With the 2024 Royal Rumble rapidly approaching, you'd think Cody Rhodes would be solely focused on besting the likes of Gunther, CM Punk, and 27 other performers on his way to the first back-to-back winner this decade.

Sure, winning the Battle Royal match marks the start of a story, not the completion of a mission, but if a performer has aspirations of headlining WrestleMania, the first and easiest way to get that done, especially since it allows a performer to shoot their shot and pick who they are going to compete against in South Philly later this year, thus making it arguably the most important multi-man match of the year.

And yet, Rhodes remains firmly fixated on one thing and one thing alone, defeating Roman Reigns to become the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship on his terms, to the point where, in an interview with Busted Open Radio, Rhodes let it be known that he wouldn't even want to beat the “Tribal Chief” at any other event but the “Showcase of the Immortals.”

“I don't think I have a definitive answer, but I will tell you, I think it does. The reason being, if last year, the match had gone differently,” Cody Rhodes told Busted Open Radio via Fightful. “If last year Roman had just beaten me 1-2-3, right in the middle, I just crumbled under the lights and I wasn't on his level, that's a different story. The way the match unfolded and the year I have, it feels like it has to be at WrestleMania. It just seems like it's coming full circle. Everything can change. You have to get to WrestleMania in the first place, whether you win the Royal Rumble or the Elimination Chamber. It's not an easy task. It would have been different if this was the first time. This is a rematch. I feel like the rematch needs to take place where the original match took place. Just my gut. Is there a world where it doesn't happen there, sure, perhaps, but in my lay down at night and go to sleep dreams, it would be at WrestleMania, especially since I love Philadelphia.”

Alright, so Rhodes' comments, while a solid effort in the classic babyface tradition, create more questions than answers, as would his story be finished if, say, Randy Orton defeats Reigns at the Rumble, becoming the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship on the final Saturday in January? Or how about if the match at Mania somehow becomes a threeway, with Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson inserting himself into the bout in an abuse of his corporate power? Would Rhodes put an asterisk next to his title win if he pinned “The Great One” instead? Needless to say, let's hope Rhodes wins the Rumble, otherwise he's going to have some seriously feelings to potentially work through.

Cody Rhodes complements Shawn Michaels for NXT.

Elsewhere on his Royal Rumble promotional tour, Cody Rhodes stopped by ESPN to talk about, you guessed it, NXT, the developmental brand that is currently running a tag team classic in his father's name.

While Rhodes has only been to NXT a few times, as the developmental system didn't exist when he was coming up, the OVW alumni still found time to celebrate Shawn Michaels for creating a fantastic show, as it's as beneficial for the performers as it is the fans watching from home.

“Maybe one of the hardest things to do in all of sports and entertainment is to get a show that maybe lost its cool and get it to be cool again,” Cody Rhodes told ESPN via Fightful. “Shawn Michaels has done that, and he’s done it also while developing all these relationships with these young kids who are going to have Shawn Michaels as the first booker they dealt with, somebody who helped them with promos, somebody who helped them in their matches. It’s almost laughable if you say it because every one of those kids should come out being the best wrestler of all time, the best superstar of all time just because it’s Shawn Michaels. I think history is going to be very kind to Shawn, not just as one of the greatest to ever do it, a hall of famer and all those things, but he took a show that, respectfully, had kind of lost some of its shine and he has absolutely brought it back to where it’s doing great numbers, we’re seeing a little crossover. It was a very fun experience for me to be in his house on that night. It was very special.”

Has NXT truly returned to its 2010s glory days, when the likes of Johnny Gargano, Adam Cole, and Kyle O'Reilly were turning in some of the highest-rated matches in WWE history? Eh, probably not, but there are genuine fans who consider it the highlight of WWE's weekly offerings, which is a stark contrast from the 2.0 era.