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The Bill Simmons Podcast
Euro NBA Thoughts, Plus Cody Rhodes on Being the WWE’s Guy, Leaving AEW, Feuding With John Cena, and the Rules of Kayfabe
02:08:13
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- [00:00]
Cody Rhodes
This episode is brought to you by Wayfair. Your home is more than a space. It's where you express yourself. Like We've all got our game day set up, right? I'm all about the viewing experience and the entertaining, so I got my sofa in optimum viewing position and I got my grill and patio set up for halftime or after the game. Whatever your vibe, Wayfair is the trusted destination for all things home. They've got all your home essentials, storage solutions, decor and more all in one place. Get inspired with room ideas and curated collections, all with everyday ways to save. Shop everything home@wayfair.com with free and easy delivery straight to your door that is W A Y F A I R.com Wayfair every style, every home this episode is brought to you by Michelob Ultra. Cracking open a cold one on a hot summer day is one of the best feelings, but it's even better when it feels like you earned it. Like in a friendly little competition. It's always better when there's something worth playing for. And McLobe Ultra Superior Light Beer is a pretty great prize. I would, I mean, I would be all tennis for Mick Loeb Ultras because that's what I do all summer. Because tennis is an actual sport, unlike pickleball. So tennis, doubles, singles, whatever. Let's play for an ultra. Fill your fridge with Michelob Ultra this summer@doordash.com enjoy responsibly. Copyright 2025 Anheuser Busch Michelob Ultra Light Beer St. Louis, MO the Bill Simmons Podcast Brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network where you can find the rewatchables. We do them on Monday nights. We're doing one day movie month this month for August. August is coming. Robocop is going to be Monday. We're doing all bangers. It's going to be an all banger one day movie month month. I think. I think it's going to be all bangers. Pretty confident in that one, but you can watch that in The Ringer Movies YouTube channel as well. I think Robocop's on Amazon prime for free if you want to want to go check it out. I was just in Chicago for 24 hours. I'm a little delirious. I'm too old to fly. I don't know how the NBA players do it flying back to Chicago. It's like four hours. Got up super early yesterday, then flew back today. But I was at the the national the Sports Collectors Convention looking for stuff really for this studio. I put it on My Instagram. I found one thing I was really excited about. This Bull Durham tobacco sign. I got. But I got. Got a couple other good things too. That when I'm gonna do a studio tour on here, I'll do like five minutes explaining a lot of the choices. But. But it was really fun to go back to the collectors convention. I had not been since COVID and it's just massive now. And weirdly, there's less eclectic stuff than ever and just more old baseball cards from the 50s, 60s and 70s. I have no idea who's buying. Who under 40 years old is like out there looking for like a Stan Musial card. I don't get it.
- [03:05]
Bill Simmons
But.
- [03:06]
Cody Rhodes
But I had a great time. I was looking for all kinds of things for the background for hair, but just in general, I was looking for basketball cards. Ten minutes to go. I found this amazing item. Hold on. So this is from 1924. It's a holy Cross football doll. I'm pretty sure it's not a voodoo doll. I'm not positive yet. We'll find out, I guess if. If anything crazy happens to me. But it says HC back when Holy Cross used to be really good at football. Found this with 10 minutes to go with the show. You never know. I got a bunch of good stuff. But this is obviously. I think I had this in the 80s on the back. It has all the championships. This was the 86, my favorite team. Needless to say, I have a spot in the studio for it right behind the guest head. It's going to be really good. Very fun to go to the collectors convention. The big piece I bought was this Bull Durham tobacco thing. You can see oj, the OJ piece behind me. The juices on the loose. So that's gonna be a staple of the studio. But I wanted a couple more things like that. Anyway, thank you for your patience with the studio. I know it sounds a little echoey. We're gonna work on all this. The lighting is gonna be really good. We're in the exhibition season. I think by the time we get to football season, it's gonna be absolutely awesome. So I'm excited about that. Less excited about the Boston Red Sox, who last time I checked, had a chance to be like a pretty interesting playoff team with. With the amount of bats they have, maybe they weren't going to win the World Series. But I really have enjoyed this season. Crochet. We have an ace. Roman Anthony. Best young Red Sox player I think I've seen since Nomar Garcia Pera in 97 you might want to throw Mookie in there, but I don't even think Mookie was as confident as Roman Anthony is this first year. It's nuts. They just have a Bregman's back. They have a likable team. Rafael has been really. He's cooled up a little bit, but he's been really good. But it's the kind of team where it's like, man, if this team got a number two starter, they'd be really one more bullpen arm. They'd