10 Things We Learned From American Nightmare: Becoming Cody Rhodes

7. Why NXT Was “Maddening” To Him

Cody Rhodes Documentary
WWE.com

Countless members of WWE's current roster viewed Dusty Rhodes as a mentor during their NXT days. Seth Rollins, Roman Reigns, Bayley, Kevin Owens and many others have gone on record to describe Dusty as akin to a father figure, and... that always bugged the sh*t out of Cody.

The 'Dream' wasn't chuffed with WWE's treatment of Cody as Stardust back between 2014-2015, and he'd actively encouraged his son to quit if he wasn't happy either. The worst thing about all of this to Cody? NXT's young "Dusty kids" like Rollins and Reigns were heating up, and here he was playing a watered down version of Goldust without experiencing even half the success.

In the doc, Cody likened that to his dad having a baseball team but telling him he wasn't allowed to play. Triple H then kinda half-heartedly defended the Stardust idea by saying WWE cares more about the overall brand than individuals. Fair enough, but everyone thought the gimmick was rubbish by 2015.

No wonder Cody was miserable.

In this post: 
Cody Rhodes
 
Posted On: 
Contributor

Lifelong wrestling, video game, music and sports obsessive who has been writing about his passions since childhood. Jamie started writing for WhatCulture in 2013, and has contributed thousands of articles and YouTube videos since then. He cut his teeth penning published pieces for top UK and European wrestling read Fighting Spirit Magazine (FSM), and also has extensive experience working within the wrestling biz as a manager and commentator for promotions like ICW on WWE Network and WCPW/Defiant since 2010. Further, Jamie also hosted the old Ministry Of Slam podcast, and has interviewed everyone from Steve Austin and Shawn Michaels to Bret Hart and Trish Stratus.