The Rock Appears Unlikely To Compete At WrestleMania 39 Due To Lack Of Time To Prepare

In the latest update of “will he or won’t he” regarding The Rock’s participation at WrestleMania 39 in Los Angeles, it appears as though Dwayne Johnson will not be in a match.

Ever since WWE announced that WrestleMania 39 would be in Los Angeles, there was a belief by many people that one of WWE’s greatest wrestlers of all-time, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, would have one more match against his cousin, Roman Reigns. After all, Reigns is the current Undisputed WWE Universal Champion that has held the Universal Title for over 800 days and it appeared as though a showdown with The Rock was inevitable.

However, the dream match between the Tribal Chief and the People’s Champion may not happen after all. That’s according to the Wrestling Observer Newsletter’s Dave Meltzer, who noted for several weeks now that WWE needed to know if The Rock was going to wrestle because they had to shape Royal Rumble plans around whether or not he would wrestle Roman Reigns at WrestleMania 39.

The following is from the Wrestling Observer Newsletter (available via subscription) with Meltzer noting that The Rock believes he won’t have time to be ready for WrestleMania 39.

“We were told that unless he changes his mind in the next few days, since a deadline for Mania plans is coming, that he’s indicated he won’t have time to get into the kind of shape he feels he needs to be in to do a main event match with Roman Reigns, but kept the door open for something in the future. Of course it is a possibility that it’s something being kept a secret from everyone.”

“WWE has always had a backup direction this year given they were aware Johnson was not a sure thing for some time, and as time went on and he didn’t agree, felt the likelihood had lessened. I don’t know that he’s officially turned it down, but the only indication is that it was considered less likely than a few months ago.”

“Johnson right now has different projects going on, most importantly the launching of the XFL which debuts the weekend of 2/18 and he will be very heavily involved with the promotion of the league. He had said he would need to have training time to be able to get in ring shape. So his decision comes down to his belief of having adequate time to prepare.”

This is one of those stories where things could change because, as Meltzer noted, The Rock could change his mind and it’s also a case of perhaps the inner circle of WWE knows the truth, but they might be keeping it close to the vest.

As we covered yesterday, WWE also recently released new merchandise for The Rock ahead of the Royal Rumble on January 28th. That has led some people to speculate that not only is Rock probably going to beat WrestleMania, but he might even win the Royal Rumble too.

We will have to watch the Royal Rumble and WrestleMania 39 to see if The Rock will be there and if he is, in what capacity will that be? Interesting days ahead.