be really interesting. So what do they get? They got Steven Matz and Dustin May. The Dodgers, who are trying to win a World Series, would like take them. The Red Sox were first in payroll in 2013, the second to last time they won the World series. They were third in 2018. They were fifth in 2021, the last time they made a real playoff run since then. 12th, 11th, 18th and 9th. Which doesn't make sense when you consider all the other teams that spend a lot of money are these big market teams that used to be like the Red Sox, the Yankees, the Mets, the Dodgers, and on the other hand, the Spenway Sports Group, which owns. They own Liverpool Soccer, they own Penguins, a whole bunch of stuff. But Liverpool has just been buying. I mean, they're like a drunk guy at 2 in the morning, just buying cheeseburgers and pizza, just buying everybody, trying to get everybody. And then the Red Sox get Dustin May and Stephen Matz. I'm still going to watch this Red Sox team. You're not driving me away this time. The Mookie bets. I lost four years of my Red Sox life. And, and, and you're not doing again. I like watching these guys. You can try to drive me away. Terrible Red Sox owners. It's not going to work. I'm still here. One other thing I had for you. There's been some stuff written this week about the NBA's ambitious foray into Europe with the Euro League. The opportunity is that Real Madrid and FC Barcelona in the Euroleague have not re upped. They have. Their licensing deal is expiring in 2026, and they're basically become free agents. Adam Silver's been intrigued by this forever, I feel like. And that there's been some reporting about this too. I feel like the league is cooling off on expansion for the NBA and kind of looking abroad at this Europe thing as a real opportunity. And Adam's out there with his crew, meeting with all of these possible investors with some soccer teams. Here's the opportunity. Paris, growing market with Wimby London, completely untapped. Like they don't even have like a regular Euro league team. They have to like play their way in with the results. There's these massive soccer clubs that want to grow their footprint in basketball. So you have that too. So what's the NBA offering? Well, from what I've heard and from what's been reported, it's probably a 10 team league, but they could get away with eight. Maybe you grow it to 12, you get a guaranteed spot in the league, you get the voting rights, you get better TV distribution, better sponsorship, you're not relegated, you don't have to worry about like you know that. I think there's 12 teams in the Euroleague that are in there, but there's another six that you can get bounced out or if you don't have a good season. And there would be some sort of link to the NBA, which I think is the key here. Their exhibition games, which I've already announced a bunch of them, Manchester City and Paris. London, maybe a tournament. And I've heard a couple different ideas for this and I don't even know if they decided on what they want to do yet. But you could have maybe in October. You have the two best, three best NBA teams and the three best teams from this NBA Euroleague, they have a little round robin. Maybe it's just champ versus champ, best of three. Maybe it's something in February with all the best teams. There's some sort of synergy thing and it goes beyond just we're going to have some regular season games over there and some exhibition games. I think big picture, 20 years from now, what does this look like? The leagues are probably a little more intertwined. Not too intertwined, but a little intertwined. So they are trying to lock down Real Madrid and FC Barcelona because they can get out of the EUROLEAGUE next year. They have AC Milan, I think pretty much on board. On board. They're owned by Redbird and they don't have a real hoops team attached. The Milan team is Olympia Milano, who's resigned in the early league for the next 10 years. But so AC Milan, count them in in some way. In Paris you could have psg, which is owned by the Qatar Sports Investments, been reported all week that Silver met with them. Paris basketball won the 2024 Euro cup but isn't officially in the Euro League. Maybe you have both of them. London doesn't have like a. As far as I could tell, they don't have a set in stone Euroleague team, the London Lions is the best one They're a little independent, they're owned by Tess, I think it's called Tech company. But you could have the London soccer, one of the Tottenham, Arsenal, Chelsea, any of those, buy one of those teams and launch their own or who knows. You also have Manchester City which has to be mentioned because they're hosting this NBA game randomly. So I'm going to count them in as a possible one. Then he had the two Greek teams. Boy, I'm going to regret trying to say either of these names. Fenerbach, Olympios, maybe I got them. Both of them have notoriously battled the Euroleague over the years. So maybe one of those you have Alba Berlin, which started this whole thing. They're on a one year Euro deal right now and they said they'd joined the NBA already, that kind of got the ball rolling. And then the Athletic today reported that four existing Euroleague franchises already mentioned. Real Madrid, Barca, Barcelona, Asbel, which is in France and then an Istanbul team could all be potential defectors.
