Randy Orton and Cody Rhodes Advance in King of the Ring Tournament – The road to WWE Night of Champions grew clearer on the June 13 episode of SmackDown, as both Randy Orton and Cody Rhodes advanced to the semifinals of the 2025 King of the Ring tournament with hard-fought victories in Fatal 4-Way matches.
In the night’s first tournament bout, Randy Orton emerged victorious over LA Knight, Aleister Black, and Carmelo Hayes. The closing sequence saw chaos erupt when Bron Breakker appeared unannounced and speared LA Knight out of his boots, taking him out of the match. Orton capitalized by hitting an RKO on Hayes. Though Hayes rolled out, Knight—still stunned from the Spear—had been inadvertently struck by Hayes and was easy pickings for Orton, who pinned him to advance. Orton now moves on to the semifinals, where he will face Sami Zayn, who qualified earlier in the week on RAW.
Later, Cody Rhodes kept his SummerSlam title hopes alive in a star-studded match against Shinsuke Nakamura, Andrade, and Damian Priest. Near the end, it looked like Nakamura was about to steal the win when he went for Cross Rhodes—Rhodes’ own finishing move—but Cody escaped and planted Nakamura with the real thing to score the pin. With the win, Rhodes moves into the semifinal round, where he awaits the winner of an upcoming quarterfinal bout.
The King and Queen of the Ring tournaments will conclude at Night of Champions PLE, and both winners will earn championship matches at WWE SummerSlam this August.
On the women’s side, Jade Cargill will face Roxanne Perez, and Alexa Bliss awaits the winner of Asuka vs. Stephanie Vaquer vs. Raquel Rodriguez vs. Ivy Nile, which is set to take place next.
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Randy Orton and Cody Rhodes Advance in King of the Ring Tournament
