In August, Arik Cannon criticized the 19-year-old Avery Styles for not helping set up chairs at a GCW event. Once this went viral, his father, AJ, responded at the time that his son was there to wrestle and not to be part of the ring crew. Rhodes also defended Avery on social media.
This was a discussion on the latest episode of What Do You Wanna Talk About? with Cody Rhodes. Styles addressed the situation on the podcast and called it ridiculous. It all comes down to people thinking he needed to pay his dues.
“Probably the most ridiculous thing that was ever talked about on X,” Styles said.
Rhodes said the wrestlers’ reaction showed how Styles is viewed in locker rooms.
“You’ve set such a reputation and such a precedent that you saw with the chairs thing,” Rhodes said.
“This kid, he’s getting fair treatment here. We’re gonna fight over this. That’s respect to you, and to him,” he added.
Rhodes said he likes to weigh in on online debates every now and then, and this was one he felt he needed to address.
“I like to get in there every now and then, you know. I like to get in there, but that one, I thought, this kid, we’re not doing that,” Rhodes said.
“Some of us, myself included, couldn’t let it be,” he said.
Rhodes clarified that he was not suggesting second-generation wrestlers are exempt from the usual expectations in pro wrestling.
“I didn’t mean second gens and multi gens don’t need to do the things that they’re supposed to do. What I meant is there’s a level of knowledge and osmosis. And my mom, for example, even though she slapped you three times, I consider her a wrestler. She never set up a chair in her life. My sister, I consider her a wrestler. She never set up a chair in her life. She lived this. She lived by it. You went through your run with your children, like you lived by it. So a little grace is all I’m saying here, and also to really bring it down, he wasn’t there for that show. He was there for another show. He just happened to be. He’s got a target on his back, and that’s never going to go away,” Rhodes said.
“I don’t regret for one second getting in there because we weren’t having it, but I didn’t mean the second gens don’t have to set up the chairs,” Rhodes offered to clarify.
Rhodes added that he drove the ring truck early in his career. Styles said Avery will be expected to help when a ring is moved into a gym Styles is starting.
