Major Update on Decision to Align Pat McAfee With Randy Orton Ahead of WrestleMania

The road to WrestleMania 42 took a strange turn Friday night on WWE SmackDown when Pat McAfee returned to the company, turned heel and aligned himself with Randy Orton against Cody Rhodes.

It turns out that McAfee was the mysterious man on the other end of the telephone these past few weeks, and the reveal left many wrestling fans scratching their heads. It was a decision that Cody Rhodes later said would be like Disco Inferno being named the third man in the nWo over Hulk Hogan.

"What are you gonna do? Fire me? It sure worked out for you the last time." @CodyRhodes is NOT holding back 😳 pic.twitter.com/vH37jN5CB1
— WWE (@WWE) April 4, 2026

That may not be the fairest comparison, but throwing the former NFL punter and current ESPN personality into the middle of this feud with two weeks to go before WrestleMania is a very strange choice.

Why would WWE Chief Content Officer Paul 'Triple H' Levesque make such a call? Well, he didn't according to the folks over at BodySlam.

Bringing Pat McAfee back was at the behest of TKO

"Sources indicate that this was not a call from Paul "Triple H" Levesque or WWE creative, but a call straight from Ari Emanuel and TKO brass," BodySlam revealed on their Patreon.

McAfee has been on hiatus from WWE ever since he stepped away last summer due to extreme exhaustion. Reports started to surface back in January about his expected return, however, and his recent comments about the wrestling business passing him by were said to be him publicly kayfabing the audience.

"Another source indicates that Ari Emanuel believes that McAfee is a star and will help elevate this program between Orton and Rhodes and get it to where it needs to be between his show on ESPN and weekly SmackDown episodes before WrestleMania in two weeks," BodySlam added to their report.

.@PatMcAfeeShow is going OFF! 😳 pic.twitter.com/nPcbkdiwpF
— WWE (@WWE) April 4, 2026

TKO are apparently firm believers that bringing in main stream stars will not only help bring more eyes to the product, but give an added boost to struggling WrestleMania ticket sales.

Minutes after his return, McAfee was hitting social media and pushing for fans to buy a seat to the 'Showcase of the Immortals' so they could witness Randy Orton wrestle for his 15th World Championship.

This philosophy also helps explain why IShowSpeed, an extremely popular streamer with 51 million followers, is reportedly going to compete in a six-man tag team match at WrestleMania 42.

Rapper Lil Yachty has also been brought into the fold. He accompanied Trick Williams to the ring Friday night on SmackDown and helped him attack Sami Zayn after the main event, so there's a good chance that he'll be sticking around for a few weeks as well.

As of April 1, just over 38,000 tickets for night one of WrestleMania 42 have been sold, while roughly 40,000 tickets have been moved for night two. Both figures, which were provided by WrestleTix, are well behind last year's show inside Allegiant Stadium.

We'll see if McAfee can persuade people to make the trip into Sin City at the current going rate, or if more special discount ticket offers will be needed in the very near future.