- [10:38]
Bill Simmons
Hmm.
- [10:39]
Cody Rhodes
So I think this goes London, Madrid, Barcelona, Milan, Paris, Berlin and Greece as your definite seven that are in this. I think Adam has those seven in his pocket and does maybe doesn't know who the Greece team is yet. Maybe you could add Tony Parker's French team. That's that as well. He's the president of it. You could add the Istanbul team, you could add Manchester City. All of a sudden I'm at 10. Maybe there's an Israel team down the road, maybe there's a third Spain team, who knows? But they could take this right away. And if you look at the way the, the Euro League is, where you, you basically have this ownership, it's called Euroleague Commercial Assets. That's the company that runs the league. You have voting rights on league rules, financials, TV deals, et cetera. And then there's a B license that, that's a one year thing that you got to play your way in based on results and then a C license that's like basically a wild card. They could challenge this. They could offer the sponsorship expertise, better TV deals, they could shoehorn some of the TV stuff into their things. They could do the schedule so that it complements the NBA schedule correctly. And, and I think this is going to be going like I, I like I, I honestly wouldn't be surprised that this was going in the 26, 27 season. And what's really interesting about this, and I mentioned this a couple weeks ago, that I felt like the NBA is drifting against expansion, which was a lock forever until they got $76 billion from the media deal. Then suddenly, you know, need the media money and the teams that, I mean, the owners don't need to give up the media money for expansion fees because they made so much. I think this is the apple of their eye right now. And I think that's why the reports are coming out this week. That's why Adam is very publicly meeting with all of these people. Even though it's private, but it's not. Stuff's leaking out and, and, and I think this is gonna happen in a real way. And what's cool about it. I remember watching a bunch of Luca games when he was playing over there as a 17 year old. I can't remember what team he was on. And the quality play was good, the crowds were great. It was FIFA, so the style of it was, was pretty neat. And it was a good enough product. It was just the players weren't quite good enough and it still felt a little, not rinky dinky, but just compared to the NBA, it just definitely felt second class. I think if you can move that up where it's somewhere between first class and then you could also be a place. This could be a place where you park some of your retiring players. It's like, oh, you're last year. You're going to play for this team and maybe you go there, maybe they change the rules where you could get a little bit of an ownership stake. If you go over for a year. They could do some things with this league that they can't do with the NBA. They could bend the rules and make a little more European. I don't think they would do relegation with it. But some of the ownership stakes stuff, there's, there's a little bit of urgency with it just because of those two. Those two Spanish teams are coming up on their license agreement. I don't think this is a response to the, the Maverick Carter league that he's been trying to start that I talked about a couple months ago. That's a little bit of a different format. It's like an F1 thing. You move from city to city for two weeks. Nobody really seems to think they're going to be able to get the kind of talent that they're bragging that they could get. I just think they're going to get their legs cut off by this Euro League. And I think this is a really, really, really interesting wrinkle I'm thinking about when I'm 75. Could the NBA have like a 45 team league? Who the fuck knows? Will we be able to fly from LA to London in three hours?
- [14:14]
Bill Simmons
I don't know.
- [14:15]
Cody Rhodes
Will you be watching me at a virtual hologram wondering why I'm still doing a podcast?
- [14:19]
Bill Simmons
Maybe.
- [14:21]
Cody Rhodes
But keep an eye on all this. Read all the stories. Joe Varden had one in Athletic today. Like, people are going to start reporting on this. Just follow this because there's a lot of money at stake and I think it's a chance for them to weave in some, some soccer clubs, some Qatar money, some Saudi Arabia, like, so some of the stuff they can't really do with the NBA, they can do overseas. And, and I think, I think it's notable. Okay. Speaking of notable, Cody Rhodes is coming up in a second and he was awesome. We hadn't done a podcast together before he came to my house. We did it in the studio and, and we had a great time. So that's coming up next. Let's take a break and we'll do.
- [15:00]
Bill Simmons
Pearl Jam and then Cody Rhodes.
- [15:28]
Cody Rhodes
All right, we're taping this on a Monday. Cody Rhodes is here. We've never talked on a podcast. I. I feel like we're both members of the bet on yourself club.
