LIVE UPDATES – WWE WrestleMania 40 Kickoff Media Event: The Rock, Cody Rhodes, Roman Reigns & More

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Welcome to our live coverage for the official WWE WrestleMania 40 Kickoff media event featuring The Rock, Cody Rhodes, Roman Reigns and more.

About The WrestleMania 40 Kickoff Media Event

The WrestleMania 40 Kickoff event starts at 7pm ET/4pm PT/midnight GMT today, February 8.

The event will be presented as a press conference, but is taking place at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, and is free for fans to enter.

Set to make appearances are the aforementioned Cody Rhodes, Roman Reigns and The Rock – with the expectation that there will be official confirmation today of who will challenge Reigns for the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship at WrestleMania itself on April 6/7.

Also set to appear are World Heavyweight Champion Seth Rollins, Women’s World Champion Rhea Ripley, Bianca Belair, and WWE’s Chief Content Officer, Paul Levesque aka Triple H.

The Raw announce team of Michael Cole and Pat McAfee will be hosting.

In an update, WWE actually announced just hours before the event that joining Cole and McAfee will be CM Punk and Big E.

Punk was originally planned to face Seth Rollins at WrestleMania before Punk suffered an injury during the Royal Rumble.

Upon arriving in Las Vegas, The Rock said: “I have the feeling this press conference will be talked about forever”.

WrestleMania 40 Kickoff Media Event Live Coverage:

6:22pm ET: Hello! We’re now just under 40 minutes away from the media event kicking off, so just a reminder to check out our homepage to get caught up on all the headlines heading into tonight (The Rock has already had some pretty interesting comments to make) and check back here at the top of the hour!

6:55pm ET: FIVE MINUTE WARNING! We’re five minutes away from getting underway, so stay tuned and refresh this page for live updates as they come through below! 

7:02pm ET: Michael Cole welcomes us to the event, and we see shots from earlier today (or yesterday in some cases) of Triple H, Cody Rhodes, Roman Reigns, Paul Heyman and The Rock arriving in Las Vegas – followed by a video package documenting the history of WrestleMania and previewing this year’s.

7:06pm ET: Michael Cole welcomes us again and we are live! Cole is joined on the panel (laid out like a premium live event pre-show panel) by Pat McAfee, Big E and CM Punk.

7:07pm ET: Big E jokes that he’s only here to make sure that CM Punk doesn’t get fined – and Michael Cole introduces Punk as “most importantly, the husband of AJ Lee”.

7:08pm ET: Big E says he’s in great health, CM Punk says he’s upset that his triceps injury isn’t 100% recovered despite only being one week removed from surgery. But he does say his mouth still works so he can still “piss some people off”.

7:10 pm ET: CM Punk jokingly asks where all the fans getting behind Cody Rhodes were in 2013 when Punk was in the situation Rhodes is in now.

7:12pm ET: Big E praises Cody Rhodes and mentions how much he’s done for the late Brodie Lee’s family as an example of why he’s the perfect top star.

7:15pm ET: We go to Byron Saxton interviewing Paul Heyman in the back – Heyman says the mood in the Bloodline locker room is the same it’s been for years. Everyone is talking about The Rock and Cody Rhodes, but the hype is about who gets to fight Roman Reigns and share his spotlight. That’s Roman Reigns’ “mood”.

7:16pm ET: Pat says he thinks Roman Reigns wants to face The Rock. Big E agrees. Punk says Roman wants The Rock, but it’s more about who Roman doesn’t want, and he doesn’t want Cody.

7:17pm ET: Michael Cole announces WWE Speed, which will air exclusively on X, featuring new matches that are up to five minutes in length.

7:21pm ET: Michael Cole throws to the stage, where Triple H comes out and the actual event is underway. Triple H basically tells his version of the story of how WWE and WrestleMania has grown over time into what it is today. He says WrestleMania 40 will take it to a whole new level – it’s a new era and “an all new WWE”. He promises we “ain’t seen nothing yet”, and asks everyone in attendance – “Are you ready?”

7:22pm ET: Michael Cole and Pat McAfee are now on the stage, and Cole throws to a video package for the first “guest” of the evening – Bianca Belair.

7:26pm ET: Bianca Belair talks about her Hulu reality series with Montez Ford. She then talks about her history-making WrestleMania performances, including mentioning Sasha Banks and the match they had at WrestleMania 37. Bianca says she wants to continue her WrestleMania undefeated streak this year, even though she doesn’t have a title right now. You can’t spell WrestleMania without “EST”. True. Belair will be in a qualifying match on tomorrow’s SmackDown for the Elimination Chamber match. Video package now for the next guest, Women’s World Champion Rhea Ripley.

7:32pm ET: Rhea Ripley says what makes this WrestleMania so special is that she is walking in – and out – as the most dominant woman to hold a championship in WWE. She says she’ll beat Nia Jax at Elimination Chamber and head into WrestleMania as champion, but she’s interrupted by Becky Lynch.

7:34pm ET: Becky says she’s going to win the Elimination Chamber match to earn the right to challenge Rhea for the title at WrestleMania and it’ll be “Mami vs The Man” for the first time ever… if Rhea can get past Nia Jax. Becky says she’s made a career out of knocking “golden girls” off the top, and Rhea is going to learn what it’s like to be “a bottom” at WrestleMania. Adam Pearce shows up to try to get them out of each other’s faces. It goes as well as it usually does when Adam Pearce tries to do that, but Becky does eventually back off.

