WWE Had Different Plans For Cody Rhodes-Randy Orton Rivalry
The WWE WrestleMania 42 match between Cody Rhodes and Randy Orton was planned for another time, according to a new report.
Changes on the road to WrestleMania seem to be commonplace in this era of WWE. Even though Chief Content Officer Paul “Triple H” Levesque doesn’t like having to change plans, it has happened in recent years.
WrestleMania 40 in 2024 looked like it would be Cody Rhodes against Roman Reigns, then Cody gave up his Rumble win title shot to The Rock, and the fans hated that, so Cody was given the match with Reigns and finally became WWE Champion.
As for WrestleMania 41 in 2025, John Cena’s heel turn at Elimination Chamber was set up only a few weeks prior, and only a few people knew about it. That set him up to cheat to beat Rhodes to win the record 17th WWE World Title.
At WrestleMania 42, in the likely Saturday main event, Cody Rhodes will defend the WWE Championship against his wrestling mentor, Randy Orton. However, there was a point when WWE was actually planning another Cody Rhodes-Drew McIntyre match for the WWE Title, possibly a Hell in a Cell match.
Instead, WWE took the title off McIntyre, which led to fans complaining about it online a lot because they wanted to see McIntyre go into WrestleMania as the WWE Champion, not Rhodes again.
WWE Wanted To Do Cody Rhodes-Randy Orton After WrestleMania
In the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Dave Meltzer reported that Cody Rhodes and Randy Orton were going to have a feud this year, but it wasn’t originally going to be a WrestleMania main event. Even though he’s on another brand, Meltzer noted that Bronson Reed’s injury led to a change.
The Bronson Reed injury for whatever reason was the clincher of the idea to go with Rhodes vs. Orton and McIntyre vs. Fatu in singles matches.
Rhodes vs. Orton was always the direction, but originally that was planned as Rhodes’ major program after WrestleMania.
During the March 13th SmackDown episode, Randy Orton attacked Cody Rhodes during a contract signing in what was Orton’s return to being a heel, even though some fans will likely want to keep cheering Orton for the legend that he is.