Cody Rhodes apparently had to deal with some very real backstage awkwardness after a WWE pre-show suddenly turned into a Roman Reigns vs. Cody debate. The weird part? Cody says they weren’t even wrestling each other that night.
Speaking on The Ebro Laura Rosenberg Show, Cody called out Peter Rosenberg over comments he remembered hearing during a WWE pre-show. Cody likes what Rosenberg brings to WWE, but joked that maybe sitting in on a few meetings wouldn’t hurt before he starts accidentally creating stories backstage.
“One of the beautiful things about having Mr. Rosenberg as part of our WWE family is he brings a genuine love for what we do.
But I also think he could benefit from being in the meetings every now and then and hearing about, like, maybe where we’re going, where we’re not going to go.”
Cody said he was sitting in the locker room watching the pre-show when Rosenberg suddenly brought Roman into the whole “QB1” conversation. In Cody’s memory, Rosenberg suggested Roman was pissed about Cody calling himself QB1 and that the night would somehow determine who really held that spot.
“Every now and then I’ll be watching the pre-show in the locker room thinking he’s going to say normal stuff. He’s wrestling Gunther and he’s got to look out for the sleeper, and out of nowhere he’ll say something like, ‘Well, Roman Reigns is mad cuz Cody’s been calling himself QB1. Tonight we’ll find out who QB1 is.’
Me and this dude aren’t wrestling each other. We’re not on the same — same. So now you’ve set it off where there’s literal, like, tension backstage over a thing that was said by someone who works for us and wasn’t there and didn’t even know.
And I thought, what a distraction. Just distraction.”
That apparently wasn’t just Cody getting annoyed at something he heard on television. According to him, the comment created “literal” tension backstage because suddenly there was a Roman-versus-Cody conversation happening when there wasn’t supposed to be one. Rosenberg immediately defended himself, though, saying, “That wasn’t exactly what I said, though.” Cody basically responded that whatever the exact wording was, Rosenberg had still taken the conversation somewhere it wasn’t supposed to go.
“Whatever you said, we weren’t on the same planet.”
Rosenberg then explained his version. He remembered talking about Roman’s match and mentioning that Cody considers himself WWE’s QB1, but insisted he wasn’t trying to manufacture some secret beef between the two.
“There had been a lot of conversation about Roman’s match that night, and don’t forget Cody is QB1. He always sees himself as the guy, and he’s going to prove it tonight. I swear to you.”
Cody wasn’t exactly thrilled in the moment. He revealed that he texted Rosenberg afterward with a pretty straightforward question.
“And I texted you. I was like, ‘What are you doing out there?’”
Instead of going back, watching the clip and turning it into a bigger issue, Cody decided to leave it alone. When he saw Rosenberg later on the post-show, he deliberately tried to smooth things over.
“I thought, and I don’t know if you recall, I came to the post-show later and saw you. I thought, I’m not going to look at it and I’m not going to bother with it at all. I’m going to be very nice. I put my arm around you. I wanted to just let’s put the boat back going the right direction.”
The bigger headache was what happened outside the locker room. Cody pointed out that Roman and Cody already have two extremely passionate fan bases, so throwing QB1 into the conversation basically gave everyone another excuse to start fighting over who WWE’s real top guy is.
“But you’ve got the most aggressive fan bases ever who cannot agree about anything now going to war when we weren’t wrestling each other that evening. So in a way it was fun, but it’s also distracting from what the story is.”
Cody wasn’t telling Rosenberg to become a WWE robot either. He actually thinks Rosenberg’s value comes from having his own voice and approaching wrestling as someone who was a fan long before he started appearing on WWE programming.
“You speak for the fans and you speak from where you came from. You didn’t just show up on WWE as a WWE guy. You have your own equity and your own career which they need to hear your voice. We can’t wash you out.”
Still, Cody clearly remembers the QB1 situation because of how quickly one pre-show comment turned into a headache behind the curtain. Roman and Cody weren’t fighting over the top spot that night, but apparently just suggesting they were was enough to make things uncomfortable.
Do you think Cody Rhodes had a point about the Roman Reigns comments creating an unnecessary distraction, or was Peter Rosenberg just doing his job on the pre-show? Let us know what you think in the comments.
This transcript was produced exclusively for Ringside News from the original recording. Republishing the transcription in full is prohibited. When using excerpts, provide prominent credit and a link to this article.
