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With WWE WrestleMania 34 almost upon us, we are taking a look at five things you might not know about recent ‘Mania events.
In this article, we focus on WrestleMania 29 – a show which saw John Cena defeat The Rock in their second consecutive headline match on “The Grandest Stage of Them All”.
Over 80,000 people were in attendance at New Jersey’s MetLife Stadium for the event, which also featured Brock Lesnar vs. Triple H, The Undertaker vs. CM Punk and Alberto Del Rio vs. Jack Swagger.
#5 It was the first WrestleMania in 16 years with no women’s match
It’s unthinkable nowadays that WWE would have a whole WrestleMania card with no women’s matches, but that’s exactly what happened just five years ago at WrestleMania 29.
Four women were originally due to compete, with Nikki & Brie Bella teaming with Cody Rhodes & Damien Sandow to face Brodus Clay, Tensai, Naomi & Cameron, but the match was cancelled at the last minute because of time constraints.
That means WM29 was the first WrestleMania since WrestleMania 13, 16 years earlier, to feature no women’s matches anywhere on the show.
#4 Ryback hated the finish to his match
The finish to Ryback vs. Mark Henry at WrestleMania 29 saw “The Big Guy” fall flat on his face after collapsing under the weight of his opponent while attempting his Shell Shock finisher.
Henry then laid on the mat for 12 seconds before finally getting a pinfall victory over Ryback, who was massively popular at the time despite losing on five straight PPVs heading into the event.
The former Intercontinental champion said on the Shining Wizards podcast in March 2017 that he spoke with Vince McMahon about the match for 30 minutes before the show, adding that he was even advised by fellow WWE Superstars not to allow the finish to happen.
#3 Bret Hart gave Triple H vs. Brock Lesnar a 4/10 rating… or did he?
Bret Hart’s 4/10 match ratings have become somewhat of an internet phenomenon in the wrestling world.
He first gave the score when discussing the Triple H vs. The Undertaker match at WrestleMania 28, and he gave the same verdict for the Triple H vs. Brock Lesnar match at WrestleMania 29.
However, it appears to have been forgotten (or, perhaps, totally missed at the time) that Bret’s rating for HHH vs. Lesnar was in reference to a ‘4/10’ sign in the crowd on Raw, and that he actually thought the two men had the second best match of the night.
#2 Chris Jericho wanted to face Ryback
Ryback’s miserable experience at WrestleMania 29 would have been a whole lot better had Chris Jericho’s original storyline idea come to fruition.
Y2J returned to WWE at the Royal Rumble in January 2013 and, as he revealed in his book No Is a Four Letter Word: How I Failed Spelling But Succeeded in Life, his plan was to go on to face Ryback two months later at WrestleMania 29.
Despite initially going along with the idea, Vince McMahon changed storyline plans in the build to the event and had Jericho lose to the debuting Fandango instead.
#1 CM Punk was supposed to be in the main event
CM Punk made it no secret throughout his WWE career that his main goal was to headline WrestleMania one day – something he failed to do during his nine years with the company.
The closest he came to going on last at “The Show of Shows” was at WrestleMania 29, where he faced The Undertaker despite original booking plans stating that he would be in the main event.
During an interview on the set of Jumanji in 2016, The Rock revealed that his match with John Cena at WrestleMania 29 was supposed to be a Triple Threat, also involving Punk, but WWE decided to build the event around Rock vs. Cena II instead.