7:36pm ET: Bianca Belair’s qualifying match for the Elimination Chamber tomorrow night will be against Michin. Michin lost to Tiffany Stratton last week. That makes perfect sense.

7:39pm ET: Video package for the next guest, Seth Rollins. This one could get very interesting.

7:43pm ET: Rollins comes out and does his usual schtick. He jokes about getting a “big pop” as a little dig at Roman Reigns. Rollins says it’s time to cut to the chase and calls out Cody Rhodes… but instead, he’s greeted by the entrance of one Roman Reigns, who, with Paul Heyman, joins Seth on stage.

7:48pm ET: Roman orders the crowd to acknowledge him. Rollins jokes that Reigns showed up to work for once – to which Reigns replies by pointing out that Rollins showed up to work in his wife’s shoes. Roman then calls Cody Rhodes “Mr Hesitation”, he hesitated to make his decision and it’s now no longer his decision – it’s Roman’s decision now. Roman says he’s going to get to choose who challenges him in the main event of WrestleMania. Roman says: “I choose… The Rock.” And guess who’s coming out next… The Rock is here!

7:51pm ET: The crowd seems somewhat split, but definitely more boos for The Rock than cheers. He says: “Finally, The Rock has come back to Las Vegas”. He asks the fans if they think Roman Reigns is going to beat The Rock at WrestleMania, and then asks if they think The Rock is gonna beat Roman Reigns at WrestleMania. The majority response is “We Want Cody” chants, although there are some chanting back, “No we don’t”.

7:54pm ET: After a long pause, he asks the fans if they think The Rock vs Roman Reigns will be the biggest main event in the history of WWE. He says he “loves the passion”. As he’s welcoming and thanking the press and the fans, he’s once again interrupted by “We Want Cody” chants.

7:57pm ET: Rock proceeds to call those chanting for Cody the “Cody crybabies”. He then shows on the screen the entire family tree of The Bloodline. He says if people can’t see the fact that there is only one dominant and powerful royal family in pro-wrestling – if you can’t see that, and if you think that Rock and Roman isn’t the biggest main event in WrestleMania history, then “it doesn’t matter what you think”.

7:59pm ET: He continues saying it’ll be the Universal Champion vs The People’s Champion in the biggest main event in the history of professional wrestling “bound by blood”. He hugs Roman, but then we hear a voice, and you’ll never guess who it is. Cody’s here! He says “this right here is bulls**t”.

8pm ET: Cody points out it’s his choice who main events WrestleMania because he won the Royal Rumble, not Roman or The Rock – he says at Mania 40 in the main event HE CHOOSES ROMAN REIGNS!

8:03pm ET: Roman says Cody is embarrassing his own entire family, nobody cares about his story, and he’s irrelevant just like his dad. Cody asks “how’s Jey?” – Rhodes says the Bloodline isn’t a family, they’re just lackies and goons for Roman. Cody says if Roman and Rock’s grandfathers were here, they’d be ashamed. Triple H, Adam Pearce and Nick Aldis are now on stage as things get a bit heated – specifically with The Rock confronting Cody.

8:05pm ET: The Rock tells Cody “when you’re talking about Roman’s family, you’re talking about my family – so now we have a problem”. Rock then SLAPS Cody, and Seth Rollins actually joins Cody in confronting Roman and Rock. The aforementioned authority figures pull everyone back – Cody and Seth leave while Roman and Rock stay on stage. We’re now back to the panel with Michael Cole, Big E, CM Punk and Pat McAfee.

8:10pm ET: Punk says he wants to see Cody punch Rock in the face, and reiterates that it’s Cody’s shot to call. Big E admits that he doesn’t know where this is going. Cole reminds us that Cody did say he picked Roman to challenge at WrestleMania, so as far as he’s concerned, that’s the match. So the status of Seth Rollins and The Rock is currently unknown. Cole admits it’s “so up in the air”.

8:12pm ET: In a backstage interview, Triple H attempts to explain what just happened, but can’t, and is then cut off by The Rock who tells him to “fix it”, and dares Triple H to let Cody/Seth insult the Bloodline family again. Roman is with The Rock but doesn’t say anything before they walk off together.

8:15pm ET: And that’s how we end things! So in summary, Roman Reigns tried to choose The Rock – which the Rock was on board with – but Cody Rhodes pointed out it’s his decision, not Roman’s, and chooses to challenge Roman. So as far as we know, the match is set to be Cody vs Roman. However, The Rock is mad that Cody and Seth supposedly insulted the Bloodline family, and he’s ordered Triple H to “fix” the situation, using his position on the TKO Board to act as Triple H’s superior – so there’s also a potential tease of a tag team match with Rock and Roman against Cody and Seth. If there’s any more official clarification that comes out, we’ll keep you posted.

8:27pm ET: In a late update, Triple H tweeted out confirmation that Roman Reigns vs Cody Rhodes is in fact official for WrestleMania 40.

Thanks for following along! Check out the homepage as we’ll be providing updates on all the fallout and headlines coming out of what just took place.

• WrestleMania 40 Kickoff media event
• WrestleMania
• The Rock
• Roman Reigns
• Cody Rhodes

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