Dave Schilling On Why Seth Rollins vs. Brock Lesnar Opened WrestleMania 35

It’s long been perceived that when Brock Lesnar matches open a WWE PPV, it’s so he can go home early, and Dave Schilling has confirmed that in at least WrestleMania 35’s case. Lesnar lost the WWE Championship in the opening match of the 2019 PPV and Schilling, who was on the WWE Creative team at that time, noted while live-tweeting on a Watch Along of the PPV that the match was moved from the semi-main event position.

Schilling wrote:

“Brock and Seth was supposed to semi-main and last minute Brock changed it to the opener so he could go home early. That pushed Lashley and Finn to a spot when the crowd was flatter than a plate full of piss.”

Finn Bálor defeated Lashley in the semi-main event of the show to win the Intercontinental Championship, which immediately preceded the Winner Takes All match between Becky Lynch, Charlotte Flair, and Ronda Rousey for the Raw and Smackdown Women’s Championships. WrestleMania 35 went notoriously long at 7.5 hours including the pre-show, leading the final matches to have fairly subdued fan reactions as the crowd was worn out. To date, it is the last WrestleMania to last only one night.

Schilling also noted during the live-tweet that Vince McMahon laughed off the fact that fans hated the idea of Kurt Angle vs. Baron Corbin:

“Oh no it’s Kurt Angle Vs Baron Corbin. When it was mentioned in a production meeting that the fans hated the idea of this match, Vince laughed so hard and said ‘f**k em.'”

Brock and Seth was supposed to semi-main and last minute Brock changed it to the opener so he could go home early. That pushed Lashley and Finn to a spot when the crowd was flatter than a plate full of piss.

— Dave Schilling (@dave_schilling) March 16, 2023

Oh no it’s Kurt Angle Vs Baron Corbin. When it was mentioned in a production meeting that the fans hated the idea of this match, Vince laughed so hard and said “fuck em.”

— Dave Schilling (@dave_schilling) March 16, 2023