5 Times the wrong WWE Superstar won in the main event of WrestleMania

WrestleMania is the biggest event on the WWE calendar, and the main event is supposed to be the biggest match that WWE can put out all year. While that hasn't always been the case, several main events were memorable - and ones that had a great ending as well.

Although WWE considers their "season premiere" to be late in the summer, WrestleMania truly feels like WWE programming's season finale. However, there have been several times when WWE got the WrestleMania main event wrong.

This list doesn't focus on that. We look at five WrestleMania main events where the wrong Superstar won:

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#5. Brock Lesnar - WrestleMania 34

Brock Lesnar after the WrestleMania 34 main event.

Even before WrestleMania 33 took place in 2017, a report from the Wrestling Observer Newsletter revealed that WWE was planning a blockbuster main event for the following year's event in 2018 - a headlining bout between Brock Lesnar and Roman Reigns.

A few things were obvious about WrestleMania 33 after this - Brock Lesnar was going to defeat Goldberg. Roman Reigns was going to become the second man to defeat The Undertaker at The Grandest Stage Of Them All.

Sure enough, both those predictions were correct, and Brock Lesnar would go on to have a year-long reign as the Universal Champion - getting through the likes of Samoa Joe, Braun Strowman and Kane in the process.

While Brock Lesnar and Roman Reigns were largely kept apart, they crossed paths at SummerSlam 2017, where Reigns took the pinfall in a Fatal-4-Way match.

Ultimately, Roman Reigns and Brock Lesnar would cross paths again. It seemed clear that Brock Lesnar's year-long Universal Championship reign was set to culminate in another coronation for The Big Dog.

All the pieces added up - Brock Lesnar and Roman Reigns' match at WrestleMania 31 was interrupted by Seth Rollins. WWE seemed keen on a Lesnar-Reigns rematch, and the main event of WrestleMania 34 was the perfect place to coronate the latter.

That's not what happened. Instead, Brock Lesnar and Roman Reigns had a rather underwhelming main event, with the crowd still not buying into Reigns as a babyface.

The shock when Brock Lesnar pinned Roman Reigns was evident. Everybody expected Roman Reigns to get his first victory over Brock Lesnar, but he was pinned clean.

Brock Lesnar's win didn't do much, and it seemed as though WWE wanted him to surpass CM Punk's record-breaking 434-day reign as World Champion. Reigns would have to wait another four months until SummerSlam 2018 to get his Universal Title win over Brock Lesnar.

#4. Roman Reigns - WrestleMania 33

Roman Reigns after the WrestleMania 33 main event.

Had Roman Reigns turned heel post-WrestleMania 33, this wouldn't have even been on the list. This would be the third straight WrestleMania main event for Roman Reigns - and the third straight legend he would face at The Grandest Stage of Them All.

When it was revealed that the non-title match between Roman Reigns and The Undertaker would headline WrestleMania 33, one thing seemed clear - this would be The Undertaker's final match in WWE.

Nobody objected to the idea of The Undertaker retiring, and under those circumstances, Roman Reigns winning made a lot of sense. There were two big problems - first, WWE didn't do well to capitalize on Roman Reigns' win, and this wouldn't be The Undertaker's final match.

He would go on to wrestle a few more times, including a match in 2019 where he teamed up with Roman Reigns to defeat Drew McIntyre and Shane McMahon.

Given that The Undertaker would only retire three years later, he would likely have been better off winning the match against Roman Reigns. Many would argue that The Undertaker shouldn't have even competed at WrestleMania that year because of his weak physical state.

#3. The Rock - WrestleMania 28

The Rock at WrestleMania 28.

2011 was the first and only time when a WrestleMania main event was announced a full year in advance. The Rock's "Host" appearance at WrestleMania 27 was meant to set up the following year's main event against John Cena.

From a business perspective, it made a lot of sense. There was a lot of casual fan interest and WrestleMania 28 became the highest-grossing pay-per-view in professional wrestling history, garnering a whopping 1.23 million pay-per-view buys.

What was funny about the match was that WWE spent nearly a year advertising it as a "Once in a Lifetime" match, knowing well that they were going to do a rematch at WrestleMania 29 in 2013.

There are two ways to look at it - From a creative perspective, The Rock coming back and beating the face of the franchise for over seven years made little sense. It made WWE a lot of money from a business standpoint as they managed to drag it on for another year.

Looking at the creative side of things, The Rock shouldn't have won at WrestleMania 28. But given that it was in Miami, the reaction John Cena would have gotten if he had won may not have been great.

#2. Triple H - WrestleMania 25

Triple H

When we talked about WrestleMania having the wrong main event, there are few better examples than the 25th edition of The Grandest Stage of Them All. Given that it was such a special occasion, many felt that WWE would have a better main event planned.

There were two World Title matches at WrestleMania 25 - one was a Triple Threat Match for the World Heavyweight Title between Edge, John Cena and The Big Show, while the WWE Title match was between Triple H and Edge.

The feud with the most heat was Triple H vs. Randy Orton - as it was made as personal as possible heading into WrestleMania 25. It was assigned as the main event, which seemed to be the incorrect decision.

What made it worse was the stipulation. If Triple H was disqualified, the WWE Title would change hands anyway. Triple H won in a lackluster match, while Randy Orton seemed to lose all the heat and momentum that he had as a heel.

Randy Orton was at his ruthless best in early 2009, but it didn't pan out as it should have.

#1. Hulk Hogan - WrestleMania IX

This would not have sat well in the modern era.

This tops the list because if WWE pulled something like this off at WrestleMania in the modern era, they would get severe backlash. It was WrestleMania IX in 1993 and the young Bret Hart was set to headline the show in a WWE Title defense against Yokozuna.

Bret Hart was informed a day earlier that he would be dropping the Title to Yokozuna. And despite the fact that he was upset about it, he would try to make it the best main event that he could.

After getting blinded by Mr. Fuji, Bret Hart lost the WWE Championship to Yokozuna. Right after, Hulk Hogan would make an appearance to "save the day" (despite losing his match earlier that evening) and proceed to beat Yokozuna in less than half a minute.

It was a huge waste of a WrestleMania main event. Hulk Hogan never gave Bret Hart the "passing of the torch" match that he deserved that year and instead dropped the WWE Title right back to Yokozuna - who would embark on a lengthy reign before Bret Hart received his coronation at WrestleMania 10 the following year.