Sometimes, we make this pro-wrestling thing way more complicated than it has to be.

With art of any kind, there’s room for individual styles, unique interpretations, doing things people never expected to help further that art. But sometimes you gotta take that brush and paint that soup can. In WWE’s case, that latest Warhol is Oba Femi, the man who tore through the company’s developmental brand and is now slated to open Night 2 of WrestleMania 42 for ESPN’s free portion of the event, He’s big, he’s bad, he’s boisterous and beats the opposition down — Femi works so well because there isn’t an era you could drop him in where he’d seem out of place. He’s the king of any castle, and “The Ruler’s” decree for success? Stay grounded in the things that you know, communicate your worth, and tear apart whatever's in front of you.

In a now-viral clip from February, Justina Emmanwori, mother of Seattle Seahawks safety Nick Emmanwori, struggled to understand the importance of the Super Bowl as a singular event. Anyone lucky enough to spend their undergraduate days with Nigerian friends and classmates has heard a similar facsimile of her disbelief. While it extends across cultures, there tends to be a push from immigrant parents not just for education, but the pursuit of practical careers, like becoming a doctor, lawyer, or something else the world will always need.

“Engineer!” Femi exclaims, reminding me of the final piece of the immigrant career trinity.

Already a decorated track and field athlete at the University of Lagos, the American portion of Femi’s college education started at Middle Tennessee State in 2017, and he eventually found his way to the University of Alabama. He racked up numerous accolades along the way, culminating with back-to-back wins in the shot put event at the 2021 and 2022 SEC Indoor Championships, respectively.

Even then, he was on a unique path. The man with the strongest arm in the South wasn’t looking to become a lawyer, doctor or engineer. With his parents’ blessing, he was a studio art major, eventually earning a Bachelor's degree in visual arts. You can still see the graphic designer in him today; there’s precision in the way that he operates, in how he communicates with the audience, in how every time out, he paints the exact picture he’s trying to get across. And his literal canvas is now the wrestling ring, the place where power and personality intersect to create beauty and tragedy. Lately, the size of the spotlight has increased, but that doesn’t change his approach, effort or output.

“How you react to fame and fortune and things happening in your life is very dependent on how you are brought up,” Femi says.

“Because I had a good upbringing, I was very grounded in my foundation of who I am as a human being. So it can be rain, sunshine, win, loss, you remain the same. And I think that's a very powerful lesson that has helped me stay grounded as a grown man. And it's a lesson that I plan on also teaching my own children when I have them — you're never as good as you think when you're losing, and you're never as good as you think when you're winning. Stay the same. Know who you are. Stay grounded. Stay humble.”  

Yet there’s a switch that flips when he arrives at the building, an energy Femi can seemingly summon at will. He’s adjusted his cadence to give the crowd the opportunity to place an emphatic “HOO!” in the same place where Steve Austin’s famed “What?” filled empty space on WWE television for years. He doesn’t actually swing one arm in front of the other when he walks, but that emphasis — putting his foot firm on the ground as if to say he’s the one keeping the world in place — just seems to fit. The large, beaded necklace and the furry armbands — both influenced by his Nigerian heritage, but carving out something different, something that hasn’t really existed in the wrestling space.

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Femi is the first of his family to spend his late teens in the States, in a hyper-competitive environment where he not only survived, but found a way to become something brand new in a business clamoring for it. And now, as WrestleMania fast approaches, he’s wanted on both WWE brands — “Raw” and “Smackdown” — and already had his first taste of the boisterous battle that is the Royal Rumble. He lasted almost 40 minutes in January’s big showcase and eliminated a match-best five other participants, before getting eliminated by his now-opponent Brock Lesnar after being caught off guard.

But even with all the changes in his life in 2026, it’s still his picture he’s focused on painting. He broke in his brush on WWE’s toughest canvas on the March 16th edition of “Raw,” confronting and physically dominating Lesnar in a way most of the audience has never seen. He’s now gotten the best of Lesnar twice, and this weekend looks to cement himself as WWE’s next big thing by defeating the former UFC heavyweight champion on the profession's biggest stage.

But Femi can also admit that Lesnar, The Undertaker and a few others caught his eye early, not just for their strength, but their fluidity at their size as well. “[If there was someone I was] emulating, I would say Brock, because he was always that big man, hybrid style,” he acknowledges. “He was grounded and he stayed strong and powerful and did big, powerful moves. But at the same time, he was light on his feet.

“When I say light on his feet, I don't mean his shooting star press or anything like that. Just the way he moved alone. I've always looked at Brock and Undertaker as well. There's a certain fluidity I like in my wrestling. Certain guys possess it.”

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Getting the best of one of your inspirations on the very biggest stage is the kind of thing that takes you from the process to the promised land, but even with all of that in front of him, Femi is still rooted in the things that got him to this point.

“I think the only thing that has been different for me has been the travel schedule,” he says. “I stay very focused. I stay very grounded. I'm one of those people who has a strong belief that it doesn't matter if it's 500 people at the [WWE Performance Center] or 80,000 people at WrestleMania. The ring is the same size, the ropes are the same tightness, and it's up to me to go out there and deliver. So that's my approach.”

