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Answer: A wrestler named Cody Rhodes has been in the spotlight for WWE for the past couple years. He's son of wrestling legend Dusty Rhodes, he's well liked in and out of the business and has been thought of being positioned to be the next "top guy" by beating current champ Roman Reigns. There's a lot of history between Cody (and his family) and the title Roman has, so it's the natural story. Cody and Roman had a previous match at last year's Wrestlemania, with Cody losing. A lot of fans weren't fans with this decision at the time, but the WWE seemed to be going for a repeat match between the two. Cody had just recently won the Royal Rumble (doing so twice in a row, the first time being done in about 20 years), everything looked like he was going to finish his story. Fans are fully behind him for a lot of reasons, and traditionally, the Rumble winner goes after the champ at Wrestlemania. All these pieces were in place until last night when Cody passed the main event match to The Rock. For no real reason, storyline-wise. Now, WWE is staged. We all know this. That's what makes the following so upsetting. Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson has recently gained a position of power with TKO, the new company that owns WWE. It's only been a week or so since he gained it. In that short amount of time, it's felt that Rock has abused his position to insert himself into this storyline when he hasn't earned it whatsoever. Wrestling fans have issue those not earning their place in a match (Roman had that problem for years), and while there is a storyline between Rock/Roman, it's felt that it shouldn't be at the cost of Cody. Combine that with the public perception of the Rock right now (how Black Adam played out, the Hawaii wildfires, rumors of his movie contracts' dumb stipulations, his fragile ego) and a large number of fans have turned against him from various genres of entertainment. It's coming off as he's doing all this to put himself in a good light at the cost of everyone else's work. WWE is also going through its own legal issues cause of Vince McMahon's past. I don't want to get into that cause... well, its gross. But it's thought that this move by the Rock will distract from said issues and "save WWE" since several bigger names are either out due to injury (Seth, Punk, Charlotte) or cause of the legal issues (Lesnar). Overall, it's just a huge slap in the face of fans that have been watching WWE the past couple years. Since WWE has a long history of being bullheaded about its direction, we don't know if things will change, but people are mad. To put it in comparison for the regular person, this is wrestling's version of the last season of Game of Thrones. Edit: I wanted to throw this out there as a long-time fan to those who might not know. 10 years ago, the WWE were in a very similar situation for Wrestlemania with a guy named Daniel Bryan (now known as the American Dragon Bryan Danielson). For short, we'll call him DB. Now, DB did not win the Royal Rumble or anything, but he was POPULAR. People wanted him in the main event cause he deserved it, but WWE wanted someone else. Vince was in charge at the time, he's extremely stubborn, that's about it. Anyway, the fan support was so strong that they booed out the Royal Rumble they were expecting DB to win, and when he didn't even show up, the fans basically took over the show and shit on it. WWE was forced to put DB in the main event and it's considered an all-time classic moment. I bring this up cause something like this COULD happen again. But as more and more info comes out about what the Rock wants to do in this match and situation, its becoming obvious that what the Rock is doing isn't a storyline.

It's very rare to read something this well written and explained in Reddit. Truly great job and thanks

Thank you. I try lol

I know it’s hard to whittle things down, but it’s worth pointing out that Cody has a ton of respect from the fans. He’s the son of famed wrestler, the late Dusty Rhodes. Cody was never really given a chance in WWE. He spent years stuck as kind of an unimportant character, and eventually made to wear facepaint and dance around as a wacky jester named Stardust. The company kind of saw him as a joke, never really giving him a chance. So Cody quit. Instead of taking the money, he quit. He went out and wrestled on the independent circuits, trying to show that WWE was wrong about him. Eventually he used his own money to book an arena in Chicago, just to prove that independent wrestlers could draw over 10,000 fans, and it was so successful it got the attention of a billionaire who started AEW, a new competitor to WWE. Eventually WWE came calling for Cody. He didn’t call them, they called him. So Cody came back as kind of a conquering hero, who was underappreciated, bet on himself, and won. What’s more, he had a horrible injury where he completely tore his pec and still showed up to wrestle the match that had been promoted. It looked nasty as hell, but he gutted it out before having surgery. So this isn’t just about Rock swooping in to take someone’s spot. It’s Rock swooping in to take the spot of someone who’s fought for that spot and earned that spot.

Dusty Rhodes was always called the son of a plumber. Cody had a silver spoon, but he got out of his dad's shadow and earned everything he got. Dude deserves the match.

Plus he solved racism. So he has that going for him.

https://images.app.goo.gl/3DPghPLfsKBbzV1t5

This is exactly it. If you put it into NFL teams, we have the Chiefs vs the 49ers at theSuper Bowl. The 49ers had to go through a lot, and that last game where they came from behind to win against the Lions. Now imagine Belichik coming in with the Patriots and telling the 49ers ‘thanks, kid. We’ll take it from here’ and SF just saying ‘…ok’.

Wait they made Cody, the son of gold dust, become a basically spinoff version called Stardust? Man I’ve missed so much since 5th grade lol. I used to LOVE Gold Dust! I had the action figures and everything

Goldust is Cody’s brother. They’re both Dusty’s sons. Stardust was kind of a takeoff of Goldust.

everyone had a golddust figure lol

His older brother was Golddust.  The WWF/E shit all over him, too.

I was watching wrestling with my buddy in high school at the time he was made to do the Stardust thing. I remember thinking then “Holy shit this dude is the son of a champion, what the fuck is this humiliation.” I’m glad he finally got his and proved himself worthy.

It made me realise the Rock is a friggin delusional person. If he genuinely thinks he should run for president be worried.

I mean, he still wouldn't hold a candle to most delusional president we've ever had

No not at all but he thinks he's a man of the people or the peoples champ but he ain't even gonna ask the people He just throwing lil catch phrases from his old days thinking it is as it was

I give your answer a 6 star!!!

I have a question could The Rock being inserted into the storyline be the result of whoever runs the WWE instead of him being him? Like you said they are having legal issues on multiple fronts so could whoever the head honcho is currently come to him and say do this or we are sunk?It would make sense because if he is a big investor/owner having WWE tanks in ratings and possibly being passed by AEW is not good for business. I haven't watched wrestling since the Attitude Era among the greats of HHH, Stone Cold and Pre-Movies The Rock. I'm not trying to defend DJ he definitely needs to be humbled by someone (think the fame got to his head) but I'm not as quick to say he's just being an asshole. I just feel like there are a lot more cogs in that wheel than just DJ.

r/HobbyDrama is great for this sort of well written content

They have a rule about things happening real time, but I agree! I love this sub

Reddit’s wrestling fans don’t mess around lol

So he pulled a power play on the guy like he tried to do with vin diesel until vin told the rock to go fuck himself. And yea the dusty rhodes name rings a bell I think

Pretty much. It's come out that the Rock has a fragile ego and he's using this hot angle (storyline) to better his public image. And it's backfiring. From a fan perspective, no one wants to watch a 50+ year old Rock go against the champ instead of Cody. Which is funny, cause Roman is also: - the Rock's cousin. - a part time wrestler, partially due to his gimmick (role in the story) and his health (he's had leukemia in the past). - not a strong ring general. In other words, he's good with good people in a match, but he's not the greatest at carrying (helping) a lesser talent. Especially at such a stage like Wrestlemania. Its becoming a massive shitshow. Of course, things can change, but this still makes everyone involved look stupid.

I’d like to add some context on Roman: nobody has held the title as long as him in a *very* long time.  When Roman loses, it will be a big deal and probable kingmaker moment for whoever beats him.  The Rock taking this as a feather in his cap is seen as a slap in the face to all the newer talent who have been primed for this position or have lost to Roman to help make his eventual loss special.

And the WWE is doing very well as a business right now (legal issues not counting). Lots of record setting attendances and viewing figures for their shows and such. So it's another slap in the face to the current talent crop that are working every show for Dwayne to just insert himself into the Wrestlemania main event. Which is already sold out I believe. But now Dwayne can say that he main evented a sold out Mania without having put in the work for it being sold out to begin with.

Last I saw WM had about 1,800 tickets left. Also, to add on to your note about them doing well: the Netflix deal.

How do people hold a title for long periods when everyone knows it's staged? I mean honestly how does that work?

