This Saturday, the Royal Rumble took place and with it the beginning to the road to WrestleMania. The first steps regarding what we’ll see on WrestleMania this year, especially with the Royal Rumbel winners we saw last weekend.
All the way until WrestleMania both Cody Rhodes and Rhea Ripley were the favorites to win the men’s and women’s rumble according to betting odds in all kinds of betting sites, and obviously they were right since Rhodes and Ripley were the eventual winners, but this is not surprising at all considering the directing WWE were presenting both wrestlers ahead of the Royal Rumble.
Outside of the two world women’s champions, Rhea Ripley was the wrestler with the most screen time these last few months before the Rumble, making it more than obvious Ripley was going to win the Rumble, it was also obvious due to the fact no other wrestler in the women’s division was as protected as Ripley has been these last few months, and even more during the Rumble with Ripley winning the whole thing at the number one spot. In terms of what direction WWE will take with Ripley it all points towards she facing Bianca Belair at WrestleMania. A match between Ripley and Charlotte Flair can’t be totally discarded, especially when both wrestlers already faced each other a few years ago on WrestleMania and a story between both is pretty there to be booked.
The Cody Rhodes winning the rumble was so the safe move and the obvious one taking into consideration the booking of Levesque so far as booker of WWE’s main roster. It was pretty much known for months that Cody Rhodes was going to win the rumble and it happened it didn’t surprise anyone, it was a good moment for him, and obviously this will make Rhodes cross paths with Reigns at WrestleMania. WWE fans have a deep connection with Sami Zayn, and this story has several parallels with the story of Bryan Danielson (FKA Daniel Brayn) and the yes movement, the reaction the angle got on Saturday was the biggest pop of the night and Sami Zayn is the most over person in WWE right now. The question now is if WWE will pivot and add Zayn to the WrestleMania plans or his feud with Roman will just be a transitional feud for Reigns before WrestleMania. Time will tell if Levesque will take the risk or will he just play it safe.
The elephant on the room is the subject of The Rock. It’s no secret that the plans WWE has had for a long time was to book a match between Roman Reigns and The Rock in the biggest stage of them all, but obviously the match will not take on this year’s WrestleMania. WWE still wants the match, and we might see a case of WWE sacrificing this year’s main event to set up next year’s main event, just like we saw in WrestleMania 27 when WWE sacrificed that year’s main event (Cena vs. Miz) to eventually set up the twice in a lifetime John Cena vs. The Rock matches. WWE is running out of time too, although, they have several options; once would be to book the match on Summer Slam or wait one more year for the match but with Rock’s schedule and projects it feels unlikely to take place. There’s also the fact WWE can’t go another year with a Roman Reigns long reign as world champion since he has defeated everyone on the roster and most legends still available to them, with the exception of Steve Austin and that’s up in the air.
For now, that’s all the pieces we have for WrestleMania, but as time goes on, we’ll see the plans Levesque has for WrestleMania and what the eventual card will be, but this is what he was waiting for; his tenure as booker of the main roster so far has been to play it safe and wait to WrestleMania season, and now is the time for time to start showing us what he is made of as a booker of the main roster. Although, there still doubt if Levesque is still going to be the booker when WrestleMania comes, especially with Vince McMahon back in WWE and just being a matter of time when the itch of returning to the booker chair comes to him and Levesque being powerless to do anything about it, and this could also affect any plans he has for WrestleMania, and even going forward.
