The People’s Champ The Rock showed up on this week’s Friday Night SmackDown and came face-to-face with The Undisputed WWE Universal Champion Roman Reigns which indicates that The Rock will challenge Roman Reigns at WrestleMaina 40.
The American Nightmare Cody Rhodes won the 2024 Men’s Royal Rumble match and earned the title shot at WrestleMaina 40. Rhodes even pointed to Roman Reigns following his Royal Rumble win, confirming he will pick Roman Reigns for the Undisputed WWE Universal Champion at WrestleMaina event.
But on the latest edition of Friday Night SmackDown, Cody Rhodes mentioned that he will come for Undisputed WWE Universal Title , but not at this WrestleMaina. Then, The Rock came out and went face-to-face with Roman Reigns. This interaction can confirm that The Rock might face Roman Reigns at WrestleMaina 40.
Dave Meltzer on the Wrestling Observer forum mentioned (via WrestlingNews.co) that Roman Reigns vs. Cody Rhodes was the locked plan at WrestleMaina till last week.
“It was the plan on that night [Royal Rumble]. It was the plan the next day. It wasn’t the plan the day after that.”
Dave Meltzer in another post on F4W Forum, mentioned that The Rock pushed hard to happen this match at WrestleMaina even though they suggested the idea of facing Roman Reigns in Saudi Arabia.
“Dwayne pushed super hard for it. Read last week’s issue and this week’s. The card changed when Punk & Brock were out and all the dominoes fell. Dwayne already wanted it and they felt they now needed it as well. Felt this was better to change the news flow away from Vince.”
Dave Meltzer also stated that Cody Rhodes was the actual plan but the recent happenings in WWE forced them to change their direction.
“Cody was the plan. Dwayne was going to face him later, maybe next year’s Mania, maybe Saudi. The Vince thing ends up worse than they thought and they changed the plan. I literally didn’t know until yesterday that it could change and then I was told it’s under lock. But 100% it was Punk vs. Seth and Cody vs. Reigns until Punk got hurt.”