Femi became the focus of the NXT men’s division in 2025, and with good cause. The 6-foot-6, 310-pound Nigerian wasn’t simply dominant — he talked like a champion, he dressed like a champion, and when the bell rang, every move, every expression, every burst of otherworldly power screamed champion. He won the NXT Championship at January’s “New Year’s Evil” event, and fended off any and all comers for almost nine months before losing the title to Ricky Saints in September, only to regain it in December. 

Recapturing the title was a prize in and of itself, but it also gave Femi a once in a lifetime opportunity — the chance to compete on the show that featured John Cena’s final match. Just over three years after his first pro-wrestling match, Femi found himself in a Champion vs. Champion showcase against Cody Rhodes, the top man in the industry. And where others may have shrunk, Femi looked every bit Rhodes’ equal, showing exactly why he’s in position to be the top man sooner than later. “I made it a mission of mine to show these people at the main roster, show all the producers, the bookers, the head honchos that I belong,” he says.

“I'm not just a prospect, because this thing that [people] keep saying, ‘The future, the future, the future’ — it's like, ‘No, man. These guys are at the top and they're in their 40s. I'm under 30. I'm ready to go.’ And I wanted to show them that day. And what better stage to do that than side-by-side, shoulder-to-shoulder with the No. 1 guy in the company, Cody Rhodes? And I think I accomplished my mission. My statement was clear: I belong here.”

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After successfully defending the NXT title against TNA X Division Champion Leon Slater this past January, Femi left the belt in the middle of the ring, effectively relinquishing the championship en route to the WWE main roster. “[It] was time. You know when you've done everything you can do for a company, you know when you've done everything you can do for a brand, a relationship, a friendship,” he says. “You know when you've done everything and you've tried your best and you've put your all, and it's time for you to move on to the next thing. And that's just where I found myself when I had the NXT Championship.

“I'd done everything there was to do. I'm grateful for my time in NXT, of course. That was my indies. I appreciate everything I went through there.” 

One potential speed bump in going directly into the WWE pipeline is some wrestlers miss out on those rivalries built throughout smaller promotions that can follow them as they find more and more success. Talents like Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn, all the iterations of the Bullet Club and The Elite, they’ve all seen their closest friends and coldest foes through wins, losses and life experiences, only making those rivalries better over time. But to his credit, and to theirs, Femi found not one, but two peers that he looks to face going forward. “You have Oba Femi, Trick Williams and Je’Von Evans,” he says.

“You can't tell me the [WWE Performance Center] doesn't make stars. How often do you get such people getting called up to the main roster and they're already on that level? The PC did that, the NXT did that. We did that.”

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What the trio did was something that hasn’t ever really been done — on the same roster, held in the same regard at the same time, you had three dark-skinned, dread-headed, main-event talents fighting for their show's top prize. And they were three distinctly different men, not only in moves but in mantras as well. Femi, “The Ruler,” made it his mission to not only intimidate, but to bulldoze anyone who stood across from him. Williams, a two-time NXT Champion in his own right, let his success go to his head — and wardrobe — leaning heavily into his South Carolina roots while finding his Southern Player showman. He’ll face Sami Zayn for the U.S. Championship at WrestleMania, where he figures to have a grand entrance and an even more grandiose response. And Evans, the effortlessly athletic 21-year-old with the giant smile, has a grace you don’t see out of 6-foot-2 wrestlers, and was instantly a hit with the NXT audience. He’ll show off that near-fictional athleticism in a five-way WrestleMania ladder match for the Intercontinental Title.

Femi ended Williams’ second reign in his final year in NXT, and fended off both men multiple times the rest of the year. It’s the rare feat that neither Williams or Evans seemed defined down after losing to Femi — it was simply understood that these are matchups you’ll need to see for years and years. “It puts joy in my heart knowing that we did what we did for the brand of NXT,” Femi says. “We became the top trio in the next year. And we all got called up around the same time. And it's good to watch the people around you grow as well. They pushed me to become a better version of myself.

“You know the way the [NXT] black and gold is romanticized by fans? I do strongly believe that the Trick Williams, Je’Von Evans and Oba Femi era will also be romanticized.”

With Evans on “Raw” and Williams on “Smackdown,” either choice for Femi could see a rivalry revisited immediately. But “The Ruler” hasn’t decided on a permanent destination just yet. All of the early success, from the titles to the history-making moments, the claims everywhere that he’s next up, none of it seems to phase him. Oba Femi has done — and will continue to do — the work. In only a few years, he’s had a career most would envy. But, grounded as he may be, he has no problem making sure the powers that be know exactly what he’s worth. “As long as I'm paid what I'm worth, I'm given everything I ask for, I will elevate whatever show I'm put on. I know that for sure,” he says.

“I'm a star in my own right. All that humility stuff, yes, humility, but you also have to know where you stand on the pecking order. And I understand that very clearly.”