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Too heavy to be doing all them spin kicks and shit.
She gon be a bean pole before too long.
Report: The Rock made the call to turn heel, give WrestleMania main event back to Cody
The most detailed report yet about how WWE changed their plans for Roman Reigns, Dwayne Johnson & Cody Rhodes after fans revolted against a Rock/Reigns match in Philadelphia. But we still have lots of questions...
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From the outside, it seemed pretty clear that WWE changed their plans for Roman Reigns, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, and Cody Rhodes in response to backlash from fans after Royal Rumble winner Rhodes seemingly gave The Rock the WrestleMania main event he’d earned with Reigns on the Feb. 2 SmackDown.
Reporting since they officially course-corrected at last week’s WrestleMania XL Kickoff confirms that notion, and the latest Wrestling Observer Newsletter has the most detailed account of what happened yet.
Dave Meltzer writes that after the negative response to the end of the Feb. 2 show, it was The Rock who said he should be out of the Reigns match so Rhodes could be slotted back in. It sounds like everyone else had already figured that out, but it still probably took Johnson — who just days before had been named to the Board of Directors of WWE’s parent company, TKO Group — officially agreeing to drop the match he’d come back for.
Johnson also pitched his own heel turn, and the idea of a Roman & Rock vs. Rhodes & Seth Rollins tag match for night one, although it’s still not clear if that match will happen or if future twists & turns in the story will take that idea off the table.
The big question that remains is why WWE booked Cody to win the Rumble in the first place if they knew Johnson was doing the Reigns match at WrestleMania this year. We’d previously heard that Rhodes warned company official they wouldn’t get a positive reaction to his scene with The Rock on SmackDown. Now the Observer Newsletter makes it seem like head of creative Paul “Triple H” Levesque knew that too.
Meltzer’s heard that Triple H “scrambled behind the scenes” to keep Rhodes involved. At one point he wanted to shoot an angle for the Feb. 2 show that would see The Bloodline injure Cody to set-up The Rock being announced as his replacement at the press conference in Vegas. In that scenario, Rhodes would return later to finish his story and win the belt from Roman after WrestleMania.
Perhaps that’s something we’ll get more insight into in the future. Meltzer writes that “there is said to be far more behind the scenes that hasn’t come out but given the timing can’t be talked about now”, which is pretty cryptic even for a wrestling rumor report. Another possibility is that WWE is being extra tight-lipped about future story developments, like whatever Roman is teasing for SmackDown tonight (Feb. 16).
Guess we’ll just have to see what the “long gamers” have planned, and what the dirt sheets tell us about it afterwards.
Lol us "getting worked" and "kayfabe must not be dead with y'all" never checked out cause these pivots didn't make kayfabe sense to begin with. Past 3 weeks have been obvious behind the scenes or last min changes in direction.
So it was a pivot. Good on Rock for realising.Report: The Rock made the call to turn heel, give WrestleMania main event back to Cody
The most detailed report yet about how WWE changed their plans for Roman Reigns, Dwayne Johnson & Cody Rhodes after fans revolted against a Rock/Reigns match in Philadelphia. But we still have lots of questions...
From the outside, it seemed pretty clear that WWE changed their plans for Roman Reigns, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, and Cody Rhodes in response to backlash from fans after Royal Rumble winner Rhodes seemingly gave The Rock the WrestleMania main event he’d earned with Reigns on the Feb. 2 SmackDown.
Reporting since they officially course-corrected at last week’s WrestleMania XL Kickoff confirms that notion, and the latest Wrestling Observer Newsletter has the most detailed account of what happened yet.
Dave Meltzer writes that after the negative response to the end of the Feb. 2 show, it was The Rock who said he should be out of the Reigns match so Rhodes could be slotted back in. It sounds like everyone else had already figured that out, but it still probably took Johnson — who just days before had been named to the Board of Directors of WWE’s parent company, TKO Group — officially agreeing to drop the match he’d come back for.
Johnson also pitched his own heel turn, and the idea of a Roman & Rock vs. Rhodes & Seth Rollins tag match for night one, although it’s still not clear if that match will happen or if future twists & turns in the story will take that idea off the table.
The big question that remains is why WWE booked Cody to win the Rumble in the first place if they knew Johnson was doing the Reigns match at WrestleMania this year. We’d previously heard that Rhodes warned company official they wouldn’t get a positive reaction to his scene with The Rock on SmackDown. Now the Observer Newsletter makes it seem like head of creative Paul “Triple H” Levesque knew that too.
Meltzer’s heard that Triple H “scrambled behind the scenes” to keep Rhodes involved. At one point he wanted to shoot an angle for the Feb. 2 show that would see The Bloodline injure Cody to set-up The Rock being announced as his replacement at the press conference in Vegas. In that scenario, Rhodes would return later to finish his story and win the belt from Roman after WrestleMania.
Perhaps that’s something we’ll get more insight into in the future. Meltzer writes that “there is said to be far more behind the scenes that hasn’t come out but given the timing can’t be talked about now”, which is pretty cryptic even for a wrestling rumor report. Another possibility is that WWE is being extra tight-lipped about future story developments, like whatever Roman is teasing for SmackDown tonight (Feb. 16).
Guess we’ll just have to see what the “long gamers” have planned, and what the dirt sheets tell us about it afterwards.
Lol You going to have Phenom throwing his infamous blue caps
It took a damn press conference and a failed PowerPoint for him to realize this tho
But yeah, glad he was forced to realize what was best for business and what would make Wrestlemania T H E biggest ever is CODY RHODES.
End of the Bloodline coming soon.
Romans gonna take a long vacation and come back a face.
Not without getting turned on first. After WrestleMania, who knows we might be getting a whole new Bloodline w/Rock, Solo, Jimmy, & Jacob Fatu (if he signs w/WWE). If this ^^^ happens Roman will probably get stomped out by Rock & Co. and he probably feuds with them throughout the summer & fall. By the new year, the build to Rock vs Reigns starts at RR.
I really want the Bloodline to continue. Same with the nWo; just because a faction loses momentum or becomes stale is not a good reason to disband. Now it's time for the Bloodline to get some new blood for a while. That is either new leadership, new members, or a feud with a stronger faction.
Factions are my favorite thing about wrestling. They rarely ever reached their potential unfortunately and always are disbanded too soon (Raven's Flock, Special K, NoD, Nexus, etc).
Factions are my favorite thing about wrestling. They rarely ever reached their potential unfortunately and always are disbanded too soon (Raven's Flock, Special K, NoD, Nexus, etc).