The Rock chose WWE Raw as his location of choice to celebrate the start of 2024.
As seen on the Day 1 special episode of Monday Night Raw, The Great One made another unannounced return to the company, much to the delight of fans in attendance.
Ahead of the show, Triple H had teased that a former WWE Champion would be returning on January 1st. As ring announcer Samantha Irvin made the introduction, the San Diego crowd all groaned as former champion Jinder Mahal made his entrance. The former World Champion felt disrespected that he was not appreciated by the fans, insulted America and claimed that he was better than The Iron Sheik.
As Mahal continued to let his feelings be known to the fans, The Hollywood megastar’s music hit to a rapturous ovation.
Soaking in the praise from the capacity crowd, The Great One made multiple references to The Iron Sheik and agreed that Mahal is not on the level of the late, great Hall of Famer. Including some self-deprecating humour in his tirade, The Rock stated that if Mahal were one of his movies it would be Baywatch.
As most fans expected, there was only one way the confrontation could go. With Mahal having enough of The Great One’s insults, The Modern Day Maharaja tried to attack The People’s Champion but was laid out with a People’s Elbow.
This was the first time that The Rock appeared on WWE programming since his unannounced appearance back in October 2023.
The Rock Sends A Message To Roman Reigns
Just as it appeared that the segment was over, the former World Champion grabbed a microphone to make one final statement. Claiming that he would be going out in San Diego later that night, Rock stated that he might sit at the head of the table, making it clear that a confrontation with Roman Reigns would be inevitable.
Speaking on Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer stated that this match has been in the works for a number of years and believes that this is the WrestleMania plan:
The head of the table thing. That whole thing, Head of the Table and The Tribal Chief was all done originally to build up the Roman Reigns, Rock match years ago. Because this match had been on the table, I think probably before the pandemic, maybe, or right after. I remember they were gonna do the Dallas show and then it was gonna be Los Angeles. And then, I guess this year. I mean, he turned down the first one to do the second one, which would have been Los Angeles. And then Los Angeles ended up being cancelled in December I think. But he said that he’d be open for next year.
But at the time, it was kind of if he wasn’t doing it in Los Angeles, probably not doing it. But we’ll see. I mean, I don’t have it confirmed. I could not imagine in January, if this was a Vince McMahon company, this would be a 100% lock that he’d be doing WrestleMania. And I don’t think that Levesque is going to be any different. I mean, like, he’s different in some ways, but I don’t see him in January teasing this and not delivering something along those lines. I don’t have that confirmed, [but] the timing and everything all seems to work out this way.
On the following SmackDown, Roman Reigns and Paul Heyman responded to The Rock’s major tease.
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