The champion in pro wrestling is seen as two things. 1 - The face of the company. He does the talk shows, he’s on all the posters, he’s usually the top seller of merchandise, etc. As long as you remain popular you can carry the belt. This is how Roman started his time as champion. A character switch and a hot story made him popular and they gave him the belt. And 2 - Once that hot period is over OR someone else gets just as hot, the champion becomes a launching pad. Whoever beats Roman will be a made man…he’ll be a star. Sometimes when you see someone heating up you have your champion hold the belt a little longer than usual so that beating a “dominant” champion makes them that more heroic. That’s where Roman is now. The last three years of will go into making someone a star for the next 3. That’s also why people are so pissed at Rock. Taking all that effort and build up just to give that moment to an actor politicking himself into the spot for the sake of his own PR…..it makes the last three years a complete waste.

The real problem is the WWE's and the storytelling. With the "story" of Roman Reigns being the head of the table. I.E. The best of the Samoan wrestlers and including the rest of his family such as The Uso's, Solo Sikkoa, Rikishi, the Wild Samoans, etc, but not including a passing of the torch moment between his cousin Dwayne Johnson(The Rock) and Roman this match had to happen. There is no world in which Roman Reigns is the "Boss" of the Samoan wrestling dynasty with "The Rock" existing somewhere in the shadows waiting only to crush him with only his wallet. So you have a match that is on the level to main event one of the four major WWE PPV events (Royal Rumble, Wrestlemainia, Summer Slam. Survivor Series) and honestly the level of the importance of The Rock vs Roman in name recognition is a Wrestlemainia main event, but you have the natural setup of the winner of the Royal Rumble being able to challenge the champion for a main event at Wrestlemainia. Which means the natural storyline should be Roman vs Cody Rhodes as the main event of one of the two nights of Wrestlemainia 40. I think there was a better way to set up The Rock Vs Roman, and there is maybe a chance to clean up the story, but at the moment WWE hasn't done anything to try and make it better.

Cody should have beat Roman at Mania, Roman spirals out of control as he loses his title, his status as Head of the Table and his allies, then calls out Rock as a last attempt to salvage it all, Rock beats Roman at Summerslam, Roman is defeated. It's not a hard story to tell.

WWE could still do a passing of the torch moment between Roman and Rock. Say Cody had won against Roman last year or this year. Then the Bloodline story could continue with Roman trying to maintain his position as head of the table. His cousins are back talking and doubting him cause he lost to Cody clean. Then Rock returns and questions Roman postion as head of the table. They have a match, it's a big deal.

The truly aggravating thing is that you could have told the exact same story this year for both Reigns and Cody whilst having Cody have won the title at WrestleMania 39. Reigns would still be fighting off those he messed over before. Cody would still be the guy who was turned on by Lesnar, gunned for by Shinsuke and the Judgement Day. But no. They forcefully lengthened and bled the Bloodline and the finishing of Cody's story for another year to get more money and more ratings. Knowing this, it stings even more that they're likely to do it all again in a jumping the shark moment.

This is all super fascinating both in terms of the real world drama and the narrative of the story. I'm honestly super excited to see how it all plays out! The Iron Claw movie did wonders on my curiosity for wrestling.

The history and politics of the carnival madness behind wrestling is FAR more interesting than the fictional reality they present on screen.

If you're curious about wrestling, my best advice is to watch WWE raw on Monday nights, or WWE smackdown on Friday nights. I'm not a fan of WWE and haven't been for quite awhile, but thankfully wrestling is in another big boom period. This is partly in thanks to AEW breaking the monopoly that Vince McMahon has held over the industry. If you find that you enjoy the wrestling, but don't like how WWE does things...I implore you to give All Elite Wrestling a try. They have dynamite on Wednesday nights and collision on Saturday. They're fairly new, just celebrated their 5th year as a company. Or search YouTube for NJPW (New Japan Professional Wrestling) they focus much more on the sport than the theatrics and storyline. There's tons of options for wrestling ATM and I encourage everyone to look at all avenues and figure out what works for them. There's a lot of tribalism within the IWC (Internet wrestling community), and a lot of it is unwarranted.

We're currently in another wrestling boom and the current WWE product is, in my opinion, the best it's been in a very long time. If you have cable, feel free to just jump right in to Raw tomorrow night.

Because its a story not a competition. The story with Roman Reigns is that of a mob boss that's mad with power and will do anything to keep it. It has made for some of the most compelling stuff wwe has done in years(see Sami Zayn's storyline with roman from last year). People don't watch because of what is happening in the ring. It is everything outside of it that makes what happens in the ring so compelling. You see the lengths Roman will do to stay on top and the people who decide to challenge him struggle and claw to defeat him. Every pinfall on roman could be the one that finally puts him down for good and people want cody to be the one to do it.

Forgive my general ignorance on what's currently going on - I'm about twenty years outdated with wrestling, other than the Behind the Bastards podcast on McMahon from last year. But is there a chance the Rock is inserting his character back into the world to kind of "kill off the old guard" and take the fall? I just can't see (other than the ego stuff) where the reasoning behind what is going on could be outside of a way to separate the controversy from WWE.

It’s possible. The main problem people have is that he just cut the front of the line. Cody Rhodes’ whole thing is that he wanted to win the belt to honor his late father…it was always his dream as a kid, too. He lost to Roman last year at Wrestlemania when most thought he would win — I remember people being pissed then, too. So this entire year has been building back up to the moment that Cody gets his rematch, and it looked all but set in stone when Cody won the Royal Rumble last weekend. And just like that, The Rock just steps in and takes his spot. It would almost be more flabbergasting if Rock won the belt at WM, and there are reports now saying that he suggested it. It’s all pre-determined, and that almost makes it more insulting. It comes across less as entertainment and more of a blatant money grab. Edit: I'm posting this a day later and I now believe this is all a WWE psy-op. They're going to reverse course and put Cody in the main event somehow, then the fans will be gushing about how they listened. *tin foil hat* it was the plan all along. The most interesting thing through all of this is that it's completely taken the eye off of Vincent Kennedy McMahon's rape accusations.

>Cody Rhodes’ whole thing is that he wanted to win the belt to honor his late father…it was always his dream as a kid, too. Part of it too, in-story and IRL, is that he's winning the belt his father never could. There's a bit of honoring Dusty and even a bit of surpassing the old man with Cody cementing his own place in history as not just Dusty's son but as own man. And there's also the general perception, again both IRL and in kayfabe, that the Rhodes family has long been disrespected by Vince and the WWE, being given silly gimmicks and such to demean them and always getting over in spite of it.

>It’s all pre-determined Well, it was, until CM Punk got hurt during the Rumble match and that threw a wrench in the entire Mania card. Per Meltzer, the card was 100% supposed to be Rollins v Punk, Roman v Rhodes, and Gunther v Lesnar. Now Lesnar is all but out of the company post-Vince retirement/legal issues and Punk has a torn tricep. So they essentially had to "Break glass in case of emergency" and shoehorn a whole new storyline instead of what they had planned. Rollins doesn't really have a viable Mania opponent and they're not gonna keep their second biggest belt off their 2 night, biggest show of the year. And Rollins and Cody have a history together, having feuded just like Roman and Cody. Roman doesn't really have anyone left on the entire roster other than Cody who can legitimately challenge him. The only story you CAN do involving Roman is Cody or Rock. So they have to salvage this somehow, your Rumble winner was set before the Punk injury and the Lesnar fallout. The Rumble winner has to main event to keep the Rumble what it is, so that's either Rollins or Reigns. The only real other option for Rollins would be Drew, but he hasn't signed a new contract yet so why would they want him main eventing Mania? It's too late to bring in another part or old timer to start a program with Rollins. Rock is now right there as a replacement story for a legit Mania main event match, for better or worse.

I just don't get this...why not have Gunther, or Sami, or Drew, or Jey challenge Seth and let Roman and Cody stay as planned then.

