Undisputed WWE Champion “The American Nightmare” Cody Rhodes appeared on The Ariel Helwani Show to discuss various topics, including WWE Hall of Famer AJ Styles stating that he needs a break.
Rhodes said, “I actually didn’t know AJ said that. That’s — I mean, I think it’s okay to say now. When I wrestled AJ after WrestleMania 40 — I jumped into a program with AJ Styles. We wrestled at Backlash in front of wrestling’s greatest crowd, and then we had another one in Scotland. AJ Styles was incredibly generous, and he wasn’t even on the way out. Incredibly generous on his final tours that he was doing with me, and what I needed to be doing. ‘Should I be at the monitor? Should I be giving a speech at the end of the shows?’ All the things that no one could teach me other than someone who had been there before, and that was AJ. So AJ very much fills a big brother role.”
On the notion he should take a break:
“I think it’s safe to say from the outside, ‘Cody should take a break.’ It’s been advised across the board. But also — let me put it to you this way. There are guys who do take breaks. And I’m not mad at anyone who takes breaks, and they get to go and get in incredible shape, or go do a project or get healthy, whatever the heck it is that they’re doing. They get to do that, and they come back and they’re fresh, and they get that big reaction on the first night. But then it settles back into what it was. If others are doing that — and I heard this from Bobby Roode, and I hope he doesn’t mind his name being mentioned here — well, then it’s my job to be the guy who’s always here. Then it’s my job to be the one who doesn’t leave you. And if that means that things can get a bit stale on occasion, or maybe a better way to put it — not stale, if that means things can get a bit expected, then that’s still a safe place to be. And I liked his outlook on it, and that’s really been my outlook the same is, I need to be the one who’s here all the time until someone else steps into those boots.”
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(H/T to 411Mania.com for transcribing the above quotes)
