The news about The Rock taking Cody Rhodes’ spot at WrestleMania has not been well received by fans on social media. As was noted earlier, the segment was posted on WWE’s YouTube account and is now their most disliked video ever.
The match is not officially announced yet because they want to hold off on making it official at the press event happening this Thursday in Las Vegas. Things can always change but right now, the top two matches for WrestleMania look to be Rock vs. Reigns for the Undisputed Universal Championship and Seth Rollins defending the World Heavyweight Championship against Cody Rhodes.
While many people might be expecting Reigns to retain his title, that may not be what ends up happening. Fightful Select reported that they spoke with people who have stated that The Rock pushed for the match with Reigns and some believe that he was pushing to win the match, which means that the last thing you would see at WrestleMania is Rock holding the Universal Championship. This would also mean that Reigns would not surpass Hulk Hogan’s title reign. It throws a monkey wrench into the plan for Cody to defeat Reigns for the title since that is what has been built up for the last 2 years.
The Rock being slotted in the match is being seen as a political move that can bring more immediate money into TKO and this isn’t being viewed as something malicious being done by The Rock to Cody Rhodes. One has to wonder if TKO executives, The Rock included, are seeing the negative reaction across all social media platforms and if they are contemplating pivoting back to Rhodes vs. Reigns. At this point, there is no indication that they are going back to that match but between now and Thursday, plans can still change.
There are changes happening behind the scenes. Fightful reported that Brian Gewirtz, a former WWE creative team member and longtime friend of The Rock, will factor heavily into The Rock’s creative plans. Gewirtz was the person who wrote for The Rock during the Attitude Era and he has always been involved during Rock’s return appearances over the last decade or so. PWInisider wrote that this could end up being a “B-plan” for the future if a decision is made for The Rock’s team to take over the creative end of things that is currently handled by Triple H.