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Bill Simmons
Yes.
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Cody Rhodes
You're like an all time bet on yourself guy.
- [15:39]
Bill Simmons
I feel you are too, though.
- [15:40]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah, but I mean, for you, you leave WWE and it's like, what's that guy doing? I remember seeing it from afar going, oh no, where's he? And then it couldn't have worked out better. But it was a bit on yourself staple.
- [15:54]
Bill Simmons
I think part of me, though was also like, oh, no.
- [15:59]
Cody Rhodes
A lot of, well, you were married, right?
- [16:01]
Bill Simmons
But you didn't have a kid, so I was married. It's very important that I was married and to the story because I would always tell people, hey, I'm the one Rhodes who saved his money. So I had 10 years with WWE. I'm good financially. I can make these swings and bet on myself and do this unprecedented stuff I'm going to try and do. But that wasn't entirely true. It became at one point a little bit more. Ooh, we are going check to check. I just bought a house in Denton, Texas. The first house I'd actually bought 10 years into my wrestling career. And that's when I decided to see you by and. And, and where I was going. And some of these shows I was doing, I PWG in California, for example. Yeah, you have to want to be on pwg. It's not a matter of them paying you big money or anything like that. And then certain indies would pay Great rates because you had the WWE name. But then if you wanted to keep going and come back, it was a whole.
- [16:58]
Cody Rhodes
You're flying to Japan too, right? You're doing some Japan stuff from here.
- [17:01]
Bill Simmons
Because at the at I ended up with New Japan, I would come in. I'd only come in for their big shows because they really loved like American Cowboy Wrestler and they'd bring me in. I had the WWE name. They had a lot of respect and reverence for my dad. Yeah, I'd come in like once a month with Japan. And that's was such a fun experience. It's a different type of wrestling, very different style. And so much you can learn. I got to learn a great deal over there.
- [17:27]
Cody Rhodes
You're flying coach over there?
- [17:28]
Bill Simmons
No, no. Well, trying to be honest with myself here.
- [17:33]
Cody Rhodes
I say indie wrestler, let go and go. Just zooming down to Japan.
- [17:37]
Bill Simmons
I think because you're very right in terms of indie wrestler. I was lucky that Atlanta was my home for so long. 10 years with WWE. So every status, the greatest delta status you could ever have. So I used. I was always. My global certificates is what I use. And sometimes you'd have to wait till you're literally scan your boarding pass and they told you, I think it's gonna be you. There's four open. And my wife and I would actually do that at the time, just praying. Cause the other option was a little brutal for sure. Especially if you're wrestling the day you land. Like, ugh.
- [18:10]
Cody Rhodes
So it wasn't. So you did that. I forget what you called it. What was it called? The all in one where you guaranteed, like, I'm gonna sell 10,000. It felt like once you got the 10,000 fans right away to go to the show, I felt like you had momentum. Cause I was falling on the dirt sheets. I was like, oh, this Cody thing might actually. Who knows, who knows how this is going to go for this guy.
- [18:30]
Bill Simmons
I think probably the two really large factors in it all. Going into the All In. This was an independent show by itself. Ring of Honor helped us produce it. But I think the big factors for me was I had the list right when I left. And that was the list of places I wanted to go, things I wanted to do. Nobody had really ever.
- [18:50]
Cody Rhodes
I got nervous when you said you had a list, because lists are very controversial. I was on the edge of my seat for a second.
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Bill Simmons
This was just a list of opponents, list of places. And also, nobody ever quits wwe. You. You end up you. They quit you.
- [19:06]
Cody Rhodes
Well, especially in your early 30s.
- [19:08]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, that's really unusual and a legacy. I had a great relationship with most people. I had had big moments up and down the card, and I just felt where I was at. It was time to move. But I had that list, and the whole purpose of it was to mobilize. Hey, I'm not lying to you when I said, hey, I can do really cool stuff and I can do it better. And I'm gonna go here, I'm gonna go here. And they were all over the map. So that was a huge piece of it. And the other part of it was that underground scene was forming with. You could just see it. For example, wrestlecon is this convention where it's a lot of legends, ex WWE independent talent, things of that nature. It will piggyback off of a big WWE event. Usually. Yeah, we'd go, a group of us, we'd go and notice we had a line around the hallway to the elevator, down the stairs and out the door. And then we'd see one of the legends, God bless him, not have that same effect. So there was just this general underground rumbling that was happening. That's why when the bet came up, somebody saying, hey, nobody can draw 10,000 in America other than WWE, it had been true up until that point. And I think fans felt they wanted to be in on that journey with us. The only way I can describe that original, original event was it just felt like Woodstock, every piece of it. It was just. We didn't know what we were doing, but we were going to fake it. We were going to fake it till we make it. And the event, I mean.