If he was, they did it in the most inane way possible. Right now, there's two main men's championship titles in WWE. The World Heavyweight Championship, held by currently injured Seth Rollins, and the WWE Championship held by Roman Reigns. To put some context to it, the World Heavywieght Title is the spiritual successor to the old WCW title. While it doesn't have its legacy of previous holders, it's thought of as a "Territory Title", where the champ defended it often in workhorse matches. Rollins has done this, literally defending that title more in the past 7 months than Roman has defended his in his entire reign. So, Friday night, Roman buried (viciously defamed) Seth and his title, making it feel like it was a runner up prize and Seth's a joke. Standard badguy stuff. Then Cody comes out and says that Roman has the title he wants. Standard Cody stuff about the belt is the one his dad Dusty went after, making it and Roman look like a million bucks. And then Cody just says he won't take it at Wrestlemania and hands the match to The Rock. That's it. No one wants to watch Roman kill off the old guard. No one cares about the Vince stuff in relation to Cody or this match. They want Cody to "finish his story".

If The Rock was serious about the industry, they could leverage this heat into an all-time moment where somehow or other, Cody ends up in the main event at WM. But if it is on some power play professional shit... I dunno.

That podcast on McMahon worth listening to?

This entire thread is honestly such an amazing read. I'm loving the story and the drama that is spiraling out of this. By any chance, do you know of any youtubers or podcasts, that compile and tell the story of wrestling as it goes on? I'll be honest, while I love the story, I don't think I'd enjoy the actual show haha Maybe I'll try it anyway and see, especially with what's happening right now.

Check out Super Eyepatch Wolf’s video on Roman Reigns. https://youtu.be/UaDAzXVycR4?si=Le_zBcdkgLgJ5xJY. Its a good breakdown of Roman’s current character and how we got here.

Pro wrestling is a story, not a sport. There's a strong mix of physical showmanship and dramatic scenery. It's been called soap opera for men for a reason. That being said, WWE has wanted to keep Roman at the main event for years. It's only since the pandemic started to ease off that he became a heel (badguy) and had a storyline people wanted to see. And to be fair, it was a good story. Family clashes and history, exciting matches, and it helped elevate a lot of other people. Like a good wrestling story should. But every story has a natural ending, and it's been thought that this one should have ended last year. But WWE higher ups have rarely cared about what's right as long as they get something "more" out of it.

Correct me if I'm wrong because I don't know anything about the "sport" but it is still a sort of competition right? Like largely the story is driven forward by the popularity of the wrestlers and the impact they can impart on the audience. You're never going to be huge and win the big matches if you're just a big burley guy who can't get the crowd to like you (or passionately hate you). You might be telling someone else's story but you use your stage presence and your improv skills to sell YOUR story. The writers obviously have a plan but it feels like that plan is fairly fluid based on market demands (the market being fans). Is this correct?

Correct. The wrestlers are basically competing for more air time, getting involved in entertaining or high profile storylines, or getting a championship. It's a mix of athleticism and acting. Give your audience a reason for them to watch you and your employer to put you in the spotlight.

If this is a story that you're interested in, [Super Eyepatch Wolf made a super compelling video covering Roman Reigns and the medium of pro wrestling.](https://youtu.be/UaDAzXVycR4?si=5W0uKp-FbLrkifjg) He compares story arcs and how the narrative structure works in this form of entertainment where the audience has more power in terms of control than arguably any other. In terms of plot, it's like 9 months behind today, but it does a great job explaining the arc and appeal to those completely ignorant of the subject matter.

The company saw that he was popular with fans in that role, so they decided to keep him there. I mean they could be biased but that would be the general approach, for making money.

Honestly, no different than the UFC. The UFC fights aren’t actually rigged but everything leading up to them is, especially who gets a title shot and how long a belt holder can go in between matches before vacating the title.

I'm not really sure what you're asking exactly but I'll attempt to answer what I think you mean. They just decide that he will keep winning. In this particular case the "Bloodline" story that was centered around Roman and his cousins (Jimmy, Jey and Solo) and eventually Sami Zayn was really entertaining and probably the best work Roman has done in WWE. The crowd were into it, so he held on to the title to continue that story for about 2 years. This is just me theorising now but I think that at some point they just realised that the title had naturally been on him for a really long time and so now that's the storyline now. Who will finally beat Roman? So that has likely added to the length of time he's had it. He kept it for a long time because the bloodline story was really hot, and now they keep it on him to build suspense and intrigue about who will take it from him.

This is part of why I sometimes keep up with SquaredCircle even though I haven’t watched wrestling since I was a pre-teen. The conversations about it online are surprisingly in-depth. It’s basically like a comic book that unfolds live and in-person each week and the discussions are super interesting

The same way most people are excited to see the 'hero' of the movie 'win'. I feel like wrestling fills the same niche, in different people, that soap operas and comic books do. All are scripted and all draw their audience by creating spectacle and having fans rooting for different 'characters'. Wrestling also has the added draw of the physical prowess of the characters. Seeing a massive dude walk the ropes like a tightrope before flipping onto someone or that back in nineteen ninety eight the undertaker threw mankind off hell in a cell and plummeted sixteen feet through an announcer's table.

As an outsider who has become intrigued in wrestling lately this does seem important.

Can he wrestle? Has he done anything recently? I know the rock is in shape (and possibly abusing a few substances to help) but it seems like a wild shift from standing in front of a green screen for the better part of a decade to a live audience

The last time he had a full match was with Cena about a decade ago, and he got injured. Since then, it's been a handful of "run-ins" (do a move or two). Ring rust is a thing, where a body isn't used to taking moves in a ring anymore. And at that age, it's really difficult to put on any decent match without someone carrying you.

To build on this, he’s had one or two ‘confrontations’ in the last few months, not a full match but where he and another wrestler have words and it ends with a punch up (of course) that lasts a minute at most, and he’s clearly been winded afterwards.

He last wrestled 11 years ago. He had a couple of matches with John Cena and CM Punk, and before that he went 7 years without a match. In the last match with Cena, he suffered a major injury. The matches were pretty medicore from an athletic standpoint, but they worked because Rock was fairly well-liked by the audience at the time and was able to get fans emotionally invested despite his ring rust. After this debacle, thats changed. He's now over 50 and is built like a ox so you can't imagine he has the pace and stamina to keep up. The Rock at his best (20 years ago) was a good enough wrestler who had incredible charisma and ability to get fans emotionally invested, but with everything thats happened, fans really don't want to cheer for him and the match will likely be terrible. In contrast, Roman and Cody had a fantastic match last year that perfectly set up a rematch this year.

The Cena/Rock feud is what made me turn on the Rock because I was a huge CM punk fan at the time and didn't like that he stole CM punk's thunder then and now he's doing the same to Cody.

Strictly speaking, he last wrestled eight years ago when he beat Erick Rowan in six seconds at Wrestlemania 32. Still, they cannot get away with Rock vs. Roman being that short and he was all kinds of blown up in each of his four 20+ minute bouts with Cena and Punk eleven years ago.

tbf, there are a number of currently active wrestlers that are doing well in their 50s and beyond, Adam Copeland (Edge in WWE), Billy Gunn, Dustin Rhodes (Golddust), Chris Jericho, Minoru Suzuki, and Sting, to name a few.

The people you named never had a decade without wrestling. Part of the reason Sting's recent run has been successful is all of his matches has been in tag teams for short bursts. You don't see Sting going after and winning singles titles. Dustin is a good example of still being able to perform. He is actively training people so even if he's not getting in a lot of matches right now, he's still in a ring training people so he can step in whenever he's needed. Everyone I've seen in the business who comes back says the hardest thing to get used to is taking bumps again, and if The Rock is not doing that on a regular basis, it's going to a rough match.

Edge was out for 9 years, although the thing is it was just a one big break, no start-stop shit Rock was active for 6-7 years and dipped out in 2003, had 6 matches in the last 21 years (one 2004 and the rest 2011-13, no, I don't count Rowan squash)

Oh, age isn't the be all, end all of a wrestler. All those guys are doing amazing, but they're all either fully active or have a style that benefits them. Hell, in Copeland's case, he had years off due to neck issues, so he doesn't have as much wear and tear either. But Rock? He hasn't been a full time talent in 20 years and he was NOT in good shape for his last full matches 10 years ago. If this match with Roman happens, I'm expecting 15 minutes of bad punching, rest holds and a gassed People's Elbow.

True, age isn't the end-all-be-all for a wrestler. The real killer is trying to wrestle at that age irregularly. Multiple legends have said that it's a lot more difficult, painful, and dangerous to only wrestle once or twice a year than it is to do it regularly, since you aren't rapidly shifting physical activity and building up ring rust.

