The road to WrestleMania 42 hasn’t been without its bumps, from major stars getting injured, causing high-profile matches to be changed, to fan response to additions reportedly from top brass at TKO being overwhelmingly negative. Head of creative, Paul “Triple H” Levesque sat down with commentator Joe Tessitore ahead of the big event, and explained a major difference between the professional wrestling business and other sports before their big games.

“If you lose your quarterback… If you lose your star center or star guard in the NBA, you have a second string guy to back him up, and you hope those second string guys are pretty good,” he explained. “There is no backup Cody Rhodes. There is no backup Randy Orton. There’s no backup Roman Reigns. There’s no backup CM Punk… it’s different because it’s the individual attraction.”

He explained that unlike a TV show, there’s the human factor. Levesque said you could write the greatest script in the world to get to a big battle scene, and right before that scene, the star gets injured. Unlike TV, there’s no waiting to shoot that final moment.

“The variables are so many and they’re so varied that you sort of have to, at any given time, be ready for anything and be able to move on from anything,” he said. “Doesn’t mean it’s easy. Doesn’t mean it’s not the most frustrating thing that I’ve ever experienced, but it’s a part of what we do.”

Triple H explained he once received wise words from the late Dusty Rhodes. He explained that, in your mind, you see things 100 percent. But, if you can get just 70 percent of that on TV, Rhodes said it was a “grand slam.”

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