There was a lot of hype heading into WrestleMania 39 as Cody Rhodes had momentum on his side and The American Nightmare’s fans were hoping to see him dethrone The Tribal Chief. However, that’s not what happened as Roman Reigns defeated Cody Rhodes in the WrestleMania 39 night two main event and the finish has been heavily debated ever since.
Recently the call to have Cody lose has become a hot topic once again after text messages showed Vince McMahon discussing the change in creative plans for the match. WWE Hall of Famer Diamond Dallas Page also recently claimed that Cody was originally told he would be winning at WrestleMania 39.
Dave Meltzer discussed the shift in creative plans for the WrestleMania 39 main event on Wrestling Observer Radio and he noted that it was Roman Reigns who pitched the idea for Cody to lose, and Vince McMahon approved it.
“It was Roman Reigns’ call. I mean, Vince had to approve it, but Roman Reigns was the one who went to Vince with the idea and pitched the idea that it would be better, it would be more meaningful if he didn’t win the first time, we build to a bigger one the second time and explained it.
I think Heyman with Reigns did that. I think they were very persuasive. The argument’s very strong with the benefit of hindsight that they were right because the second year was much bigger than the first year. But Vince made the call and Levesque was on board with the call but Vince was the one who made the call.
Vince was the one who had final say at that point. He had final say the whole time. He was the chairman of the board again or whatever. He was in charge of the company and he remained having the final say even though Levesque was ‘in charge of creative.’”
Ultimately everything worked out alright for Cody as he went on to defeat Roman Reigns and become the new Undisputed WWE Champion a year later in the main event of WrestleMania 40.
H/T WrestlePurists