LAS VEGAS – The WWE Universe was in for a treat on Thursday night when Cody Rhodes, The Rock, Roman Reigns and Seth Rollins shared the same stage at the WrestleMania XL Kickoff event at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
WWE fans awaited to see who Rhodes was going to choose to face in the main event at WrestleMania in April. As the Royal Rumble winner, he got to choose either Reigns or Rollins. It appeared things were leaning toward Rhodes choosing Rollins and putting his own story on pause. Reigns even came out on stage to declare that he was going to choose to face The Rock – a choice that was not up to him.
The Rock came up to a massive amount of boos and called Rhodes fans the “Cody Cry Babies.” As The Rock explained why he should be the one to face off against Reigns, Rhodes interrupted him. Rhodes chose to face Reigns at WrestleMania for the WWE Undisputed Universal Championship.
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The Rock and Cody Rhodes faceoff at the WrestleMania XL Kickoff event in Las Vegas. (Fox News Digital/Ryan Gaydos)
Rhodes and The Rock came to a stare down, and after a few choice words between the two, the People’s Champion slapped Rhodes across the face. All four competitors on stage had to be separated.
Rollins talked to Fox News Digital about the moment afterward.
“It’s just what happens when powerful people exert their power,” Rollins said. “They just think they do whatever they want and get away with it and that sucks. It just sucks. I don’t know any other way to put it. I guess it (resulted) in Cody getting what he wanted. We’ll figure out what’s next for the World Heavyweight title. But Cody said it best. It’s bulls—-. It feels pretty gross to me.”
Rollins tried to convince Rhodes to challenge for his championship, pointing to Reigns’ part-time in-ring schedule and that his World Heavyweight Championship was the so-called working man’s title.
However, Rollins understood why he was going after Reigns.
Cody Rhodes and Roman Reigns face off at WrestleMania XL Kickoff Event in Las Vegas. (Fox News Digital/Ryan Gaydos)
“I sold Cody on this title because I believe in this title and I do think because of Roman Reigns’ lack of independence, for lack of a better term, that this title is more prestigious and means more,” he said. “Especially, going forward, if Roman Reigns keeps his title, this one is only going to get bigger. But I understand where he’s coming from. I never faulted him for wanting to finish the story – it meant so much to him. I understand why he made the decision, and it is what it is and that’s his prerogative as the winner of the Royal Rumble. I don’t know why those idiots thought that was their decision to make.”
Rollins took issue with The Rock coming back into the fold after being away from WWE for so long. It has been nearly eight years since The Rock actually had a match.
“Ten years or something like that. The last time he came around, I don’t like (CM) Punk but he did the same thing to Punk, kinda came in and took his main event and did it two years in a row with some very not-so-memorable matches with John Cena,” he told Fox News Digital. “But yeah, now coming back, on the board of directors, like I said man, it feels like gross. I don’t like it. I feel like we gotta do something about it. Just don’t know what that next step is going to be.”
At least two matches appeared to be set for WrestleMania 40 in Philadelphia. The other was set last week on “Friday Night Smackdown” when Bayley chose to fight Iyo Sky for the SmackDown Women’s Championship.
Seth Rollins speaks to Fox News Digital. (Fox News Digital/Ryan Gaydos)
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There still seems to be a lot to play out between Rhodes and Reigns before April.
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