Backstage Notes on Booking of Brock Lesnar & Roman Reigns’ Matches at WWE MSG House Show

– As previously reported, Brock Lesnar ended up facing Austin Theory in a WWE Championship match in the main event at last weekend’s WWE live event at New York City’s Madison Square Garden. After Lesnar quickly beat Theory, he was attacked by Roman Reigns and The Usos. They proceeded to assault Lesnar and left him in a bloody mess at the end of the show. The footage of the angle was later used last Monday on Raw. Dave Meltzer discussed the booking of the MSG event on today’s Wrestling Observer Radio.

According to Meltzer, the match booking changed several times after Bobby Lashley got injured and was pulled from advertising for the event. Lesnar was originally advertised to face Lashley for the title at the show. The matchup was then changed to Lesnar vs. Theory before reportedly changing multiple times and ultimately ending up at Lesnar vs. Theory again.

“Other names” were reportedly tossed around to face Lesnar at the event, so the Theory matchup apparently did not become a “lock” for the show until closer to the day of the event on Saturday (Mar. 5).

Additionally, the advertising also changed for the event for Roman Reigns’ title match. At the show, he defended his Universal title against Seth Rollins. Ahead of the event, Reigns was scheduled to be facing an unnamed opponent after being initially advertised for a matchup with Rollins. However, Rollins ended up being Reigns’ opponent anyway.

Meltzer reported that WWE floated around some other ideas for Reigns’ matchup after changing the initial advertising. However, WWE officials ultimately settled on coming back to the Reigns vs. Rollins matchup.

Brock Lesnar and Roman Reigns are currently scheduled to face each other in a Championship Unification Match in the main event for WrestleMania 38: Night 2 on Sunday, April 3. The event will be held at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas. It will be broadcast live on Peacock in the US and the WWE Network everywhere else.