Seth Rollins net worth and salary

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Seth Rollins is one of the highest earners in WWE

The self-proclaimed Architect of the Shield, arguably one of the greatest WWE stables of all time, Seth Rollins is one of the best wrestlers in WWE today. He has made the best transformation as a singles star compared to his Shield brothers Roman Reigns and Dean Ambrose both in terms of success inside the ring as well as crowd acceptance.

So, when it comes to the paycheck, there is little doubt that Rollins earns much more than his Shield brothers. In fact among the younger crop of wrestlers, he earns the highest with $2.4 million per year currently as per Forbes. This puts him ahead of Roman Reigns and Dean Ambrose who are the 6th and 10th highest earners respectively.

Further, Rollins is only behind the company’s face John Cena, “The Beast Incarnate“ Brock Lesnar, WWE’s Chief Operating Officer Triple H and “The Viper“ Randy Orton, who are all company veterans. This shows the progress Rollins has made since he joined the company in 2010.

The wrestlers’ pay are broadly divided as, base salary and bonus pay. The base salary is almost related to the wrestler’s tenure thereby ensuring WWE veterans earn a sizeable income. The bonus pay is WWE’s way of rewarding success which depend on number of events worked ranging from house shows to pay-per-views.

The wrestlers also receive a share of merchandise sales which are normally 25% of profits from licensing and 5% of direct sales, either at shows or from the online store.

The bonus pay is the main reason Seth Rollins earns big as he was the numero uno in the company, holding the WWE World Championship and being involved in the main event of most pay-per-views as well as house shows. Rollins was named the WWE Superstar of the Year 2015 for his outstanding work as well.

Rollins worked 81 house shows and was in the main event of 76 of them whereas Dean Ambrose worked close to 200 events and yet was involved in only 36 main events of his non-televised shows.

Seth Rollins winning the Superstar of the Year 2015 at the Slammy Awards

Since WWE’s pay structure for live events depends on the nature of the match, i.e. from main events to dark matches, it is pretty conclusive as to Rollins’ superiority over other wrestlers, thereby making him one of the highest earners and further, his net worth is estimated at $4 million as per The Richest.

Seth Rollins net worth – $4 million

This figure is only going to rise further for a man who has risen to the top of the wrestling world in a relatively short time.

Born as Colby Lopez, Rollins initially used an in-ring name of Tyler Black prior to WWE. He made his wrestling debut in 2005 for Scott County Wrestling and wrestled in the independent circuit and made a name for himself by winning the Heavyweight and Tag Team Championships across various promotions.

He took another significant step in 2007 when he joined the Ring of Honor and formed a stable called,”The Age of the Fall”, with Jimmy Jacobs and Necro Butcher.

He became the ROH World Champion in 2010 after pinning Austin Aries and then embarked on a series of seven title defences which lasted 210 days before signing a developmental contract with WWE and losing the ROH World Championship to Roderick Strong in a no disqualification match.

Rollins took his current in-ring name on joining WWE and he was initially assigned to Florida Championship Wrestling where he won the FCW 15 Jack Brisco Classic Tournament and became the first ever FCW 15 Champion. In 2011, he teamed up with Richie Steamboat to defeat Titus O’Neill and Damien Sandow to win the FCW Florida Tag Team Championship. 

In July 2011, Rollins and Dean Ambrose had their first meeting in a series of fights as they fought for the FCW 15 Championship in which Rollins eventually prevailed. He later lost the title in September to Damien Sandow. In February 2012, Rollins defeated Leo Kruger to become the FCW Florida Heavyweight Champion.

After the rebranding of FCW into the present NXT, Rollins entered the Gold Rush tournament where he beat Jinder Mahal in the finals to be crowned the inaugural NXT Champion.

Rollins made his main roster debut at Survivor Series 2012 along with Dean Ambrose and Roman Reigns to form the Shield and went on to establish themselves as the most dominant faction the WWE has ever seen.

The Shield went through almost every wrestler on the roster and Rollins held the Tag Team Championship titles along with Roman Reigns as well. The Shield reached their ceiling when they defeated the Evolution consisting of Triple H, Randy Orton and Batista in consecutive pay-per-views at Extreme Rules and Payback 2014.

Dean Ambrose (left), Roman Reigns ( centre ) and Seth Rollins formed the Shield

The following night on RAW, Rollins betrayed his Shield brothers to join up with Triple H thereby turning heel. Owing to the fact that he sided with the Authority, he won the Money in the Bank Ladder match to earn a World Championship opportunity.

After a series of matches against Ambrose and a loss in the World Championship match at Royal Rumble 2015 with John Cena and Brock Lesnar, Rollins finally became the WWE World Heavyweight Champion by cashing in the Money in the Bank contract during Reigns’ and Lesnar’s match at Wrestlemania 31.

Rollins defended his title first against Randy Orton and then against Dean Ambrose before he feuded with then United States champion John Cena in a “winner takes all” match at Summerslam where he became the first and only wrestler to hold both the championship belts simultaneously. 

He later lost the United States belt to John Cena in a rematch at Night of Champions. However, he retained the WWE World Heavyweight Championship against Sting on the same pay-per-view. He later defended his title against Kane before suffering a major knee injury at a WWE live event in Dublin, requiring surgery.

This forced him to vacate the title and ended his reign at 220 days. He returned from injury at Extreme Rules 2016 and went for the title, then held by Roman Reigns, whom he beat at Money in the Bank to win the Championship for the second time.

However, the reign lasted only a few minutes as Ambrose cashed in his Money in the Bank contract to win the title on the same night.

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