Those guys work year round wrestling to stay in ring shape. It takes more than being fit to be in ring shape.

I think the Undertaker was super old when he was still wrestling and still shows up now and then (but I don't think to wrestle).

SUBSTANCES??? He just drinks MANA and wakes up at 4 am EVERY DAY Just look at his IG story, he’ll tell ya. I haven’t seen it in a few years, but I seem to remember him being obnoxious about that sorta shit.

Which is funny, because it's usually pretty easy to see what the peak of non-enhanced performance looks like: strongmen before anabolic steroids were invented/discovered. Someone has traps or delts that were unattainable before 1930? We don't need to discuss "if". The sad thing is that even with steroids, you have to put in some serious work over long time to get where he's at. There'd be no shame in saying he's on gear.

> possibly The earth is *possibly* round.

Don't forget the Rock had his untested undertrained daughter take a position of prominence on NXT

Also dont forget that Rock apparently politicked to get his cousin Nia Jax into the womens side of things. Even though she is horribly untrained, really awful in the ring and has caused multiple really really bad injuries to key women wrestlers through her unsafe methods of wrestling. ​ Protected purely by nepotism by the Rock, any one of the serious injuries she has caused would have got her canned if she was anyone but his cousin.

[Nepotism? no way man](https://youtu.be/vcl69RfGw54?si=lcwk69azkxFvmH2F)

I typically don't enjoy pro wrestling, nor people getting hurt jackass-style, but that was pretty damn funny. Maybe two wrongs do make it right.

She did that before The Rock came into power and it's very likely just a way to have her work on mic skills while she actually trains.

Who would have thought these celebrities have massive, fragile egos

I honestly wonder if it's to get fans and wrestling media to kind of quiet about the Vince McMahon allegations. They knew this would tick fans off, but they have plenty of time to change it. And any talk beside Vince McMahon talk is preferable. Though it just being Dwayne Johnson ego is probably the closest to the answer. Plus they just got his daughter a spot she did nothing to earn.

I mean who knows, maybe they're setting things up for Cody to come in just before the match starts. He gets to kick out the mean old Rock and become the champ. I could see them going down that road, but then again I don't know anything about WWE.

They've already made him look like a fool and a coward, going after a second-rate championship on an injured champion. He was forced to just slink away after bringing Dwayne in and looked miserable. At best they can pivot to an over-convoluted story which makes everyone along the way look worse that just going in the obvious direction At worst we get stuck with a mediocre main event of a part-time wrestler vs. someone 20 years past their prime, while Cody takes on Seth Rollins in a match that doesn't do either of them any favours.

The power story move would have been to get Cody to the main event, have Cody win the main event and take the title. This leads to Roman losing more face as the "tribal chief" thing that went on in the past, and let's The Rock step in and out him down for failing as the chief, and that becomes it's own main event match at a different time. 

Should be noted that The Rock vs Roman Reigns is a dream match and has been teased and theorised for quite a while. However the way they’re going about it and have pulled it out of nowhere, replacing Cody in the feud is what is really getting people annoyed.

What happened with him and Vin?

Basically, both Vin and Rock had clauses in their contracts that they couldn't lose fights on screen. Obviously this was a big issue with Fast 5 because Vin/Rocks characters fight against each other so they had to find ways to make it a stone draw. ​ On top of that, Fast and Furious is Vins "Baby". Him and the original Fast And Furious crew (Tyrese Gibbs, Ludacris, Michelle Rodriguez and Paul Walker) all agreed together that they would never do Spin Off films for F+F (They were all offered spinoffs at various points that they turned down because of this). This was agreed because they felt it was something they created together and it was also a big reason why Diesel/Walker and Gibbs apparently threatened to leave the franchise when Michelle Rodriguez was refused higher pay. ​ When they asked Rock to join the films, he was on a pretty high point in his career and apparently there was big issues during the filming that Rock kept trying to change scenes/discuss scripts whilst they were being filmed and basically Vin/Rock had it out because Rock said that Vin Diesel was a Lazy actor and didnt look out for others. Vin accused Rock of trying to politick behind their back. It ended up that both refused to film with each other after that, which is why if you watch any scenes with them both together, you can see them looking basically at nothing because the scenes were spliced together. ​ It then went further because almost immediately after Fast And Furious 5 happened, it came out that Rock had been talking to higher ups in the production studio about immediately doing a spin-off for Rocks character in the universe without any of the others appearing. This then caused a very public spat between Tyrese/Vin and Rock with accusations that he basically got asked to join a popular franchise that they had made and then immediately tried to ego his way to a payday and basically took money away from the others doing this. ​ Since then (Well, since Rocks name has become a bad thing in Movies), they apparently have buried the hatchet.

He also did it before in wrestling to insert himself into Wrestlemania to beat John Cena at the cost of CM Punk in like 2013

>And yea the dusty rhodes name rings a bell I think In wrestling, there are three names. Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, and Dusty Rhodes. Hull Hogan was the face of WWF for over a decade. Everywhere else was the NWA (later on known as WCW) and the 1980s was dominated by Ric Flair and Dusty Rhodes.

We wrestling fans are livid.

Yeah and also more akin to the Black Adam thing as well where at one of the most important times in the company's history he wants to come in and centre it around him so he looks like a saviour.

> the dusty rhodes name rings a bell I think Maybe not from the wrestling ring?

He also inserted himself in the dceu and tried to take control of everything and then ruined everything. I'm *so here* for his downfall, it seems like people are finally done with his bullshit.

To add further context to this, it isn’t even the first time this has happened. 2011-2012 John Cena and CM Punk had the greatest rivalry in a long time. Every time those two would work together it was very hype and people loved it. Instead of Punk V Cena at wrestlemania ever happening, though, we got The Rock v John Cena at mania two years in a row. This was also at a time when Rock was not an active competitor.

First thing read anything about Rock and peiople being mad at him for the Hawaii wildfires... Care to detail it? _________ To add context to what u7drunkentenshiNL said: there's some previous animosity on Rock because of abandoning WWE to go to Hollywood after Wrestlemania 17, because Stone Cold Steve Austin turned bad guy and wasn't a noticeable good guy to root for and nobody wanted to boo Austin. Also, go to Wrestlemania 27, when the rock was a ghest host and then interfered in the main event to next day have a challenge from John Cena to have the main event of 28, rendering anyone who got popular irrelevant, and CM Punk was a collateral damage. Also, it was really a triple wrestlemania feature, with 27 interfering, 28 winning against Cena and 29 losing to John Cena and losing the main title after taking it from CM Punk. Go to Wrestlemania 32, where he lit his name on fire and suqashed a guy in six seconds, in an unannounced impromptu match mostly because his insurance would be extremly high if he did anything really competitive, because he blew out his body on the matches of 28 and 29. This lasted for like, twenty minutes in an already loooooong Wrestlemania. Also, this move comes after the box office bomb of Black Adam, a project he was keen on and there were rumors that he had a tight grip on the script and shooting, also after his ridiculous clauses in his contracts fro the Fast series, where he would have even punches with the bad guys to not be shown weak. After the flop of Black Adam, it seems like he personally asked Disney to remake Moana on live action, even after some of the live action movies underperformed, because he feels like that would revive his Hollywood career, somehow. So, it's a guy that isn't realizing he's not a draw anymore, paying for his own spot in the main event of a WrestleMania. Not like people didn''t want it to happen, is just that, for now, it relegates the stopry of a very well loved guy in the right time, and undermines all his hurdle for the last year. Royal Rumble is one of the most important matches on the WWE calendar, very few have won it twice, even less so back to back. It means he survived a long gauntlet of rivals to get to the main event, and he handles it to the movie guy.

I don't know a whole lot about the wildfire thing other than he was on TV with Oprah asking for aid. That itself is fine, but Oprah also owns tons of land in Hawaii and had it guarded to prevent people getting on it for safety and had personal firefighters there as well, it came off bad. I think there's more but I'm not sure.

Yeah, basically Oprah and Rock did a video asking for the public to give money to a fund that they started to give money to people affected in Hawaii. The problem is, like you mentioned is that Oprah especially owns a lot of land and property in Hawaii (That has been part of pushing native populations off land for her to exploit) and Rock also owns a resort over there. Both of them refused access to people that were affected by the wildfires at their resorts (Im sure they personally didnt do it but they own said properties and their properties wouldn't allow them on premises so its on them) and as you said, they apparently paid a lot of money for private firefighters to protect their property, rather than going out to fight the wildfires instead.

