Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes did an interview with the FLAGRANT podcast. Rhodes talked WWE, TNA, why he left WWE several years ago, and tons of other topics.
Cody Rhodes on why he been able to be a traditional babyface without getting booed:
“I’ve been very lucky that something about my return set in with all the different demographics. There’s usually a good chunk of fans who rally against the babyface. ‘Well, I like the bad guys.’ Something happened. The first person who really let me in on that this is wild that there’s no one going against this was a Hall of Famer, Mr. Paul Heyman, who, without giving me credit in a moment, gave me a lot of credit. He said, ‘You’ve opened the door for traditional babyfaces to come back.’
On why Dusty Rhodes didn’t train him:
“My dad didn’t train me and he didn’t want to train me, so this was just me doing it with everyone assuming I knew what I was doing. He was really good about, ‘Hey, you want to do this? Great. I want you to be the best’, and he was confident I was going to do well, but he didn’t want to touch it because he felt if he did anything, and he even was on the writing team on SmackDown. He left the writing team before I got called up. He actually went to Full Sail in Orlando and started that up. He thought it would be against me if he spoke out in any way like, ‘Well, Cody should do this.’ It would be a conflict of interest. There’s some dads, and I’ve seen it work both ways that are so in on their kids and it works just as well, but our strategy worked the same. That was the best. He never had to push for me. He never had to be in an awkward conversation. He let me just do it.”
On leaving the WWE for the independents:
“It was a huge gamble because I could have been sued. You know, to this day, I don’t think I’ve ever signed the contract (non-compete). I never signed anything after that and it was sent to my house. I could have been sued, probably should have been sued, but I needed to take a very big risk, and a very big gamble and in that moment, I felt I’d earned it. I thought, hey, the respect they have for my family, all that I’ve done, never slipped up here once, done everything you asked. Give me this one. Let me ride off, and okay, we’re not gonna chase him.”
On being scared to leave WWE:
“I don’t know how I could possibly describe that emotional state other than I was scared to death, but couldn’t let my wife know I was scared to death. Financially, this is the thing that no one knows, I wasn’t the best with my money. So I told people all the time like, ‘Oh, I’m fine. I worked there for 10 years. I’m good. I got a good net.’ That wasn’t the case. I started working immediately after the WWE deal ended and I would be check to check. I just bought our first house. I always tell people, ‘I’m the one Rhodes that is good with his money.’ No, not necessarily. It’s gotten better.”
On Vince McMahon flying to his house to make him an offer to return to WWE:
“He found out that I was free. Nobody wanted to dabble if you’re not free, if this is a storyline, if this is a bit, we don’t need to be talking because that’s trouble. So he found out I was free and came to my house in Atlanta. It was really old school in terms of, hey, there’s no promises beyond this is what we are considering, you wrestling Seth Rollins at WrestleMania 38 in Dallas. Seth Rollins was somebody I’d felt like I had been chasing when I was there the first time, and really old school scribbled on a piece of paper the amount of money the contract would be for, and just slid it across, which was unnecessary.'” When asked how much it was for, Cody said, “I can’t tell you exactly how much it was. I can tell you it’s, I mean, 15 times more than what I had been making in WWE the first time.”
When he realized he was not going to win the title at WrestleMania 39:
“I think I went to a place in my mind, and maybe I was feeling really positive. Maybe I experienced enough heartbreak in the business to not be heartbroken again. What it became was, I truthfully told myself, and I had a really good individual step in and speak to me about this. I told myself, ‘Great. I’m still going to be the champion. I’m going to be the champion for the next year’, because Roman had select dates, and he had done the full time schedule before, so he earned his select dates, but he’s not there every week. I will be there every week. I’m at every live event, every house show, every tour, every appearance. I’m everywhere. So I’m gonna be the champion of WWE without the title, and that became the task. The hardest part of the task was they care so much now, no way with the attention spans being, will they care at 40. No way. I know you think you’re wrestling him at 40, but no way can you get there. Then, of course, the greatest hurdle of all hurdles, right? When it does look like, no, we’re going. Won the Royal Rumble again. Steve Austin, Shawn Michaels are back to back Rumble winners. I won it twice. I pointed at Roman. We’re going. This is as real as real gets, and The Rock shows up. That may be, and I don’t want to use the term heartbroken, but that maybe the most dejected (I was) for a moment.”
On wrestling Brock Lesnar:
“The lore of him is that he is the most crazy, outrageous, strong, greatest athlete. He could end anybody in a moment. Yeah, I’ll ruin it for some. His professionalism is so underrated. He is one of, if not the most professional and understanding of what we wanted. He has a farm in Canada. I hope you’re not mad at me for sharing this, but he sent me an entire cow worth of steaks and he took a picture of himself with the cow, because he does it all. He’s a real farmer. He was the most professional with me.”
On what The Rock whispered in his ear when Cody stepped aside to give the Rock the WrestleMania 40 match against Roman Reigns:
“Him and I had an embrace. He told me something super sweet in my ear. I’m sure he doesn’t mind me sharing, even though we’re not best buddies. He said, ‘We’re gonna make both our dads proud.””
On why he thinks The Rock changed the main event from The Rock vs Roman Reigns back to Cody Rhodes vs Roman Reigns for WrestleMania 40:
“In his defense, I think Rock has become so busy. The amount of stuff, his output is incredible. His work ethic, his output, I don’t think he knew so much about the current landscape. He knows that company backwards and forwards. I mean, the show is called SmackDown because he said that word. He had set the table for everybody, but I don’t think he was always keeping an eye on the table. I think over the course of that week, and I could be wrong, but I’m so glad that he did see that, okay, this is bigger.”
On how long he would like to wrestle:
“I feel like I can go full time, 100%, and be the best, be at my best, and be the standard until 45. I don’t know why I’ve kind of put that number in my mind. I have a three year old daughter. I do not want her to have a dad that can’t do a lot. I haven’t had that problem yet. I can throw her up. I don’t want her to have a dad that doesn’t have the strength and all the things she needs to pick her up. Whatever it may be, I think about that a lot, but 45 I think for me.”
“Dusty was probably 60 when he had had his last match, maybe even 65 and I hated seeing that. I knew people liked it. I knew he was okay, but I hated seeing him that way. I wanted to remember him differently. Battleground is the match where he hits his last bionic elbow on Dean Ambrose on the floor, Jon Moxley. What people don’t know about that is the reason all of it took place on the floor is because he couldn’t get up the steps that easily. I think at that point, that’s like the hardest thing to see. He knew though I got to call it like, let me go guys. Let me go. That was one of the last big things he did with me on screen, but it was a really great gift. Because of that, I don’t ever want to overstay my welcome.”
“I had the management role with my previous company, I would say I failed at that. I didn’t necessarily succeed, but I learned a lot from that failure, and with this company, with WWE, if that’s something that comes up for me, would you like to be behind the scenes? It’s definitely something I’m considering because I had a whole run at it once before where I pretty much bombed. So at this point I think I can get this now. I think I can figure it out. Long way off though. I want to hang on to this as long as I can.”
If you use any portion of the quotes from this article please credit FLAGRANT with a h/t to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription.
