1. He Paid To Redesign The WWE Intercontinental Title
On August 9, 2011, Cody Rhodes captured his first WWE Intercontinental Title. After defeating Ezekiel Jackson on Smackdown (the program aired on August 12) he went on to have a lengthy reign with the belt. All in all, Cody held the Intercontinental Title for over 200 days, before dropping it to The Big Show at WrestleMania XXVIII. Looking for something to help make his title run stand out, Rhodes pitched the idea of redesigning the Intercontinental belt itself. Initially, WWE management didn't pay much attention to what Cody was saying, so he decided to take matters into his own hands. Paying to have the belt redesigned himself, Rhodes presented it to WWE top brass backstage before a Smackdown taping. Thankfully, Vince McMahon and others liked what they were seeing, and decided to keep the new belt. The old one was put into storage, and Cody's redesign remains to this day. The white strap helps to set it apart from the old black one, which had been there for years. Cody clearly did a good job with the redesign and it took guts to make a creative decision like that by himself. It's unclear whether or not Rhodes was reimbursed by WWE for putting the money up for the new design, however...