10 WWE Nightmares Vince McMahon MUST Regret Booking
2. You’ll Play Stardust And Like It!
Speaking of poor casting, it's Rhody Codes!
Keeping Cody locked under the face paints as Stardust was a rotten idea. It left one hell of a talent disillusioned, and Rhodes eventually left WWE in 2016. From there, he had a merry old time on the independent circuit before going on to help form AEW.
It's not out of the question to suggest that a happy Cody, sans Stardust and pushed properly, would've stayed put. In short, All Elite Wrestling as everyone knows it might never have even created had Vince just agreed to let him shed the Goldust-lite gimmick. That's a powerful thought.
In a way, McMahon aided the creation of his own competition by driving one of his own wrestlers to the brink. In retrospect, he'd surely view that as a botch. Yes, Cody is a much better performer now than he was in 2016, but his potential was obvious to anyone not named Vincent Kennedy McMahon.