WWE Canceled Mega Plans For Randy Orton

Randy Orton failed to capture the Undisputed WWE Championship from Cody Rhodes at WrestleMania 42 on Saturday.

Orton won this year’s Elimination Chamber match to earn himself a title opportunity at WrestleMania. On the road to WrestleMania, the WWE Universe saw him turn heel and align with Pat McAfee in his feud against The American Nightmare.

McAfee even tried to interfere during the main event match between Cody Rhodes and Randy Orton at WrestleMania. However, despite all the efforts made to take out Rhodes, the American Nightmare prevailed and successfully retained his title on the grandest stage of them all.

A new report from Fightful Select claims that this was not how the Saturday main event was originally supposed to unfold.

According to the report, WWE had been planning a title change at WrestleMania, with Randy Orton set to become the new Undisputed WWE Champion. However, in the last few weeks, WWE internally changed the booking decision and chose Cody Rhodes as the victor.

Randy Orton Is In Rough Shape After His Match With Cody Rhodes

During the match, Randy Orton favored his lower back and was visibly working through pain. Fans noted that he moved awkwardly throughout the match, frequently stepping outside the ring to recover.

Following the main event, WWE interviewer Jackie Redmond suggested that the WWE Universe might not see Orton for a while, as he appeared to be in rough shape after his match with Cody Rhodes:

As for Randy Orton, I don’t know when we will see him again. It took him an entire 10 minutes to come up the ramp. He was moving slowly. He was limping. He was grabbing his back, but I’ll tell you one thing, Joe Tessitore, he was a blank stare straight ahead. Did not look to his left, did not look to his right, engaged with absolutely nobody. Had to take a second for himself once he got to the top of the stage.

In fact, it honestly looked like he almost lost his balance, like he was a little bit out of it. He looked back at Cody [Rhodes], who was still being attended to by referees in the ring, and then made his way out. So one thing I do know after what we witnessed tonight is that both of those guys are in rough shape.

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