Randy Orton made waves on Thursday when he took to Twitter and outright challenged Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson to a match at WrestleMania 36. “The Viper” teased the idea of confronting Johnson during Friday Night SmackDown‘s FOX premiere on Friday, arguing that the two should to fight to see who the best third-generation wrestler is. But the face-off never happened, as Johnson was invovled in a segment early in the show with King Corbin and Becky Lynch. Orton didn’t give up though, and even asked John Cena to help him get Johnson’s attention. Over the weekend “The People’s Champ” finally responded to challenge, saying he was still healing from their last match.
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“U think Bob O Sr & Chief Maivia along with our pops’ Bob Jr & the Soulman ran up and down those roads for decades taking bumps just so we can sell out WM36 so you can RKO my ass thru the earth,” Johnson wrote. “My body’s still recovering from that Evolution beatdown you gave me at WM20.”
U think Bob O Sr & Chief Maivia along with our pops’ Bob Jr & the Soulman ran up and down those roads for decades taking bumps just so we can sell out WM36 so you can RKO my ass thru the earth. My body’s still recovering from that Evolution beatdown you gave me at WM20 😂
— Dwayne Johnson (@TheRock) October 7, 2019
Orton seemed a bit bummed by the response.
My man. So I guess that’s a ‘no’ 🥺 https://t.co/2qDiBcb5Yy
— Randy Orton (@RandyOrton) October 7, 2019
The two wrestled each in a 3-on-2 handicap match back at WrestleMania XX, as Orton and his Evolution stablemates Ric Flair and Batista beat Johnson and Mick Foley.
On Sunday night just before Hell in a Cell Orton was goaded into a match backstage by Ali. Despite a valiant effort and an impressive RKO counter, “The Viper” still managed to pull out a win.
WWE announced during Monday Night Raw last week that a 10-man tag match will take place at the upcoming Crown Jewel event with Flair and Hulk Hogan serving as the respective coaches. Hogan picked Universal Champion Rollins as his team captain, while Flair chose Orton. This week’s Raw will feature a match between Orton and another Team Hogan member, Rusev.
Sunday’s Hell in a Cell event ended on a controversial note, as Rollins retained the WWE Universal Championship against “The Fiend” Bray Wyatt due to a sudden referee stoppage. The fallout from the match will likely be addressed on Raw this week.
