could have taken it and I think one of my biggest regrets is that I didn’t press hard enough to do that. I feel like that’s an untapped story, if we ever cross paths again, there’s such a great story there that we could do." [9:55 to 10:25]
Castagnoli left WWE in February 2022 after 11 years with the company, but it has been a blessing for the Swiss as he is now the ROH Champion.
#1. Seth Rollins vs. Jon Moxley (Hell in a Cell 2014)
One of Seth Rollins' greatest rivals was former AEW Champion Jon Moxley. Both wrestlers debuted together on the WWE main roster as part of The Shield. While they were an amazing group, they eventually became bitter enemies when Rollins turned on Mox and Roman Reigns in the summer of 2014.
Rollins and Ambrose would kickstart a highly personal rivalry that lasted throughout much of that year and included a spectacular Hell in a Cell match. They would reunite as a tag team in 2017 before Mox would infamously turn on The Visionary a year later, on the night that Reigns announced the relapse of his leukaemia.
Despite their storied past, Moxley's grew disillusioned with his booking in WWE and eventually left the company in 2019 to join the upstart promotion in AEW. He has grown to be one of Tony Khan's top stars. He is easily Rollins' greatest rival that is no longer in WWE.
