When it was announced on this past Monday night's (March 18, 2013) episode of Raw that the added stipulation for the Triple H vs. Brock Lesnar match at WrestleMania 29 on April 7 in East Rutherford, New Jersey, was that "The Game" would be putting his career on the line, it caused many of you pause, and for good reason.

Thinking back, Trips had delivered an emotional retirement speech after his loss to Lesnar at SummerSlam last year. Which means he literally came out of retirement so he could have a retirement match, spawning this meme:

Yeah, that's about right.

So how is it that WWE is going to get us to care about the retirement stipulation when Triple H was already retired before coming back for this match? Could it be that Brock and Paul Heyman, the dastardly duo they are, also put "The Cerebral Assassin's" title as COO on the line as well?

Nope.

WWE.com has published an article hyping the match by getting comments from Ric Flair and Shawn Michaels, the two men closest to Triple H throughout his professional wrestling career. How they framed this tells the tale.

Here's Flair:

"He's too young to leave the business and has too much left to offer. If he doesn't wrestle again, no matter how much time he spends in the office working with the company, he'll be miserable. He needs to be in the ring. That's who he is. ... Triple H is a student of this business and has studied and has loved it since he was a young man, and it's reflected in who he is. And I think he needs to stay active and keep contributing in the ring. He can't stay backstage or in the office. He'll get bored with that real fast."

Now Michaels:

"I certainly believe that he's got plenty of other responsibilities that would keep him busy. I think he would be content. He's always had a level head on his shoulders - more so than me - so from that standpoint, I think he would. Could he say, ‘absolutely no more, not even here and there'? I don't know. I think that's always the million-dollar question for all of us."

WWE has made it difficult to care about the added stipulation because it's something that had already happened. It would be like saying "if Lesnar loses, he leaves until SummerSlam when we use another one of his dates to pop a buyrate."

Putting Triple H's executive career on the line would change things considerably, like giving Heyman an in to take over the company with Lesnar and CM Punk as his two ass-kicking front line soldiers. That could be a vehicle to promote multiple storylines, including the seemingly inevitable clash between the two.

But so far, that's not what we're getting. No, we're still only getting Triple H coming out of retirement for a retirement match. The worst part in all this?

According to the latest Figure Four Weekly, "The Game" is currently booked to win the match.

Thoughts on all this?