- [20:41]
Cody Rhodes
Well, you had some talented people involved, too. I mean, that was the other thing. There's this whole class of, whatever we're calling this era of wrestling.
- [20:48]
Bill Simmons
Oh.
- [20:48]
Cody Rhodes
Which I. I'm scared constantly for everybody involved, mainly because I'm old.
- [20:52]
Bill Simmons
In terms of the physical, what you're seeing them do.
- [20:55]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah. Because I just. And this has been. We're going back. Yeah, we're going back almost 25, 30 years here. But you just keep raising the bar and raising the bar and raising the bar with the stunts. I mean, mankind was what, late 90s, early 2000s, going through the cage, going.
- [21:10]
Bill Simmons
Through the cage and off the cage.
- [21:12]
Cody Rhodes
The tooth coming through his nose. But there's come some point where it's like, I don't know if we can go any higher, guys, on the ladder jump. And I don't know, it felt like.
- [21:20]
Bill Simmons
We were hitting it in terms of sports and sports entertainment. I feel like one of the things about our game is that danger has just continued to go up in terms of high spots and physical things that you're seeing and unbelievable acrobatics and real Cirque style motions. But it's. It's just evolved that way. It's really at. So at the Nightmare Factory, for example, I, we get so many kids who can do a 6:30, who can do, you know, a Sasuke special. We do so. And it's really great. Once they have that awesome, keep it. You will need it. You know, some of the. You'll hear people today say it's. It's not about the. The moves, it's about the moments. And then you'll hear kind of the old timers talk about storytelling versus the action itself. And the actual truth is it's right in the middle. It's really right in the middle. The modern audience has seen what can be done. And I think that right now WWE is probably at its absolute best. And if they don't know why, they're at their absolute best. That, to me is one of the reasons why you've got the king of storytelling in a sense with say, a Roman Reigns king of storytelling. And you've got a Mr. Heyman behind the scenes and Triple H at the helm. But then you also have guys who are just so unbelievably, if you give them the time, which Triple H gives them the time to go out there and do something physical and impress and steal the spotlight and take it. There's a lot of really special folks, like, for example, Mexico. We were just talking about Mexico City, Monterey at two shows this weekend. WWE now works. You know, we're overseeing AAA or however we're putting it, but that's part of the WWE family now. And to see their level of talent and lucha libre skills in the ring, which is again next level. Two people who are on all in for Pentagon, Phoenix, both of them with WWE now. So to have it all seems to be the ticket to success in the wrestling industry and keeping it successful.
- [23:22]
Cody Rhodes
I'm trying to think of the levels to this because like, I remember when Snuka was. When he was jumping off the top rope and by the way, we didn't have YouTube back then. So when he jumped off the top of the steel cage, which I saw, I thought it was like 25ft. It was like, I don't know, 10.
- [23:39]
Bill Simmons
In your head.
- [23:39]
Cody Rhodes
It was 25.
- [23:40]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [23:41]
Cody Rhodes
But he was one of the first ones, Macho man. And people got a little more airborne, but it really felt like the Hardy Brothers, those guys, when they started pushing in the 2000s, but then we've had this other level of it in the last 10 years where I'm just scared the whole time. I remember thinking like a pile driver. Seems scary. Although that's basically mostly been outlawed, right? The pile driver.
- [24:03]
Bill Simmons
It was outlawed actually at WWE up until Kevin Owens hit me with a package pal driver.
- [24:08]
Cody Rhodes
That was unfair.
- [24:10]
Bill Simmons
Post the original return to Saturday night's main event, which, which by the way.
- [24:14]
Cody Rhodes
Was laid out in this Netflix show, which was incredible.
- [24:17]
Bill Simmons
Which you've seen and I've not seen. Oh, really? Yes. It's unreal. We have not. I know WWE has been saying it's an unprecedented look into our industry.
- [24:27]
Cody Rhodes
Certainly unprecedented.