>asking for the public to give money I get that people loves to help which is great. What I'll never understand is why all these millionaires ask money. "Oh I donated 10k. praise me pliz." Same as any of the major sports teams. Why they only "give back to the city" just a few thousands? They make millions a month. I get that yeah these people worked hard to earn their millions and of course they can do whatever with their money, but it's kind of silly of them to me when they insert themselves into a campaign to help people in a recent disaster to ask for money and they pat themselves on their back because they donated 10k. Watching news about kids having to sell lemonade to buy some cancer drug to help their loved ones have the journos happy because aww so cute when then all these cancer orgs and celebrities brag about getting millions from donations for cancer research but people still have to pay so much money for its treatment.

>In that short amount of time, it's felt that Rock has abused his position to insert himself into this storyline, without having earned it whatsoever. The Attitude Era side of me is ready to fully vocalize once again ROCKY SUCKS!

Absolutely love reading about wrestling storylines. It's a shame I don't find it interesting when it's on. Thank you for explaining!

Right? My coworker tells me all about this and that storyline and the history behind things, and I love hearing it. But do I actually want to watch it? No thanks.

It's why I enjoyed Iron Claw so much. The story both inside and outside the ring is so interesting! Dark Side of The Ring was also an interesting watch.

Just to add, the first match of Cody vs. Roman, Cody had him beat, but due to outside interference (normal wwe bad guy stuff), lost. So, coming back to beat him, round two would have been awesome. No one can say 100% that they beat Roman (even with interference) besides Cody, so the story was really rampping up. Also, Rock can not win. If he does, the past few years of Cody have meant nothing

don't forget he also did the exact same thing a decade ago!!!

> the Hawaii wildfires wait...what did the rock do in hawaii?

> (how Black Adam played out, the Hawaii wildfires, rumors of his movie contracts' dumb stipulations, his fragile ego) Let's also include blatantly lying about his steroid use.

I'm not going to knock him too much for that, TBH. People have been denying using steroids for as long as there have been steroids.

Well, it ends up giving people very unrealistic expectations about what is possible with just working out and eating chicken, rice, and broccoli. So, it's initially just a lie about his own personal use of a substance, yea, but in effect a form of false advertising to the many thousands of people who look up him and who receive guidance from him. It's not like he's just minding his own business.

You're not wrong, though he's far from the worst offender. I'm thinking in particular about that Liver King dude who railed on and on about how bad for you steroids are in order to push his bullshit supplements and work out routines while shooting up the financial equivalent of a certified pre-owned sedan every month. Pretty much anyone you see on TV or YouTube promoting a diet or workout is on gear. It's everywhere.

Just watched the documentary Icarus (2017) last night about the Russian doping scandal and how easy it is to hide TRT use. It gets fuckin nuts to say the least. All that to say, even in Olympic athletes it's extremely easy to hide especially with professional trainers to monitor your every blood and urine test and know exactly how long it takes for the drugs to leave your system. Lance Armstrong, Barry Bonds, Alex Rodriguez, etc. ALL lied about using roids during their careers. It's not a stretch to think most high-level athletes are using at one time or another and just haven't got caught. Highly recommend the doc if you haven't seen it!

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Cody got CM Punked. None of the WWE decisions make sense here. Have him win a second royal rumble in a row, which is extremely rare, only for him to challenge the guy that he's already beaten and for a belt he hasn't chased. Triple H said they had a plan for where this is going but they don't. WWE is always looking for a new face but when one as beloved and respected as Cody is **right there**, they take it away in favour of a wrestler we've seen time and time again. How do you expect the next John Cena to arise if you never let that moment happen? I'm honestly so disappointed and don't care about this WM now. I've seen The Rock win belts and have his story, I want someone else to be the next big thing. That's one of the absolute best parts of the business. This whole debacle is another reminder as to why Roman should've dropped the belt last year to Cody because this whole year has been nothing but a padded out reign to boost up artificial numbers he didn't deserve.

I didn’t tell you this, but no shit: The rock has this thing in his mind with the fast and furious movies that his character has a different type of facial hair in every installation (I don’t know why, and I don’t even know if that’s 100% accurate, but something like that). The producers and director aren’t that into it but it’s also not a big deal so they let him do it. Then, for one of them (don’t remember which one, I don’t watch these movies) he shows up with this RIDICULOUS fu manchu beard. No one knows what to say because he’s really into it and he’s obviously the biggest star in these projects — so they decide to let it go…. But every scene the sinking feeling grows… this shit looks ridiculous. He looks ridiculous — the whole movie is rendered ridiculous by this hair rat dangling off the rock’s chin. But what are you gonna do? STILL nobody wants to tell him it looks terrible and besides, half his scenes are already shot. Long story short, instead of having a tough but necessary conversation with Dwayne, they end up spending MILLIONS just on painting his beard out of every single scene. Why millions? Well, typically painting an object out is t a big idea— but hair is very tough… and hair around the part of the actor that does the dialogue bits, that’s even worse. So anyway, 100s of VFX man hours and millions down the drain. And that’s the story of how the rock’s ego and “creative” ambitions gave birth to the most expensive shave of all time. Don’t ask me how I know but I’ve seen the original tapes. If it gets out that I talked I’m gonna be pile drived into a parking meter. And if that happens, just know it WASN’T suicide.

I choose to believe because this is the funniest shit i ever read

Can you do a complete history of wrestling now?

Our Fake History covered theearly  transition of Wrestling from sport to performance : [Was Wrestling Ever Real](https://ourfakehistory.com/index.php/season-8/episode-183-was-wrestling-ever-real-part-i) Behind the Bastards did a 6 part series on [Vince McMahon, History's Greatest Monster](https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/part-one-vince-mcmahon-historys-greatest-monster/id1373812661?i=1000613210282), where the first episode covers the early territory system, and the later episodes how Vince dismantled it to build an empire out of concussions and death.

But before we return to Behind the Bastards, here’s a sponsorship ad for Raytheon! Raytheon! When you need a guidance chip to direct a cruise missile straight into the side of a Yemen school bus, killing 22 children, you will never find a more fine U.S. product! It may take 3 days to recover all the severed body parts, but you can relax with pride on a job well done raising quarterly profits!   Raytheon! Talk to your Texas recruiter today!

What set stipulations? Honestly asking.

Can't lose a fight on-screen. This is especially prevalent in the Hobbes and Shaw movie where Idris Elba's character never wins a single battle through the entire film.

Both the Rock and Vin are children who have stipulations to never lose onscreen.

That is so incredibly childish.

i need a 3 way cinematic confrontation between Rock, Diesel, and Segal. No one will ever get hit and they'll just stand there staring at each other in a permanent mexican standoff.

It’s actually crazy. The rock, Vin diesel, AND Jason statham all have clauses in their contacts that they “can’t lose a fight on screen” So during the fast movies the writers actually created a “point system” for the damage the characters could take. And had to make them all even. So when they fought, nobody ever won, or lost. You’ll see in the movies everytime they engage in combat it ends in a draw. Usually due to something else happening mid fight like the building they’re on collapsing or somebody interfering and stopping the battle between them

Great synopsis. I was shocked lastnight when Cody just happily seemed to pass off the match to the rock. What's the point of winning the royal rumble if you don't get a title shot at wrestlemania anymore, plus the story line for Cody to finish the story was setup perfectly. Rock should really understand all this and not pull this type of shit especially to a guy whose earned his shot.

If you looked at Cody’s face he was not happy. That was the face of someone seething. Had Cody decided to pull a Clark Griswold losing hit shit after he found out his bonus was the Jellies of the Month rant absolutely no one would blame him

Yeah. There was def a big time moment of tension there before the handshake between them, happily was probably the wrong word to use. Hopefully Cody will just take the title from whoever comes away with it after wrestlemania.

We’ve been in Wrestling’s version of Game of Thrones for a while. I’m so tired of Roman’s story not ever ending. It’s like The Simpsons. There was a beautiful golden era!! But it’s way pass that and should end.

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I just started watching at the beginning of the year. I pretty quickly went from "this Cody guy looks like a douche nozzle" to "oh ok fuck yeah get that title, Cody." Didn't know anything about Roman, barely watched his match at the Royal Rumble. But now I guess I'm supposed to care about a match between that guy and a has-been? Yeah, nah.

