10 Best Storytellers In Wrestling Right Now

Cody excels at a role thought lost to time: the honest to goodness North American babyface star.

There are other, very popular stars, but most if not all are sublime on a technical level. The reaction is driven through a deep appreciation of their craft, not because they plain like the guy. It's impossible not to like Cody because he crafts such absorbing, believable pro wrestling stories. He's long perfected the purist-purring, old school pace between the ropes. There's such a fire and emotion to his work that transcends the lack of lung-bursting sequences pervasive elsewhere. There's so much more to Cody's work than adrenaline, and excitement, because those matches are enriched weeks and months before the bell rings.

Cody does more to tell his story in a second than the vast majority of his peers can in lengthy verbal segments. With just one affectionate hand on Tony Schiavone's shoulder, he reveals the intimacy of his inner life. There's a real human being in there, a human being who values hard work above all else, a human being whose mother will tell you to go f*ck yourself, if you cross him. Consider the story Cody crafted at Full Gear, and how everybody got over at its powerful conclusion: Jericho looked like a sadistic and tough son of a bitch, cinching in that Liontamer; Cody a badass for not tapping; MJF the "little bastard" for turning his back.

A definitive ending that yielded another long-term programme, the stakes were so rafter-high that most everybody thought Cody had booked himself into a corner, when in fact, he booked his longest Road To yet.

On it, he has drawn out the tension and the stakes so well that people are going to buy a premium-priced pay-per-view, in the streaming age, to witness his vengeance.