Major issues with The Rock's WWE return on the Netflix premiere of RAW; Roman Reigns & Cody Rhodes angles completely killed off

The Rock showed up during RAW's debut on Netflix. However, a veteran believes he killed off any potential storylines with Cody Rhodes and Roman Reigns during his appearance.

Stevie Richards is the latest to comment on The Rock’s recent appearance on WWE RAW. Last year, The Great One was heavily involved in Cody Rhodes' feud with Roman Reigns. He stood by his cousin's side, and together, they did their best to keep The American Nightmare away from invading the Island of Relevancy.

However, their plan failed, and Cody eventually won the Undisputed WWE Championship at WrestleMania 40. The following night, after winning the title, The Final Boss confronted Cody and told him that he was going away for a while but would return for him. The Great One didn't show up on WWE TV until Bad Blood 2024, where he teased a potential feud with Cody or Roman again.

Hence, when it was announced that The Final Boss would appear on RAW's premiere on Netflix, there was speculation on how he would continue his storyline with Cody and potentially face Roman Reigns at WrestleMania 41. However, that was not what happened. The Great One returned babyface and even praised The American Nightmare. He also stood by his cousin's side after Roman won his Tribal Combat match against Solo Sikoa.

On The Stevie Richards Show, the former WWE star addressed The People's Champion's appearance on RAW and said that he killed two potential storylines in one night.

"It took a lot of hard work, but it only took one segment. When I got the vibe of the feeling from The Rock coming out there and all the other stuff, Rock is Hollywood, Rock is LA, this was taking place in LA, he probably knew a lot of people. He was client-handling, shaking hands. This felt like The Rock on a house show giving the people the babyface Rock but undoing over a year's worth of business and killing the angle with Cody Rhodes, killing the thing which could've potentially happened with Roman Reigns, the Solo, any of those angles he could've intertwined himself into, he completely killed off all in one night." [1:28 - 2:13]

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Bully Ray believes The Rock is setting everybody up

The Rock is one of the greatest WWE Superstars in history. Hence, he knows better than anyone how to turn the crowd into a frenzy. Even on NXT, he addressed the displeasure he got for being kind to Cody Rhodes and told the fans that he was about to take them on a journey. Even Bully Ray believes the same.

On his Busted Open podcast, Bully Ray said that WWE could be trying to assess the fans to see which match they want to witness at WrestleMania. He also said that The Final Boss could be setting the fans up to take them down. He further added that a match against Cody is less likely to happen because The American Nightmare's fans won't rally behind him like last year.

"Is something telling me — I don't know if he's done [wrestling]," Bully Ray said, speculating about The Rock's in-ring status for WrestleMania 41. "It's almost like he's setting everybody up just to take them down. [...] I'm just not positive that the Cody fans are going to rally behind him like they did a year ago. "

It will be interesting to see whether The Rock will be factored into WWE's WrestleMania plans this year.

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If you use quotes from the article's first half, please credit The Stevie Richards Show and provide an H/T to Sportskeeda Wrestling for the transcription.