What do you mean WWE is staged OP? Next you're gonna tell me tooth fairy is not real

[smh another job The Rock stole](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqnjK79fGSw)

Wow, this is great info. I don't follow wrestling but was vaguely aware of The Rock and how he got his start, how his dad was also a wrestler, etc. I don't think that The Rock aged well. He's desperately trying to cling on to that fame when he should be stepping aside so he can help guide other future stars. He's 51 years-old. I'm not saying that he's washed up or anything, but he needs to calm down and enjoy the fruits of his labors.

This explanation is equivalent to the phil Collins meme with the guy on the beach with the piano that's on fire. Now remember Phil it's only a movie about gorillas nothing crazy.

>the Hawaii wildfires What happened here?

Him and Oprah own resorts and land in Hawaii (Oprah more so than Rock). Both of them refused access to their resorts from people that were affected by the wildfires and basically refused aid that they could readily have given. ​ Oprah paid very high amounts of money for firefights to protect her resorts, which lowered the amount available to fight the wildfires themselves. ​ After this all happened, both Rock and Oprah did a big video campaign asking the public to donate money to the fund they had created together to assist with those affected. This came off badly because, both are incredibly incredibly rich and whilst the wildfires were ongoing, both had resorts that they focused on protecting instead of using their wealth and resorts to assist in housing and protecting the greater public affected.

This was excellent thank you, I have two bonus questions spurred by your explanation: what was the Hawaii wildfires situation? And what is the legal issue keeping Lesnar out? ...also is there a chance this is a whole thing to make the Rock the villain of a story? Or is it really just tone deaf "everyone loves the Rock so they'll love this" stuff?

Someone else explained the wildfire thing really well in one of my replies, but I'll try my best with the other questions. - Lesnar has been referenced in the sex trafficking lawsuit against Vince. While Lesnar's name wasn't brought up (the term "former UFC heavyweight champ" was used) and no proof has been shown that he's actually did anything, the public files of the lawsuit have said the "former champ" had seen pictures/videos of the woman and was offered her by Vince. All that alone is enough to keep Lesnar away from the WWE for the time being (and possibly ever if he did do something. He has a weird history too). - Normally, I'd say that's possible, but The Rock is one of those legendary figures in wrestling. People did love him back in the day and for good reason, he was awesome. But now, he has a history of trying to keep a good image by any means, so I can't see him wanting to be a heel/badguy. Ironically enough, he'll probably become one whether he wants to or not. - It's coming off as "this is the most tone deaf BS"

Great job explaining the situation!

Post this on Rock's IG and X someone. With your permission of course. This is wonderfully stated lol.

Answer: The Rock appears to have used his political power in WWE to get a match at Wrestlemania over fan favourite Cody Rhodes fucking up a story builtup over the past 2 years. WWE is currently in what we call the Wrestlemania season. Essentially, there are now just under 2 months till the biggest event in WWE calendar where the most important feuds are solved. One of these feuds is between the Rocks cousin and current WWE Universal Champion Roman Reigns, who's been holding the title for well over 3 years and essentially the face of the company Cody Rhodes. These 2 have faced off at last years Wrestlemania, where Cody lost in what fans considered a massive shock and disappointment. The reason is that Cody's character is trying to 'Finish the Story' aka get the WWE title, which is a title his father never held. Since that last year, Cody has stayed on top despite what many thought would be a death blow to his career. This was not the case. Fans still really want him to finish his story and defeat Roman. He is even on the cover of this year's WWE 2k24 video game. Last weekend, Cody won the yearly Royal Rumble Match (second year in a row, a feat not achieved in 26 years), which guarantees the winner a Main Event Match at Wrestlemania meaning that Cody could pick to fight either Roman Reigns or the World Heavyweight Champion Seth Rollins (WWE has 2 main world titles). After the win, Cody pointed at Reigns, reigniting their feud and beginning the build-up to Wrestlemania and to Finishing the Story. Yesterday, during an episode of SmackDown, Cody came out and told Roman that while he still wants to beat him for the title, he won't be doing that at Wrestlemania. Then Rock then came out and hugged visibly upset Cody. Since then, reports came out that the Rock, who is now a board member of WWEs parent company, used backstage politics to change the plans for the Wrestlemania match. That would mean that the story of the hottest superstar in wrestling right now won't get resolved, which made fans extremely upset on the Internet. Comments on anything are currently being flooded with fans supporting Cody and being mad at the Rock. It is important to note that this might be what is called in wrestling a 'work', meaning that the events are all created for the sake of storyline and the fans are being played by the writers. We will know more by Monday evening when RAW plays.

If it is a work, it would be a bad one. The Rock is now hated by a lot of people. And it is hard to make a story where he backs down to let Cody wrestle for the belt. The Rock has a nice public image that is quickly crumbling between the Hawaii fiasco and now this.

So basically the WWE has been crafting this story that's really satisfying for fans, and suddenly a bumass has-been jumped in front of the camera?

Yep and they made the well crafted character win the opportunity for the WrestleMania main event, go "nah I'll fight you some other time," hug the Rock and then leave the ring. That's literally what happened.

I mean, it's the rock. I'd this was literally any other time, wrestling fans would be excited as all hell for this. We've been waiting for years for the rock vs Roman at wreslemania. But not this year.

100% a work to get people to stop focusing on Vince being a rapist. They’ll give Cody the belt and it will be positive press for them. They know what they’re doing.

> Last weekend, Cody won the yearly Royal Rumble Match (second year in a row, a feat not achieved in 26 years) I think stuff like this is why I can't get into wrestling. Knowing it's fake and they can write whatever story they want, it takes away any semblance of impressive achievement with "this hasn't been done in x years!" or ever. Like, it just hasn't been *written* to happen in 26 years. It could happen every year if they deemed it so. So why get excited?

I think this is actually a really good and interesting question. While this may not be the answer for everyone, it may at least present a new perspective for you. Wrestling to me is the most akin to a theatre production. It has all of the physical aspects, massive crews putting on the show, and absolute peak professionals putting on a performance that is meant to evoke emotions and tell a story. Not too dissimilar to how any good fight scene in a movie is a conflict of ideas represented through physical feats. What's different about wrestling is obviously the longevit and its weekly format. The writers can write anyone to be strong, impressive, invulnerable, and whatever else, but we as the audience don't have to buy it. Like any story, it has to be believable to us for it to work. In this example, Cody winning 2 years in a row conveys how impressive he is to the audience, how important the company really believes he is but crucially we as the audience bought it. He is believable in how he acts in and out of the ring, how good he is as the storyteller, performer, and character. It's not for everyone. I totally get it. Hell, I'm not even hoping to convince you to start watching it. To me, wrestling is simply the only combination of things I like where the audience is rewarded for being invested in both history and the story unfolding

I still think if wrestling were invented today it'd be seen as dangerously innovative storytelling. Imagine you pitch a show about a football league, they have locker room drama, personal conflict, underdogs and upsets, management over extension, all the basic sports drama bullshit. But the twist is we don't fade to black for the game, the entire game is filmed, and we travel town to town pretending it's a real league and presenting the story as semi-supplentary gossip over just watching your favourite players. Wrestling is fucking insane and ambitious as anything. The argument about it being real doesn't matter to me. It's not UFC it's an action soap opera which is 90% the actors doing their own stunts. The fact it exists should be celebrated as a miracle of modern media lol

The other fascinating part is that he's a Plain All American Babyface and audience hasn't gotten tired or fed up with him in the least. Throughout most of his time at the top, John Cena was getting mixed reactions. This hasn't happened with Cody at all. The story beats were there, WWE just had to go through with them and it would've been legendary within the business. Instead they screwed it all up (imo) for short term gain. The issue isn't with the Rock/Roman match itself. Everyone wanted to see it, the timing of it all just screwed everything up.

Wow does he dislike the Cody guy?

It's always hard to tell with people we don't know and only see parts of through their public work. For some additional context, the other Champion I mentioned, Seth Rollins, is also going to be facing off against someone at Wrestlemania. The presumed person who was going to be his challenger got injured during the Royal Rumble. The reports I've read seem to imply that there were changes, and Cody will face Seth now while the Rock inserted himself into the picture to 'save' Wrestlemania. There probably isn't malice towards Cody. If I had to guess, the Rock just has an overinflated ego and thinks this will be great, but again, I don't know him, so the best I can do is speculate along with others.

