Gunther has been one of the top protagonists of WWE storylines in the first half of this year, having alternated brilliant moments and surprising disappointments. 'The Ring General' – who has had a very significant rise in the last year and a half – suffered a fairly serious defeat against Jey Uso at WrestleMania 41, losing the World Heavyweight Championship to an opponent he had underestimated despite his amazing triumph at the Royal Rumble in early February.
Because of that disappointment, he had to work on himself and came back stronger than before. It is no coincidence that he recovered that belt during Monday Night Raw, before being chosen as Bill Goldberg's opponent in the last match of his legendary career. Their showdown was staged during Saturday Night's Main Event in mid-July and ended with Gunther winning.
Gunther is currently off TV
Later, it was announced that the World Heavyweight Champion would put his title on the line against another legend like CM Punk in the main event of SummerSlam (Night 1). Their clash did not disappoint, but the 'Second City Saint' proved to be clearly superior and became world champion (before being dethroned by Seth Rollins).
According to the latest rumors, Gunther is destined to stay away from TV for some time. On the latest edition of the 'Wrestling Informer' podcast, Billi Bhatti explained that WWE had a different idea about the former world champion initially: “Gunther was filmed during SummerSlam weekend and we had, well, there was supposed to be a portion on the next season of Unreal where Gunther was supposed to blade.
Now he is going in for genuine sinus surgery, and WWE asked him if he would be able to bleed from his nose. Gunther during these exchanges conveyed to WWE that he would be uncomfortable lacerating his nose, but in the end agreed to it.”
He also added: “There will likely be some heat on Gunther for this because the storyline was supposed to cut his nose… in the end, he agreed but then went against it when the moment came.”