Roman Reigns reportedly pitched beating Cody Rhodes at WrestleMania 39 to Vince McMahon
Earlier this week, Brandon Thurston of PostWrestling.com uncovered new details about Vince McMahon’s reinstatement to WWE in January of 2023. Court filings show that McMahon was involved in WWE’s creative process leading up to WrestleMania 39.
While speaking on Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer of F4WOnline.com discussed the creative decision to have Roman Reigns defeat Cody Rhodes at WrestleMania 39…
“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 that it would be better, it would be more meaningful, if he didn’t win the first time and they built to a bigger win the second time. He explained it. I think [Paul] Heyman was involved with Reigns in that. I think they were very persuasive.
You know, I think the argument is very strong with the benefit of hindsight that they were right, because the second year was much bigger than the first year. Vince made the call, and [Paul] Levesque was on board with the call, but Vince was the one who made the call.
So yes, 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, you know, or whatever. He was in charge of the company, and he remained having the final say.
Even though Levesque was in charge of creative, Vince would still have the final say until Ari Emanuel removed Vince from having the final say.”