- [24:28]
Bill Simmons
Apparently it is. Because I, I haven't seen it. I keep hearing it's a really great episode and they, they really did dig in there and, and show a different side or a side people haven't seen it from you of. I don't know what they're afraid of, but I, I, I think it's going to be great. I've heard good things. What did you think?
- [24:46]
Cody Rhodes
I, I mean, I had heard we were going behind the curtain. I was like, yeah, right, it's behind the curtain.
- [24:51]
Bill Simmons
Is it okay?
- [24:52]
Cody Rhodes
It really is. Like, especially talking about the scene of Heel turn is like almost a whole episode and just how that's laid out and whose idea it was, how they kept it a secret.
- [25:05]
Bill Simmons
Oh, man. I'm intrigued.
- [25:09]
Cody Rhodes
I was surprised, but I feel like a lot of people know this anyway. So you're lifting the veil off for. Yeah, very few people. I thought it was really neat. I actually thought it was. It was the stuff I had always wondered about but never knew.
- [25:23]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [25:24]
Cody Rhodes
And then you get to. It gave me new respect for like how much thought you have to put into every aspect of the behind the scenes stuff.
- [25:30]
Bill Simmons
Maybe that's the goal. I know when I.
- [25:33]
Cody Rhodes
You sound like down on it.
- [25:34]
Bill Simmons
No, no, gosh. For me, my whole outlook on it has been seeing these people in a different light. Not Rhea Ripley out there in the ring, not CM Punk out there. Are myself. My whole thought process is if that's endearing to a completely new audience that now wants to come and check out what they do, what we do and see it. For example, if you come to a WrestleMania, if you come to a SummerSlam, you're going to be a wrestling friend for life. Usually. There's always something.
- [26:03]
Cody Rhodes
Well, there's the stages. How old are you? You have one kid or two?
- [26:07]
Bill Simmons
Two. No, one. I'm sorry. One. Sorry. I don't know why I said two. How.
- [26:10]
Cody Rhodes
How old is your. Your kid?
- [26:12]
Bill Simmons
Four. Yeah. Yeah.
- [26:13]
Cody Rhodes
So six is. It's like between five and a half and six. That's when it gets you.
- [26:18]
Bill Simmons
She's been. She came WrestleMania when we were in Sofi.
- [26:22]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [26:22]
Bill Simmons
She was just. Because it was pre bedtime. Because it's a West coast show. So it ran earlier. That's probably my favorite photo ever. Cause I got to go see her, have a moment with her. And just this great photo in front of 70, 80,000 something people right before the first WrestleMania main event I ever got to do. Yeah. It was really special, but unreal. My whole thought process is for new fans that don't know and then they see somebody like Rhea Ripley, for example, or Punk and they want to follow them into the actual. Now I'll watch the actual show. That's how I've always thought it would be a good thing. The veil has been lifted a long time. Certainly there's parts of it that haven't been seen. But kayfabe does not mean what kayfabe used to mean.
- [27:06]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [27:06]
Bill Simmons
And I always tell people, I'll give you a thousand dollars if you can tell me what kayfabe means. If you can actually tell me. Because it's a one word definition and nobody ever gets it. But to me it's all about capturing a new audience. Because I feel the hardcore wrestling fan is. They're pretty much like myself. We're in, we're going through it. I've watched my whole life. I love it. I'll continue.
- [27:28]
Cody Rhodes
It comes a point where you're either in or you're out.
- [27:30]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [27:30]
Cody Rhodes
I don't know what age it is, but it's just you're either. At some point having K helps because it kind of regenerates a lot of it.
- [27:36]
Bill Simmons
Having. Having Liberty's only four, but just seeing her react to like a Bianca Belair.
- [27:42]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [27:42]
Bill Simmons
Because we put Bianca and Clash of Clans as like a skin crossover where you can make the character look like Bianca. And seeing her emulate the hair whip and sing the song a little very much opened my eyes to. I take it so seriously and try to get so nuanced and deep with pro wrestling. And the story I want to tell that night in the ring, it's sometimes not that deep. Sometimes it's just big bombastic fun.
- [28:11]
Cody Rhodes
But that's. That's what was interesting about this show. So I watched. I was with my son. My son's 17. He got sucked in around age 5.
- [28:18]
Bill Simmons
Okay.
- [28:18]
Cody Rhodes
And my wife and daughter were at A concert. So it was just us, and I got the. I got the screener. I'm like, let's watch one of these, see if it's good. And we're watching, and we're all in. We watch all five. But it was the little stuff, like Bianca Belair was asking. I think it was Rhea Ripley. She's like, I really loaded up my ponytail tonight.
