Brian Gewirtz & The Rock Suggested Kevin Owens Def. Cody Rhodes For WWE Title In Impromptu Match At Elimination Chamber PLE

Gewirtz and Rock felt Owens becoming champion was not the end goal, but they needed to do something massive.

Going into WWE’s 2025 Elimination Chamber Premium Live Event, Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson told Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes that he wanted his ‘soul.’ Rhodes would have to respond to Johnson’s proposal to be ‘his champion’ at the PLE.

This ultimately led to John Cena’s heel turn and aligning with Johnson. In the new series on Netflix titled ‘WWE: Unreal,’ Brian Gewirtz revealed that he and The Rock initially suggested the idea that after Rhodes turned down Johnson’s offer, Johnson would set up an impromptu match and Rhodes would lose the Undisputed WWE Title to Kevin Owens.

“The prospect of babyface John (Cena) and babyface Cody (Rhodes) felt a little dry to us. But just looking at it from the outside, let’s throw some controlled chaos into this. So, myself and Rock, we got together and we pitched something that was twofold. I had the idea of Cody needing to be Rock’s champion. We had that as the hook. We proposed, at Elimination Chamber, Cody turning down The Final Boss, and that was gonna lead to Final Boss making an impromptu title match right then and there, that resulted in Kevin Owens who had been in a storyline with Cody during that time, leaving with the championship. Kevin Owens winning the title wasn’t the end goal. The takeaway was whatever it is we do, needs to be seismic. That’s the big question. What is Cody gonna say?”

At the Elimination Chamber PLE, Owens defeated Sami Zayn in an Unsanctioned match. Randy Orton returned after the bout to set up his singles match against Owens at WrestleMania.

That WrestleMania match was thrown out when Owens revealed he had to undergo neck surgery.

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