Reason WWE Censored The Rock's Promo on SmackDown

WWE's concern over a potential FCC violation led to The Rock's promo on SmackDown being censored.

During last week's show, the Great One made a surprise appearance on the show during SmackDown's opening segment. After sharing some verbal barbs with Austin Theory, the two would brawl, with The Rock gaining the upper hand and leveling Theory with a People's Elbow. Pat McAfee, who was also making his return to SmackDown, then hit a People's Elbow of his own on the former U.S. Champion.

During the segment, The Rock had half the crowd chant "You are" to which the other half chanted "an a**hole" at Austin Theory. That last word was repeatedly censored by WWE's production team, who cut the audio to SmackDown whenever it was used.

Fightful Select reports that a possible FCC violation led WWE to make sure that the world was not used. While some have speculated that the censoring was down to SmackDown's TV-PG rating, this doesn't prevent profanity from being used. WWE & FOX instead simply decided to not risk receiving any fines.

Fightful's report also noted that there were a lot more people than usual in the Gorilla position for The Rock’s promo.

Censored or not, many hope to see The Rock on WWE programming in the near future. During an appearance on The Pat McAfee Show last week, The Rock said that he is "open" to a match at WrestleMania 40. Rocky added that he was once confirmed for a match with Roman Reigns at WrestleMania 39, but he and WWE decided to hold off on the match as they couldn't figure out what would make this match 'unprecedented.'