The Rock’s head writer thought Cody Rhodes winning the Royal Rumble was ‘problematic’

The Rock’s head writer Brian Gewirtz is making the media rounds lately and offering his perspective on what really happened behind the scenes regarding WWE’s plans for The Rock, Roman Reigns, and Cody Rhodes at WrestleMania 40. This was the crux of his interview today on Busted Open Radio.

Prior to The Rock’s return to Raw on January 1 for a promo segment with Jinder Mahal in San Diego, Gewirtz and Dwayne Johnson had a meeting with Triple H and Nick Khan in The Rock’s hotel room. At that point, it looked like The Rock vs. Reigns was a possibility for WrestleMania 40, but they wanted to do a tease of it on TV to see how receptive fans were to the idea. That’s why Dwayne finished off the Raw segment by saying he might decide to sit at the Head of the Table, and the crowd responded with a huge pop.

That loud reaction made it clear that The Rock vs. Roman was the way to go for WrestleMania, but there was still the issue of figuring out what to do with Cody Rhodes and the Royal Rumble:

“For the most part, it was overwhelmingly positive when [The Rock] teased Head of the Table. And at that point, we’re like, okay, that gives us our answer. We’re locked in. He did the TKO announcement. He went to WWE HQ…it was pretty much locked in at that point. Which begs the question, which I know you’re gonna ask, which everyone would ask…if all of that is the plan at this point in mid-January or whatever it is, why for the love of all things holy do you have Cody Rhodes win the Royal Rumble? That would be your question, right?”

Gewirtz explains why Cody winning the Royal Rumble was a big problem:

“The idea of Cody winning the Rumble, I thought, was problematic, in full transparency. I said, even in San Diego in that meeting, I thought the cleanest thing to do, if we’re booking Rock and Roman, is to have [CM] Punk win the Rumble and challenge [Seth] Rollins, just because there is a difference, storyline-wise, in my opinion, of Cody wanting to finish the story, and having earned the right to finish the story by winning the Royal Rumble.

Once you win the Royal Rumble, that dynamic changes…it goes from something that, yeah we all want things, but now he’s got it. And why would he do anything other than focus on Roman? And that’s what he naturally did when he pointed to him. Why wouldn’t he? That’s exactly what that character would do.”

Gewirtz is right. If Cody wins the Rumble, he absolutely has to challenge Roman Reigns, because that’s how he finishes the story that he spent two years talking about. It doesn’t work at all if Rhodes instead goes after World Heavyweight Champion Seth Rollins at WrestleMania 40.

From an informed fan’s perspective, Cody was not a lock to win the Rumble going into it. The expected winner was basically a toss-up between Rhodes and Punk, with maybe a tiny chance of someone else winning. This was Punk’s first televised match back in WWE after nearly a decade away; a win was certainly on the table for CM, especially given his history of being so determined to headline WrestleMania.

The Rock’s return in San Diego was received extremely well when he teased a match with Roman prior to the Royal Rumble, before Cody earned that match in kayfabe. If Punk wins the Rumble instead of Cody, there would have been no awkward hand off of Cody’s WrestleMania spot to The Rock. There would have been no major backlash to The Rock like we got in the form of the #WeWantCody movement.

I have no idea what Cody does at WrestleMania 40 in that scenario where Punk wins the Royal Rumble (and doesn’t get injured) and challenges Rollins. But The Rock vs. Roman Reigns would have gone off without a hitch, because fans would accept that Cody did not earn the title rematch at WrestleMania 40.

If Rock vs. Reigns was locked in, the only reason I can think of that makes sense for Cody’s Rumble win is that a very important decision-maker who knows how to play the game had reservations about the plan of The Rock vs. Roman Reigns at WrestleMania 40 and decided to keep the door open for the fans to pick Cody Rhodes. These are the kinds of questions and “what if” scenarios that make the backstage politics of this situation so interesting to wonder about and discuss.

What do you think of what Brian Gewirtz had to say about Cody’s Royal Rumble win undermining the agreed plan of doing The Rock vs. Roman Reigns at WrestleMania 40? Let me know in the comments below, Cagesiders.