Cody Rhodes Injury Update Ahead Of WWE Backlash 2024

With Cody Rhodes set to defend the Undisputed WWE Championship against AJ Styles at WWE Backlash this weekend, many have questioned whether the American Nightmare suffered an injury on last week's SmackDown.

Serving as the first night of the 2024 WWE Draft, that SmackDown saw Carmelo Hayes drafted to the blue brand and gave Him the chance to face Rhodes in the show's main event. While Cody picked up the win, there was some concern over the second-generation star picking up a shoulder injury, with Rhodes clearly favouring his shoulder during the final moments of the match.

Speaking on Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer noted that Cody isn't listed internally as injured and that the belief is that if there is an issue, it's only a minor one.

As Meltzer explained:

"He's not listed as injured. They never mentioned it on [Raw], so it's not a worked injury either. It's not like some storyline because it was never mentioned."

When Observer Radio co-host Bryan Alvarez pointed out how Cody was completely absent from Raw, Meltzer added:

"It's the main event on the pay-per-view. I would think that if they were doing a storyline, they'd mention it. They showed all kinds of clips from SmackDown, and they never addressed it. I would say that if it was going to be addressed as a storyline, it would have been addressed [on Raw].

Concluding on this matter, the Observer founder noted:

"I was told it was not listed as an injury, a real injury. So, whatever it was, it might be something minor, it might be nothing at all. It's probably nothing at all significant."

If there is indeed an injury at play for Cody Rhodes - either for real or in a kayfabe sense - one would think it'd have to be addressed on this week's SmackDown. As it stands, though, it appears that the Undisputed WWE Champion is fine to still face AJ Styles in Lyon, France on Saturday at Backlash.