- [28:38]
Bill Simmons
You good with that? Yeah, yeah.
- [28:41]
Cody Rhodes
And riri was like, no, no, I'm okay. And she's like, I'm telling you, it's, like, really heavy tonight. Just be ready. And it's like little stuff like that where I was like, wow, that's really interesting that she's worried about the effect of.
- [28:53]
Bill Simmons
Oh, yeah.
- [28:55]
Cody Rhodes
But that's just the kind of stuff you wouldn't think about when you're watching this.
- [28:57]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. Well, also to Rhea Ripley probably totally fine with it, because most wrestlers I know have a weird sense of like.
- [29:05]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah, bring it on.
- [29:06]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. Yeah.
- [29:07]
Cody Rhodes
Nothing.
- [29:07]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. I'm so. It's so toxic.
- [29:10]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [29:10]
Bill Simmons
For example, Cena turning on me. My hands aren't up once on those belt shots. And by standards today, it's like, please put your hands up, please. It's just this weird alpha. Toxic. Like. Yeah, let me. It's. I don't even know how to describe it, but I think.
- [29:26]
Cody Rhodes
Well, you had the craziest one. What did your pectoral ripped off your.
- [29:29]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, this guy over here just went.
- [29:31]
Cody Rhodes
And you just said, fuck it. And you wrestled hell in the cell.
- [29:35]
Bill Simmons
I did.
- [29:36]
Cody Rhodes
And you had, like. I mean, it was kind of gross. It was. Your whole side of your body was purple. Had no idea how hurt you were, but obviously you were really hurt, but what you could do. And it was kind of an amazing match.
- [29:47]
Bill Simmons
It's. I think the idea. So many lies went into making it so that I could get in that ring that night, because I was just refusing to do old school. Hey, let me be laying there backstage. And who did it? I just, like, you get hit by.
- [30:04]
Cody Rhodes
Somebody driving a van with COVID mask on. Who was that?
- [30:07]
Bill Simmons
It was the first main event I'd had with wwe, and Peacock had a bunch of subs, went up on it, and they told me that. And it was hell in the cell with Seth Rollins. This is spinning out of my coming back at WrestleMania.
- [30:20]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah, I screwed up. The backst was like your big moment.
- [30:23]
Bill Simmons
So, yeah, I'm back. And what I said all along is, hey, I can be in the main event. I can. I can handle it, and I can be in it, and I Can do well for you guys. So this was my first main event and here I am. Oh, I'm going to have to go away. I wanted to at least give them something to remember me by.
- [30:38]
Cody Rhodes
And is that some son of a wrestler shit, though? Like where?
- [30:41]
Bill Simmons
Oh, big time, big time.
- [30:42]
Cody Rhodes
Like you kind of grew up in the world and you just kind of understand differently that there's a different level of respect with but going through an injury like that.
- [30:50]
Bill Simmons
But here's the thing. It's son of, it's son of a wrestler for sure. However, had my dad been alive, he wouldn't have let me wrestle. Really. Because my dad didn't look at me like a wrestler. My dad wanted me to be an actor and thought I was.
- [31:01]
Cody Rhodes
Oh, you're like Michael Corleone. He disappointed you. He had a family business.
- [31:05]
Bill Simmons
He legit. He was, he was very happy when I got into it. But my dad just babied. I'm the baby of my family. Severely babied me and just took care of me in the greatest way. I I to me, greatest dad ever. But if all the other old school wrestlers were like, yeah, that's it right there. That's. That's old school. All of he would have been the one to be like, that's the dumbest thing I've ever seen. Why did you do that? So I. Part of it was old school wrestler. And really, again, like I said, I lied on the way I kept it. So the information was true. WWE's doctors looked at me and said, he can't hurt it any worse. That was true. Couldn't hurt any worse. But also.
- [31:45]
Cody Rhodes
But it didn't mean it hurt it.
- [31:46]
Bill Simmons
That was the part. Yeah. I was like, oh, I'm good, I'm good.
- [31:49]
Cody Rhodes
And was there a moment like 15 minutes in where you're like, shoot me in the head. This is the worst idea I've ever had.
- [31:55]
Bill Simmons
It's probably two minutes in.
- [31:56]
Cody Rhodes
Okay.
