More Details On Plans For Wrestlemania 40 Main Event, Original Plan For Cody Rhodes

The main event picture is seemingly set for Wrestlemania 40, as Cody Rhodes will challenge Roman Reigns for the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship. However, WWE threw people a curveball earlier this month when it appeared that The Rock was going to challenge Reigns and Rhodes would face Seth Rollins. That would end up not being the case, although Rock is still involved somehow.

The Wrestling Observer Newsletter reports that Triple H’s idea was that if Rhodes endorsed the Rock on the February 2nd show, that would mitigate any potential backlash, which WWE did expect. However, WWE didn’t expect the backlash to happen the way it did. The Rock and Brian Gewirtz decided that if fans were booing Rock, he should turn heel, which is what happened.

The story is that Rock and Gewirtz are pushing for things that are different from creative plans. WWE is leaning into this and blurring the lines of fact and fiction. This is why there have been segments pushing a power struggle between Rock and Triple H.

It’s believed that when the Rock announcement was made, Triple H “scrambled” to keep Rhodes involved “at all times.” One abandoned idea was for the Bloodline to injure Rhodes on the February 2nd show, which would take him off TV and set up The Rock vs. Reigns. Rhodes would eventually return and win the title. However, there was no point where WWE planned to take away the match with Reigns, although it’s unknown if it was going to happen at Mania before the backlash. They decided it didn’t make sense for Rhodes to challenge Rollins if he was “injured”.

CM Punk was the original plan for Seth Rollins, prior to his injury. Rollins will now defend against the winner of the men’s match at Elimination Chamber. The segment with Rollins asking Rhodes to choose him was to setup a backup plan, as things are constantly changing behind-the-scenes, especially with Rock pitching various things.

It is believed that there are more details from backstage that haven’t been revealed but “can’t be talked about now.” Rock reportedly said last weekend that it was best that he be out of the Reigns match and turn heel. He also reportedly pitched Reigns & Rock vs. Rhodes & Rollins for night one.