10 Times Wrestlers Secretly Went Undercover In Other Companies
4. Ricky Starks Gets Snapped Backstage (WWE Royal Rumble 2023)
The partisan tribalism that encompasses modern professional wrestling is what ruins it.
No longer can friends support friends, no longer can fans enjoy a healthy, balanced wrestling landscape, no longer can you open Wrestling Twitter without seeing @AEWSuckz69 trolling WWE supporters and vice versa - and no longer can you enjoy legitimate surprises like this.
Returning to WWE at the Royal Rumble after six months on the injured shelf, Cody Rhodes ultimately won the men's titular match from the number 30 slot. It was an emotional evening for Rhodes that also had AEW's Ricky Starks watching on from afar.
A still from what appears to be the Alamodome's surveillance footage was leaked on social media following the show, with both Cody and Ricky having since addressed the matter. Starks, in particular, has remained vehement that an event in which he supported a close friend was turned into an issue of tribalism amongst fans, as he explained on the Swerve City Podcast (h/t Fightful):-
“What y’all do care about is where I go in my off time and what other pay-per-views I show up at. Leave me alone. You gotta have real friends. Support real friends. The picture is great. It’s so good. I look so jacked, like I’m about to rob a bank.”
Cody Rhodes was Ricky Starks' debut opponent in AEW, as Starks answered the weekly TNT Championship open challenge issued by then-champion Rhodes on Dynamite's 17 June 2020 billing.