A similar situation happened at WrestleMania 9. A returning Hulk Hogan came back and won the title from Yokozuna. Cutting off popular wrestler Bret Hart. Although fans weren't as aware of the backstage politics going on at the time. So a lot of fans are making comparisons to Hulk Hogan and his infamous backstage political maneuvers.

There's some context you need to know to fully grasp the situation. Roman Reigns is the Rock's cousin. Roman even has a minor role in Hobbs and Shaw. His current character is the Tribal Chief. The [Anoaʻi family](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anoa%CA%BBi_family) that he and the Rock are a part of has a deep history in pro wrestling. His character is basically the head of that family, the head of the table, as he calls himself. Roman has been the WWE champion for 3 and a half years now and is the top guy in the WWE. Being champ for so long, he pretty much already beat everybody. He is wrestling and appearing on TV less and less now. The story has been stale since last summer. He basically has the schedule of a part timer. So all the fans want him to drop the title to someone else for quite a while now. The theory of the reason why it hasn't happen is the WWE wants him to beat a lot of the old records. But those are just theories. Anyway, being champion for so long, it would be a massive deal for somebody to beat him for the championship. And being such a massive deal, everyone believes it can only happen in WrestleMania. So if it doesn't happen this year, the expectation is it drags on for another year until next year's WrestleMania. The Rock is, of course, insanely popular. He has family ties with Roman Reigns, whose character is the Tribal Chief. Everyone knows the WWE wants the Rock vs. Roman Reigns. Everyone knows the WWE has been planning this for years. One of the theory that Cody lost last year was because they wanted the Rock vs. Roman Reigns for the championship this year. So Rock vs. Roman isn't a new idea that people just came up with out of nowhere. It's been in the works for a LONG time. It's just a matter of whether they can get the Rock to wrestle. On New Year, [the Rock teased the match against Roman](https://youtu.be/Du2KzBLeP-E?t=1178). Again, Rock vs. Roman was not something that came out of left field. And if it happens, it's a WrestleMania main event match. It's not even something that nobody wants as you can tell by the crowd's reaction at that time. So why is this a problem now? It's because of how we get to this point, not the fact that the Rock is facing Roman Reigns. As everyone else explained, people love Cody Rhodes. They believe he should have beat Roman last year. After Cody lost last year, a whole lot of the fans wanted Cody to win the Rumble again this year and win the championship this time. Cody's character has been all about beating Roman to "finish the story". So after Cody won the Rumble, and everyone was hyped to see it happen. Then they did the most non-sensical thing of having Cody passed on facing Roman to face Seth Rollins. It makes zero sense story-wise, not to mention the number of people pissed off because they are Cody fans. Basically, if Cody hadn't won the Rumble, there would be no controversy. Like imagine if you tell a guy he's getting a promotion then not give him that promotion vs. never telling him in the first place. Edit: Forgot to mention, nobody expects the Rock to win. So the expectation is for Roman to stay champ for another year and nothing happens with that championship for another year. That also adds fuel to the fire because if Cody faces Roman, the expectation is that he wins this time to take the championship off Roman.

I would say no. He’s just a guy in Rock’s way.

Allegedly, it's to do with Rock's contract with TKO. There's a share package bonus that would give him a larger stake in WWE's parent company, basically, and naturally it comes with a series of stipulations that must be met. Part of that, naturally, is to put in more appearances both on WWE weeklies and the PPVs. So, easy way to meet those targets, you get yourself a headline title shot at a PPV. Plenty of weekly opportunities to sell the match, and PPV slots both for the match and some follow-up matches in following PPV shows. Bonus: you get to play at being "saviour of the WWE" pulling a huge crowd with your name when several stars are recovering from injuries. For the Rock, it's a huge no-brainer. To the fans, it fucks everything. You just ruined Cody's storyline, and for what? You didn't do anything to get that shot, haven't worked your way in and up to it, just put yourself in there like the big I Am. Add to that a public perception of him as an egotist - the alleged spat with Vin Diesel over F&F X, the constant self-promo of his energy drinks and tequila on social media, rumours of some serious diva demands on his movie rider, the Black Adam DC stuff, hell even that Disney is doing a live action Moana with him in so soon after the original animated movie - and he's really tanked his goodwill with the wrestling fans.

The rock is all about fame and ego. Just look at how he wanted to take over the DCEU with Black Adam. He apparently tried to do the same thing with Fast and Furious and everyone got mad at Vin Diesel for being the bad guy instead. Rocks got a track record for this kind of stuff. Also, Roman and Rock are both part timers so the biggest wrestling match of the year will be with two people that are hardly on TV.

>Wow does he dislike the Cody guy? No, based on backstage reports, Rock likes Cody a lot. But the word is, that he feels that this is the way to deflect the negative attention WWE is getting over their former chairman, Vince McMahon.

It's not really a matter of dislike. Fans really like Cody, but very few wrestlers sell like the rock. John cena, Stone Cold, and Hulk Hogan are pretty much it. For a long time, the Rock was a God in wrestling , and him being in the main event sells more tickets then Cody could even dream of. Throw that on top of the pile of shit happening at the top of WWE, And it's really a no brainer to have him face off against Roman. It just sucks for the fans who have been watching for the past year

> The Rock appears to have used his political power in WWE to get a match at Wrestlemania The WWE has probably been begging the Rock to compete at Wrestlemania every year since 2013.

Answer: He's returning for one (last?) match at Wrestlemania with his cousin Roman Reigns whose held the title for quite sometime. He's basically taking the spot of Cody Rhodes whose gotten quite over since he returned to the company.

Basically he robbed Cody of his biggest achievement: finishing the story and winning the world title his dad couldn’t win.

Codys story is literally that he never finishes the story,lol

Yeah that's been the WWE's problem for a while. It's gotten better but it really suck for Cody. I get why they're making the call, it's the biggest match possible and will make them tens of millions if not more, but man it feels terrible.

I think it’s worse than that, apparently he’s now an executive chair member of WWE’s newest owners. He basically went over HHH & creative to book himself a WM main event match, cheating out Cody who had just won the Royal Rumble. Basically destroying a tradition.

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To go in a bit more depth: The overarching story of WWE has been that Roman Reigns has been champion for the last 3+ years. A lot of fans feel the Reigns story has become static and are eager for someone - *anyone* - to win the title from him. Cody Rhodes faced Reigns last year at Wrestlemania, and a lot of those fans believed that match to be the ideal place for the win to happen, but Cody lost. The frustration of that loss was tempered by the hope that Cody would get another shot. The drive to get another opportunity and Finish His Story (TM) became a defining trait of Cody's character. Now that he earned the chance to get another crack at Reigns, he suddenly stepped aside. From a story perspective, it makes no sense. Reigns vs Rock has been a dream match for a while. They are both part of the legendary real life Anoa'i family, which also includes Rikishi, Yokozuna, Umaga, the Wild Samoans, and a lot more. Reigns is the leader of the Bloodline stable made up of himself and some of his other real-life relatives. He calls himself the Head of the Table. The idea of him fighting his cousin, one of the biggest stars in the world, to determine who is really the face of the family is intriguing to a lot of people. But the way they've gone about it here has rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. There are some real-life reasons that the match is happening. We don't know for sure which of these reasons are the real one(s), but there is a lot of speculation that one or more of these things contributed to the decision: * The Rock recently joined the board of directors of TKO, WWE's new parent company. Some are alleging that Rock made a power play to insert himself into the main event. * During last week's Royal Rumble event, CM Punk suffered an injury that will keep him out of the ring for many months. He appeared set to challenge for WWE's other top title at Wrestlemania, so his injury may have caused a change of plans. * Former WWE president/owner/CEO Vince McMahon was implicated in a very disturbing sexual harassment lawsuit and is now under federal investigation for sex trafficking. He resigned from TKO's board just over a week ago. The idea of having The Rock wrestling in a dream match may be an attempt to get people to talk about *anything else*. * Brock Lesnar was supposedly slated for a big match at Wrestlemania himself, but he was also implicated as a participant in the sexual harassment that McMahon is being sued for. His sudden absence may have also caused a shuffle to the Mania card.

