When TKO let it be known that WWE was going to run fewer house shows in 2025, it left fans conflicted about the development, from fans in smaller markets all the way up to Cody Rhodes, the top star in the WWE Universe.

While Rhodes doesn't need to appear on every house show per se, as his predecessor, Roman Reigns, certainly didn't, he is still conflicted about the announcement all the same, as he believes there are “pros and cons” to the situation, which he explained on Superstar Crossover.

“Pros and cons. Pro is more time for rest and recovery. Modern WWE with all the medical protocols that exist, in terms of to have the best nutrition, to have the mental clarity and focus to be dialed in physically,” Rhodes noted via Fightful. “We still very much are a, I guess toxic to a degree, there is a vanity element to professional wrestling and sports entertainment. In terms of everyone's preparation, that's a good thing. In terms of being able to get that mental clarity and getting your time at home, but also be able to be locked in on work. To be able to get the best nutrition, the best recovery, especially.”

While Rhodes does make a pretty good point about the pros of WWE taking their performers off of the road a little more often, the “American Nightmare” did say there are pros and cons, so what could the cons be? Well, he spent plenty of time talking about them, too, and they are interesting indeed.

Cody Rhodes believes wrestlers only get better with more in-ring action

Turning his attention to the cons, Rhodes is a firm believes that wrestlers get better by actually wrestling, which will get harder to do if they are on the road less often.

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“The con for me is I only get better at wrestling by wrestling. That's a con for me. How I can mitigate it is that I have the Nightmare Factory where we can wrestle and do things and train. Training for wrestling, I never believed in wrestling schools growing up because the only way you can really do wrestling is by wrestling in front of an audience. You have to do it in front of an audience,” Rhodes noted.

“That will be a challenge for me because I feel like I've slid into the prime of my career, and I feel really great, but I know if I take some steps back in terms of that, I'm going to have to mitigate it some way. I'm going to have to find, ‘How do I train for this if I'm not able to do Saturday-Sunday house shows heading into Monday Night RAW.' I think the majority of the locker room and roster probably looks at it as a great thing, and from a company standpoint, business-wise, it makes the shows when they do come to your city more special versus just being a given. It's mainly pro across the board; I just have to find a way to keep the wrestler in me wrestling.”

Say what you will about wrestlers being on the road for half of the year and routinely working over 100 matches a year, but performers like “Dirty” Dominik Mysterio have gotten markedly better by getting the circuit hard. How will these performers get better now? Working dark matches before RAW or SmackDown?

… yeah, that could work.