On a recent edition of the “Busted Open Radio” podcast, former WWE broadcaster Jonathan Coachman weighed in on Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s recent WWE return, as well as his heel turn on the Road To WrestleMania XL.
The Rock has slapped Cody Rhodes and joined the Bloodline to reprise his heel gimmick from the late 90s.
Coachman said, “I hope that The Rock is back and is gonna show up many times. A lot of guys won’t go full-blown heel because it costs them money in their merch. But now if you can be a really cool heel, like The Rock is, then you can flip it on its head no matter how you do it. And I hope that young kids are looking at that and saying, ‘This is what I can be.’”
Meanwhile, ECW legend Tommy Dreamer also discussed the fan outrage over The Rock almost replacing Cody Rhodes against Roman Reigns at WrestleMania XL.
While Cody will challenge Roman for the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship in the main event of WrestleMania 40, WWE almost swerved people when it appeared that The Rock would challenge Reigns and Rhodes would face Seth Rollins. Due to fan outrage, WWE reversed their decision in favor of The American Nightmare who will now get a second chance to “finish his story.”
You can check out some highlights from the podcast below:
On how The Rock originally got over after his initial failed babyface run: “If I can quote a famous philosopher: ‘It doesn’t matter what you think. Know your role and shut your hole.’ If you think about how Rocky Maivia got over, he listened to the crowd. And they were pushing him as this mega, mega babyface.”
On the fans being upset about the idea of The Rock replacing Cody Rhodes: “Your audience was mad at that decision. It’s all placement and timing. That’s why I say, ‘Know your role.’”
