Everyone, including the man Brock Lesnar faced at WWE SummerSlam, was surprised by the post-match handshake.
The Beast Incarnate shocked the Ford Field crowd on Saturday when, after his loss to Cody Rhodes, he put out his hand to shake his opponent’s and even raised it. This unplanned way to close a multi-month feud likely sent both men off in different directions, but most of all, it’s a gesture Lesnar does not just do for everyone he faces in a WWE ring.
Well, that act even surprised Rhodes himself. He expected, if anything, for Lesnar to continue the fight, as he told Justin Barrasso of Sports Illustrated.
“As I saw him taking his gloves off, I sincerely thought he was going to start swinging. Then we went head-to-head, and it felt like we were a millisecond away from starting up again. So I didn’t anticipate that handshake coming. When I saw his hand, I was grateful. That’s not something he does. Again, this run has consistently surprised me. The torch isn’t passed. You have to take it.”
When Rhodes returned backstage, everyone gave him a standing ovation, but to no surprise, Lesnar already left by then.
“I came to the back, there was a nice ovation in the Gorilla Position, but Brock was nowhere to be found. I didn’t see him the rest of the night. The way I see it, we didn’t need to speak. Brock left it all in the ring.”
This post-match moment was a nice conclusion to a feud that had an ambiguous beginning in April, when Lesnar attacked Rhodes as they were set to work together in a tag team match on Raw. Two wins for the American Nightmare and one for the man formerly dubbed the “Next Big Thing” later, and the story ended. We’ll have to wait and see how both of them fare in the rest of 2023 on WWE programming.