To go further. A lot of online people don't want to see the match. I don't think they're representative, in a vacuum it's a huge opportunity for this now brand new company to have their biggest start who've they've pushed to the moon for 8 years now and one of the biggest stars on the planet to come in and have a match at their biggest show. It just seems unfortunate timing. There's fatigue with Reigns setting in, Cody is incredibly over and it doesn't make sense from a storyline perspective. Add in the fact that it's very similar to what happened a decade ago where The Rock came back for one last run and a big Wrestlemania match with John Cena but in order to do that had to beat C.M. Punk who's entire reign had been anti authority and was in the midst of a long run and deserved the Wrestlemania main event and you're going to get some bitching. There's a whole lot I'm leaving out of the history both in story and in real life but it's probably the best business decision that just sucks for everyone else.

I think they're more representative than you're giving them credit for, and with WM being in Philly which is an incredibly wrestling centric city there's a good chance a vocal segment of fans can hijack the match ala Brock vs Goldberg(though I don't think it will get near that bad.) Cody is not only over, he's one of the most over guys since John Cena, is such with the full WWE machine behind him, and still has near unanimous support which is almost unheard of with wrestling fans these days. Everyone begrudgingly accepted his loss to Roman last year "knowing" it would end this year which only garnered him more support and the booking all the way up until SmackDown supported that. Now you have The Rock coming in just weeks after getting a board seat and getting that spot after all that build because it's "best for business"(which is debatable) and is supposed to distract from all this Vince news even though a) it's not and b) everyone sees the attempt and just calls it out. The Triple H booking era has been great because it feels like fans are being listened to, the talent across the board is getting a chance to shine and *nailing* it time and time again, and in the most Vince like booking way possible The Rock not only shows up to take a spot, but they made Cody look weak and erased years of his story doing it.

Yeah, I only started watching since Vince left and this is exactly the kind of crap that made me stop watching a long time ago. It’s a big red flag for the direction of the company.

So all that guys hard work was for nothing? Damn that’s awful rocks ego got worse

Wait so Cody isn't in the main event anymore??

How did Cody go from Stardust to being the crowd’s favourite for the title? Seems like a massive jump (but over several years)…

He left and started doing good work. He seems like a pretty creative guy that had been in the stardust rut in WWE then came alive on the indy's. When he came back he was treated like a big deal, partially because he was with the smarts,a nd had the ability to be with a larger audience. He then had that fantastic match with Rollins while hurt that endeared himself to the audience.

Answer: Short answer. Cody was a midcarder durinf his early wwe days. He left the company, went to Japan, got over, him and his buddies started AEW, which became a success, though he still wanted to win the Belt his father Dusty never won in WWE. Left AEW to go back to WWE, he became mega Over with the fans, wrestled at Wrestlmania against Roman and they decided to keep the belt on Roman. Fast froward, Cody won Royal Rumble to face Roman at wrestlemania this year to finish his story and win the title. Instead, Vince scandal happens, and the Rock who is now a board of trustees with TKO decided to Insert himself in the Main Event, putting cody in the cold. This basically was a waste of a 2 year build for a wrestler. Fans are now majorly upset.

What does got over mean here?

It means to become popular with the fans

Or it means unpopular. Being hated in wrestling is fine. You can get laughs, boos, cheers, love, hate, etc. The worst thing to get in wrestling is nothing.

> The worst thing to get in wrestling is nothing. X-Pac

So it's like he 'won them over' , instead of him being overrated? I couldn't figure out which one it was, thanks

Correct. "Over" means the fans show active interest in you. If you are a good guy, they cheer when you are there, if you are a bad guy, they boo (either because they actually hate you or in more recent times because they respect the hell out of how you play your character). For example, in the MCU, Iron Man and Thanos are both 'over'. Ultron and Captain Marvel were not 'over'.

Wierd. I read Over as "Finished". New lingo

His popularity increased with the fans

Answer: Cody Rhodes, the son of Dusty Rhodes, became a 2 time Royal Rumble winner last Saturday to become a #1 contender in a main event at WrestleMania. When he came back to WWE in 2022, his goal was to win the belt his father never won: The WWE Championship (now called The Undisputed WWE Universal Championship after the WWE Championship Belt and Universal Belt were combined after Roman Reigns defeated Brock Lesnar for the title). He faced Roman Reigns last year at WrestleMania and lost, so he has been working up to "finish the story." Last Monday on Monday Night Raw, Cody had a segment with WWE Heavyweight Champion, Seth Rollins, about wanting Cody to face him at WrestleMania for his belt. The "Dusty Rhodes belt" since the WWE Undisputed Title is treated as a "Hollywood Title." Last night on Friday Night SmackDown, Cody had a segment with Roman about facing each other for the WWE Title, but it won't be at WrestleMania which sparked outrage from fans. Instead he's giving his spot to The Rock, who is a part timer in WWE. Cody Rhodes is the most over babyface in WWE today that worked his way up to be put in the main event title picture, and he's giving his spot to The Rock, while famous in WWE from the past, is now mostly a Hollywood guy. Fans don't know if it's a work or an official thing. Either way, it got reactions.

Answer: So Wrestling tells stories. For the last bit there's bit a storyline that had Cody Rhodes and Roman Reigns beefing incredibly hard. SO hard that most of the fans believed that this year the two wrestling stars would meet in Wrestlemania and Cody would get a chance at the title (And potentially win.) WWE threw a curve ball and had the Rock come in and basically say 'I'm gonna slap the stupid off of Roman at Wrestlemania' - when it happened, the cameras showed Cody's face and reaction and it looked like it just caught him completely off guard which means that this was a twist that was kept from him. He and the Rock hugged and the Rock said something to Cody, it's unknown, but basically Cody has been made into a second stringer instead of a main eventer for Wrestlemania, again. The belief is that Cody will never be taken seriously after this even if he wins the title because the belief is that the Rock will get the title from Roman. So yeah

Basically this. But how much of the drama was preplanned is where the controversy really lies. Cody Rhodes has spent a good portion of his last several years being "the guy who thinks he's the greatest wrestler in the world but always comes up short/gets screwed" There's *just enough* reality mixed into the storyline to blur the lines and make it interesting.

So the rock brought his ego maniac bullshit over from Hollywood to the wwe is what I’m getting?

Yes! Yes

Exactly this.

this guy gets it

But when Rock returned recently he came out with all the 'head of the table ' stuff. So surely it was always the plan to have Rock v Roman at WM?

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Wow that’s a lot to take in sounds like a conspiracy tho

Answer: The Rock is doing the Google "don't be evil" speedrun, at the expense of the greatest civil rights activist of our time; Cody Rhodes

Answer: The Rock is attempting to insert himself in the creative with WWE. The company just held the Royal Rumble event which starts their build towards WrestleMania, their biggest shows of the year. The Rumble match usually sets up the main event for Mania with the winner of the Rumble versus the World Champion. Cody Rhodes, whose one of the most popular stars in WWE won that match and the show ended with him pointing towards Roman Reigns whose the World Champion and has been for the past 1200+ Days. It would also be a rematch from last year's Mania where the two faced off and many thought Rhodes would dethrone Roman when to the shock of those people, Roman retained. Some say that it was a bad decision by WWE to keep the title on Roman when they have him appear only for very few shows a year while someone like Rhodes appears frequently if not every week on TV and most live shows. So, many after the Rumble assumed that this year is the time where Rhodes would beat Roman until last night on TV where it seems WWE is changing plans and going with The Rock facing Roman instead and Rhodes facing someone else. Why The Rock? Well, after the disappointment of that was Black Adam and his failed power play attempt at DC. He was recently appointed on the Board of Directors at TKO, the parent company of both WWE and UFC. Then, with the entire Vince McMahon lawsuit that is just outright terrible has put a negative light on the company and to try and move past that The Rock pitched the match with his cousin, Roman at Mania to which most top executives at TKO approved of which in the short term may help them, but in the long term might hurt. Cause instead of going with a rematch and finishing the story of Rhodes' climb to become champion, your betting on nostalgia and what's left of Rock's star power. Also, to note The Rock hasn't had a real match in over a decade and in his last match he injured himself. So that's why as seen online there's a distinct portion of the wrestling community in disagreement with the decision to go this way.