Cody Rhodes wants his debut performance at WarGames to be remembered for all the right reasons.
The American Nightmare will step inside the double cage for the first time ever having never previously competed in either a WWE WarGames or AEW’s take on the match; Blood and Guts.
A creation from the mind of his late, great father Dusty Rhodes, Rhodes being a participant in the match will arguably mean more to him than the other competitors.
While appearing on Busted Open Radio, The American Nightmare discussed how his father’s influence is still seen in wrestling today and also credited Triple H with modernising the match in the current era:
“I really want to almost, like, wax poetic about it in terms of how it’s Dusty’s and it was his creation,” Rhodes said. “But everything is, like, coming up Dusty these days. I’ve told people this before. I thought as time went on and, you know, I got older, they would know less, but he’s just everything. He touched everything, especially on the way out.
So to be able to do this is great, but I can’t think of it in that sense because really I’m thinking about the match itself, what Hunter, Triple H, has changed [about] the match, and if there is anybody who had the right to change the match, it was him because of Dusty and his relationship.
With WarGames being a multi-man cage match, some competitors are naturally more suited to the environment than others. Rhodes is aware of this and does not want to be, in his own words, the J.J. Dillon of the team:
“But I don’t want to be the weak link in this thing. Everyone who watches WarGames knows that there’s a weak link, and there’s always somebody who’s standing out. Back in the day, it was a little obvious. You see J.J. Dillon there and you know, ‘He’s the one they gotta protect.’ But these guys I’m in there with, some of them have WarGames experience, so I’m really following that lead.”
Cody Rhodes looks to have a repeat performance of the last time that he had a match inside a cage, where The American Nightmare defeated Seth Rollins inside Hell in a Cell in a 5* performance.
Cody Rhodes has backup for WarGames
The WarGames match is traditionally a 5vs. 5 affair. However, there are only 8 competitors officially announced for the match at Survivor Series between Team Rhodes and Team Judgment Day. As seen on the November 13th edition of Raw, Judgment Day seems to have found its 5th member as Drew McIntyre aligned with the group. Addressing that his team is at a disadvantage, Cody Rhodes hinted that he has also recruited some help when Raw went off the air.
H/t to Wrestling Inc.