Roman Reigns will face The Undertaker at WrestleMania 33 this Sunday, but a question many fans have is why John Cena isn’t taking on the Deadman instead.
For the past couple of years, WWE fans have speculated and desired a John Cena vs The Undertaker match at WrestleMania, and for the same time period, WWE have wanted to book the match as well.
Plans were in place for the two to wrestle at last year’s Showcase of the Immortals, according to The Observer, but those had to be scrapped because of Cena’s shoulder injury that prevented him from competing at the event at all.
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The Undertaker, of course, ended up facing Shane McMahon in a Hell in a Cell match.
The match also could have happened at this year’s show, but circumstances had those plans not come to fruition, being diverted to a showdown with Roman Reigns, which was officially confirmed prior to Raw three weeks ago, a few days after The Undertaker delivered a chokeslam to Reigns.
After Cena’s absence from WrestleMania 32, the cards were still on the table for a Cena vs Taker match at WrestleMania 33, but the brand split created a slightly confusing scenario.
While The Undertaker had not been drafted to either brand (largely due to the fact that he is only around during WrestleMania season), he did show up one time on a SmackDown Live episode in the run-in to Survivor Series, to threaten Team SmackDown into winning their elimination tag team match at the event (which they did).
After this, The Undertaker did not show up until the build-up to the Royal Rumble, during which he turned up on an episode of Raw to announce his entry into the match instead.
Meanwhile, John Cena was caught up in the WWE Championship scene with AJ Styles and Dean Ambrose, then taking a leave from WWE to film American Grit season 2 in October.
When Cena returned at the end of the year, he was immediately inserted back into the WWE Championship situation, which he would, of course, go on to win at the Royal Rumble, and carry into Elimination Chamber.
By this time, the groundwork for The Undertaker vs Roman Reigns match had already been set with Reigns having eliminated the Phenom from the Royal Rumble match.
The mix up here was that The Undertaker appeared to be a free agent between the Raw and SmackDown brands, but around the time for the Royal Rumble, he leant towards Raw.
At the same time, Dave Meltzer reported that Vince McMahon changed his mind about the match with John Cena and that WWE were looking to have The Undertaker face a wrestler from the Raw brand itself.
At the time, the Raw roster was pretty packed. the Triple H and Seth Rollins’ match was already in the books, Kevin Owens and Chris Jericho could not face anybody but each other, Brock Lesnar and Goldberg would certainly go on to WrestleMania, and so WWE’s options were limited to Finn Balor and Roman Reigns.
Balor’s fitness, at the time, was still in question (although he has performed live shows recently, he isn’t on the WrestleMania card because his return came too close to the event), and so Reigns was the one option, the set up for which was established at the Royal Rumble.
However, that was not the only reason, and there is no way that it could have been, given that this is The Undertaker and WWE wouldn’t give him a throwaway match.
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Reports from Dave Meltzer of The Wrestling Observer indicate that Vince McMahon still intends to have Reigns be the next top babyface of the company (succeeding John Cena, Stone Cold Steve Austin, Hulk Hogan and the like), and wanted to book a match with The Undertaker to have it be a sort of ‘passing the torch’ exercise.
This report does hint that Reigns is the strong favourite this Sunday, but take it with a grain of salt. The report also expresses that other WWE authorities fear that Reigns will be ‘booed viciously’ – a fear that they had when deciding whether to book the match in the first place – but McMahon’s word rules over all, naturally.
As aforementioned, the current odds are that Reigns is the favourite to win at WrestleMania 33, possibly to end an era in which The Undertaker ‘owns the yard’ and truly begin one in which Roman Reigns does. At least, that would be what the WWE is trying.
With rumours that this may be The Undertaker’s last match, that may well be the case.
However, given that this would be the Deadman’s 100th pay-per-view victory if he does win, then the tables might turn towards The Undertaker’s 24th WrestleMania win if WWE wishes to see him accomplish that achievement this Sunday.
Given how everything has happened, there is no reason to ponder on what could have been in The Undertaker vs John Cena match (if there is no possibility that it could still happen in the future, that is).
What we have is what we have, and hopefully, the match we do receive on Sunday doesn’t just live up to, but exceeds expectations, considering the fact that names like Randy Orton have stated that this is the most important WrestleMania match this year and that it may indeed close out the show.
If Reigns wins, he will most certainly be booed off the face of the Earth, so WWE should play it safe and have The Undertaker achieve something he so sincerely deserves.
Reigns still has a long career ahead of him, and even if he loses this Sunday, it should have minimal effect on his career and still allow him to be the WWE’s next big babyface, as Vince McMahon reportedly intends for him to be.
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