WrestleMania 31 is best remembered for Seth Rollins shockingly claiming the WWE World Heavyweight Championship, but in the lead-up Brock Lesnar sparked chaos backstage.
At the spectacular, Lesnar was due to face Roman Reigns in the main event. After the pair went hard-hitting move for hard-hitting move they were interrupted by Rollins. The star decided that now was the perfect time to cash in his Money In The Bank contract, and the ‘Heist of the Century’ was born.
However, five weeks earlier it was reported that Lesnar walked out during a Monday Night Raw taping. This left Reigns and Heyman to build the match with an in-ring promo, even though The Beast was nowhere to be seen.
During an appearance on the Out of Character podcast with Ryan Satin, Heyman confirmed that Lesnar did walk out.
“I was there for his (Roman Reigns’) first WrestleMania main event because it was against Brock Lesnar.
I was there for the first promo he had to do about his first WrestleMania main event because it was the night after the blizzard and Brock and I came and I opened it up by shaking his hand and telling him that I’ve known your family longer than you’ve known your own family and then when we finally brought it out into the ring, Brock had walked out of WWE five weeks before WrestleMania and we were tasked with Roman Reigns and Paul Heyman in the ring talking about Roman Reigns’ first WrestleMania main event.
Just the two of us, which history will now show, these parallels between these two men (Reigns & Cody Rhodes) that carry their family legacies, both from the past and into the future.
Cody Rhodes’ first promo with somebody about his first WrestleMania main event was with me.”
This Wouldn’t Be The Last Time Brock Lesnar Walked Out
On July 22nd, 2022, Vince McMahon announced that he was retiring from WWE, something that blindsided much of the wrestling world including Lesnar. The announcement came just hours before SmackDown went on the air and it was reported that Lesnar walked out of the taping after hearing the news.
Triple H confirmed these reports in September, revealing that The Beast had to be talked into coming back to the arena.
H/t to POST Wrestling