While Cody Rhodes is sitting pretty as the WWE Champion, the top guy in the top wrestling promotion in the world, there's a segment of the IWC that remains viciously interested in the “American Nightmare's” run in AEW.
How could someone take so many shots at WWE, challenge them head-on for years, and literally make the first viable alternative to The Fed fans have seen in 20 years go back to the company like nothing happened, keeping his same theme song, his same presentation, and frankly, the same attitude that made him a huge heel in his final few months working for Tony Khan?
Well, the fine folks at The Flagrant asked Rhodes about his run in AEW, his decision not to become a World Champion, and how that impacted the rest of his run, and were met with a very interesting answer indeed.
“I had done two full storylines that I would say I completely oversaw. One was with Chris Jericho for the championship. Chris collaborated with that, offered hugely to it, Tony (Khan) as well, but that was my ‘Week one, week two, week three, week four,'” Rhodes explained via Fightful.
“I was terrified of winning the championship. There is this revisionist history; the last year, I was a bad guy, and they were booing me left and right. Those first two years, and especially those first two months, I was the hottest thing they had, and that was a great spot to be in, but my fear was, ‘If I win the title, I'm abusing this. I'm the Executive Vice President.' My dad, who was the Executive Vice President and Producer of Jim Crockett Promotions, he had won the championship and the people loved it. Later, the industry journalists, that's something they looked at and would judge.”
Now granted, it's not exactly a secret why Rhodes decided to do an angle where, if he didn't win the AEW World Title he would never challenge for it again, or why he decided to lose the match either. With that being said, did Rhodes really only make the decision because he didn't want to be judged negatively by journalists at the time or in the future? Well, yes, but that wasn't the only reason, as Rhodes had even more to say on the subject, including why the call was his “biggest mistake” in AEW.
Not becoming AEW Champion was a big mistake for Cody Rhodes
Continuing his comments, Rhodes noted that the decision to forgo ever challenging for the AEW World Championship, in hindsight, now looks like a massive mistake, as sometimes, wrestling really isn't that complicated.
“I would say it was a huge mistake that I went that route. I was hot, and the fans were happy. In my mind, I didn't want to do it, and we put ourselves in a situation where I could never challenge for it again. It's wrestling, you can go back on it, but I told them, ‘Nope. This is a never go back on. I want to make it clear.' I wanted to make my stories as big as the world title, which is a problem in itself. You might as well be World Champion,” Rhodes noted.
“That story was one I had good control on. I look back and said, ‘Perhaps that decision was a mistake,' but my heart was in the place of where I didn't want fans thinking I was going to abuse this position. From a creative standpoint, it probably would have been fine. Once I was there, I didn't realize how much of a ceiling it would be for fans. ‘I'll do these really great stories that just don't revolve around the title.' Wrestling, at the end of the day, sometimes it's not rocket science. It might just be about the title.”
Often dubbed the “CodyVerse” by wrestling fans for all of the twists, turns, ups, and downs Rhodes pulled as a storyteller without any clear goal at the end, the “American Nightmare” was never really able to achieve his goal of becoming a star on par with the World Title without holding it and ultimately went back to WWE to… challenge for the World Championship. Welp, you have to give it to Rhodes; he's right about one thing: sometimes, it might just be about the title.
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