After this past Saturday night’s AEW Fight For The Fallen PPV Event went off the air, All Elite Wrestling Executive Vice President Cody Rhodes took part in a media scrum. He talked about this past Saturday night’s show having a runtime of about 4 hours and 20 minutes. Rhodes also talked about what it felt like to tag with his brother in the main event.
Rhodes also discussed possibly having a rubber match with NWA Worlds Heavyweight Champion Nick Aldis somewhere down the line, among other things.
Below are the highlights from the media scrum with Rhodes;
On what it meant to tag with his brother and have his family in attendance at the show: “It’s heavy. It’s a heavy feeling, there’s no words. Dustin and I, we don’t get along in terms of like — we love each other, you know. I don’t know if you’ve got a brother, or anybody’s got a brother. We love each other very much, so these moments that are in this entertainment world we live in, they’re real to us. I know that sounds crazy, it’s all real, but those moments are even more particularly just potent for me. To be able to share the ring with him, I mean he’s just so good. So good. And it’s just, I wanna keep doing these reunions because they never get old to me. It’s fun to see my oldest sister’s kids, her husband, my sister Tiel, my mother, the family, like, it’s just crazy.”
On if there’s any chance of a rubber match with Nick Aldis: “Gosh, uh, Nick Aldis is amazing. In that moment in Chicago, I thought, ‘Oh man, there’s no way we can top that.’ That’s like my hometown now. That crowd, that Sears Center, and really just like goosebump-inducing moment that we got to share, him and I. So I don’t know, you never know. I wanted to take that [NWA] title further, and further. And then, you know. The politics of this all deemed that not possible. So at this point, solely focused on AEW, the young men and women as part of AEW. And if that’s something that comes up, I’m absolutely open to it. Our doors are very open. We’re not shy about that, they’re very open. We literally want to work with everybody. But in the interests of that, we’re focused on this brand. Because we’re heading to TNT, we talked about it. This is our brand, and our team, a damned good team. So, who knows?”
On the show’s four-hour length and if that will be standard for AEW shows: “Long, huh? You’re saying it was a little long? … It’s not a spoiler necessarily, but the show on TNT will be two hours. So, we’re a little bit backwards, as far as we want to give these mega-events before we get to the weekly show. Which will also be treated as a mega event, but the times are different. So I guess the way to look at it is we have all these guys and girls that we signed, and we don’t want to do four-minute matches. I don’t believe in them. We want guys to go out there, play their music. That’s why we hired you. We’re not here to teach you how to do it. Maybe guide you. That’s Dean Malenko’s job, that’s Jerry Lynn’s job. I want you for what we got you for. So, little lengthy this evening. But here’s my takeaway from it all. At the end of the night, nobody left. And I’ll tell you the truth, if anybody went to the Ring of Honor shows with the Bullet Club and The Elite was on at the end of the night, that’s what started all of this. Us in there, going, ‘What do we do?’ Like, ‘How do we send them home happy?’ Marty sings, or Kenny says something, or damn, we came up with a thousand things, but that genuine feeling is a real connection to the people. It’s not even a marketing tactic, man. It’s a real — AEW is everybody who was in the arena tonight.”
On holding the show in Jacksonville where it all began: “Everything about AEW has sounded ridiculous. Everything. ‘Hey, we’re gonna start a wrestling company.’ [whistles] ‘Pump the brakes, that’s tough.’ ‘Hey, the four of you — Matt, Nick, Kenny — you guys are gonna run it. And I’m the owner of the Jacksonville [Jaguars].’ All this stuff sounds so ridiculous. But it’s real, it’s real. So absolutely, the roots are deep here. Like, I got wrestling roots here because of Dusty. AEW’s roots are here. I mean, if we had a home, this is one of them, you know? Atlanta, here, Chicago. This is where so much work gets done. And for Tony to be able to go out there and produce a show in this amphitheater, and his dad to be there? I’ll tell you one of the selling points, and he doesn’t have to sell himself to me, but of course we vet each other. He vets me, I vet him, this is before we started. That connection with him and his dad, ooh. Reminds me exactly how I was with Dusty, and it’s just super-special to see. And I could tell he really wanted to — yeah, he wanted to impress all the fans, but you know just like I want to impress my mom, you know. It’s a special thing. So we had a ring, I want to come back when it’s cooler. We probably won’t be here the same time next year. But it’s very, very special.”
You can check out Cody Rhodes’ full comments in the video below:
