When Cody Rhodes returned to WWE, it was to wrestle Seth Rollins at WrestleMania 38.

On paper, the pairing was perfect; Rhodes has desperately wanted to be an old-school Hulk Hogan-style babyface for years now, and he was tasked with standing opposite a man so comically committed to being a villain he would routinely rip off a maniacal laugh that would make Mark Hamill's joker proud.

And yet, now that Rhodes and Rollins are both babyfaces, with both having on-screen friendships with the Undisputed WWE Tag Team Champions, Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens, one has to wonder about their relationship and if, at some point down the line, they could let bygones be bygones in order to present a unified front on the babyface side of the proverbial ticket.

Discussing this dynamic and more in an interview with Chris Van Vliet on Insight, Rhodes noted that while he may never be best friends with the “Visionary,” he has nothing but respect for his former in-ring rival.

“I can't even begin to tell you how good Seth Rollins is as a wrestler, psychologist in the ring,” Rhodes said. “And without getting too far, Seth made a decision that day that he made, it was his decision to make. That will forever be something I'm grateful for. Seth and I are not friends. It doesn't look like we're heading towards friendship. There's been some flirtation with it. Don't think it's going to happen though,” Cody Rhodes said via Wrestling Inc.

“All that aside, if I ever write a book one day, a whole chapter will be about how good that guy is and how he's super valuable to WWE, and he's still undervalued, in my opinion. Having Monday nights with him and I in a nice, competitive ‘who's the guy,' without ever having to be in the ring with each other, I couldn't ask for a better sparring partner in that sense.”

In professional wrestling, the dynamic between baby faces has always been interesting. Sometimes they work together like good friends, other times, there's a friendly rivalry where multiple babyfaces can be vying for the same title so long as they stay in their own lanes, and other times still, they avoid each other as they are likely not working the same storylines. If Rhodes and Rollins operate in that third category, at least until Paul “Triple H” Levesque decides to pull the trigger and rekindle the feud once again, there should still be plenty of compelling wrestling from both for years to come.

Cody Rhodes reveals which AEW manager he wishes he could have in his corner.

Elsewhere on his promotional tour to drum up interest in his Peacock documentary American Nightmare: Becoming Cody Rhodes, this time with Sam Roberts of Not Sam Wrestling, Rhodes decided to send some love to Arn Anderson and his absolutely wacky gun promo from AEW Dynamite.

For Rhodes, the promo was not only indicative of the kind of bulletproof performer Anderson has become but a reason why he wishes the Four Horseman member was still in his corner in WWE.

“I didn't know, and one of the best things about it, Tony Khan can tell you his version of this, it's the same version. Arn said, ‘you want me to tell you what I'm going to say?' I told him, ‘No, all good, just remember the thing at the end.' Lee Johnson, who is a child, who we're developing, and he's going to be star, he's in the ring, that to me, is the best part about it. He saw it live, in person, because when Arn pantomimed that he was going to ‘blow my brains out' with his fictional thing. I thought, ‘that's it. This is not going to be on primetime.' I thought about it so much in the moment. It's a scary moment. I'm standing there, the color is leaving my face, I immediately came to the back, and I was told, ‘please text [Associate General Manager and Senior Vice President, Programming & Operations, TNT, TBS, and truTV] Sam Linsky,' he's a big ally to wrestling, a good guy. He's in charge of things. He didn't care at all. I think the reason he didn't care at all…if someone else had done it, huge problem. Arn Anderson can do whatever he wants. That's really the rule with Arn,” Rhodes said via Fightful.

“I miss Arn, greatly. If I had Arn at WrestleMania, things might have been different. He was a huge positive force for me. He's so smart about the psychology of the crowd, and not enough people go to him. Plenty do, but not enough go to him and say, ‘Hey, what about this?' They don't want it changed. You don't have to change it, but you should at least hear what he's thinking. You have your (Steven) Spielbergs, (Sofia) Coppolas, (Martin) Scorseses, this is the cinema meme, Arn really is one of those. He did this at the highest level, people rioting over stuff Arn did in the past. Here he is, getting famous again, just in an inappropriate way. I love Arn, miss him, I would move a lot of things, move mountains, if the opportunity came up for Arn to show up and come to my aid one more time.”

Would Rhodes have defeated Roman Reigns at WrestleMania 39 had Anderson been in his corner? Maybe yes, maybe no, but it's safe to say Solo Sikoa would have thought twice about getting involved in the finish if Double A's Glock and/or Spinebuster was waiting in the wings to neutralize the Reigns' muscle.