How The Rock Really Felt About WWE Scrapping WrestleMania Plans
The Rock will stand side-by-side with Roman Reigns at WrestleMania but it was all nearly so very different.
Cody Rhodes will face Roman Reigns for the WWE Universal Championship at WrestleMania 40 despite WWE originally planning to have Rhodes forego his match with Reigns as The Rock returned to the company.
The situation was settled at a special press conference where Rhodes ended up on the receiving end of a slap from The Rock after he dared to talk about Roman Reigns’ family – which also just so happens to be The Rock’s family. That confirmed The Rock would stand with The Bloodline which has led to a huge tag team match that sees The Rock team with Roman Reigns to take on Cody Rhodes and Seth Rollins.
It was clear, however, when Cody Rhodes was the one who re-introduced The Rock to WWE that the original plan was for The American Nightmare to stand aside and have the long-awaited match between The Rock and Roman Reigns. But the fans pushed back hard to that suggestion leading WWE to revert to the original Rhodes/Reigns rematch.
The Rock Saw Sense In Logic For WrestleMania
Now former WWE writer Brian Gewirtz who works closely with The Rock as part of his Seven Bucks Productions, has lifted the lid on The Great One’s attitude to the changes in a feature for ESPN:
Would the fans be as adamant Cody needs to finish his story if he didn’t win the Royal Rumble? Once he won the Royal Rumble, then I think there was a certain element of, ‘Hey, don’t screw with us now.’ You can’t dangle the Royal Rumble win and then take it away. And I think everyone, Rock included, was like, ‘Yeah, they’re right. We should continue this story as it naturally would play out if this were real life.’
If this were real life and he won the Rumble and he didn’t win last year’s WrestleMania, there’s literally no logical reason — even though you could try to make one up — why he wouldn’t want to face Roman and win the title.
The Rock appeared on the final Raw before WrestleMania 40 as he and Roman Reigns delivered a vicious beating to Rhodes and Rollins signalling their intent for violence in Philadelphia.
The People’s Champ might just show his softer side before then as it has now been confirmed The Rock will induct his grandmother Lia Maivia into the WWE Hall of Fame.