- [31:57]
Bill Simmons
Because I hadn't done anything. And so it, it attacked detaches here by my armpit.
- [32:04]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [32:04]
Bill Simmons
The other part is connected to your collarbone. Right. So when the detach here, it just falls. It's, there's nothing there anymore. However, it would cramp up into the collarbone spot. So anytime you did anything, it would cramp up. It was giant. It literally is sticking out this much. And when that happened, it hurt more than anything.
- [32:22]
Cody Rhodes
Did you feel like your collarbone was.
- [32:23]
Bill Simmons
Just going to come out of your body?
- [32:24]
Cody Rhodes
Explode.
- [32:25]
Bill Simmons
You're going to literally explode. That was the only thing for me where I thought, oof, and also, everyone was under the impression, oh, they're going to go like, six minutes. It's fine. It's not going to be much.
- [32:35]
Cody Rhodes
That match was awesome.
- [32:36]
Bill Simmons
You're in there with Seth Rollins. There's nobody better. And we like, 25 minutes. There's tables involved. He pulls out a toolbox. At one point, we just went for it because, again, wanted them to have something to remember me by.
- [32:49]
Cody Rhodes
I was.
- [32:49]
Bill Simmons
I was. I hate saying it, but I was really ashamed. I'd never been hurt.
- [32:53]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [32:53]
Bill Simmons
And then I finally got to the spot and I got hurt. Like, he's. He's in here and, you know, Nick and Triple H and all these guys saying, hey, we're. You're right, Cody, we're going to go all in on you now. And then I. I felt like I'd blown it, so I wasn't going to do. I wasn't going to leave that spot that night without at least leaving a very large mark on, hopefully the fans.
- [33:15]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah. You're like, I've come this far. This is.
- [33:18]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [33:19]
Cody Rhodes
What's seven year odyssey to get back here to this moment? I'm not. I'm not leaving now.
- [33:24]
Bill Simmons
I think in my documentary, I said, it's a peck well spent. You know, like, it's. It's just a peck. And, you know, something crazy about the pec surgery. Dr. Dugas did my surgery, and he's done, like, so many great athletes and wrestlers, but right before. Right before the surgery, he goes, you know, this is mainly a cosmetic surgery. And I said, what? He goes, yeah, plenty of people don't repair it, and they're. They aren't fine. I'm like, I don't want to sit out for, yeah, six months for cosmetics reasons, and then the next thing you know, you're out. And, like, I'm like, well, no, he's.
- [33:58]
Cody Rhodes
Just trying to make you feel better.
- [33:59]
Bill Simmons
I think he was, because I was like, I don't know. I was told this was very serious, sir. But, yeah, he said that right before it happened.
- [34:03]
Cody Rhodes
You're healthy now, though, right?
- [34:04]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. That's the only injury I've had the entire time I've been doing this.
- [34:07]
Cody Rhodes
Because you're right. You're right in that Wrestler prime. Wrestler prime's like, do you know the exact age? I would say it's like late 30s into, like the 42, 43 range, because you have enough. I would say, enough experience.
- [34:18]
Bill Simmons
It's 35 to 42.
- [34:20]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [34:21]
Bill Simmons
You hit it.
- [34:21]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah. And now your mic skills are gonna be the best. They've ever been 35 to 4?
- [34:26]
Bill Simmons
You nailed it though.
- [34:26]
Cody Rhodes
But it's like, it's honestly like a standup comedian or something. If you're a stand up comedian, you're going to clubs for 10 years perfecting how to feel in front of whatever crowd you're doing, how to have heckers bounce off you, everything. And then you kind of figure out who you are and what your act is.
- [34:44]
Bill Simmons
The big thing is who you are and how you can handle every situation. And what you do is stand up. Comedy is such a great parallel because what you do in a live setting. We were in Mexico City two nights ago and we did this spot where bad guys are beating up my partner on the outside. And they did it so many times that I used to watch Undertaker do this thing when I was the bad guy. Undertaker come down on the floor. He'd snap the chair together where the whole crowd could hear it. So just the acoustic of oh. And then he'd chase us around the ring. But nothing actually happened. It was such a less is more situation. And I got to do it the other night. And it was just something that we felt in the moment and trusted the crew would know what's happening. You hear that chair, you better run. Otherwise I have to hit you with it. And I felt so great. Cause he actually was there at the show watching it. It's like, all right, you've passed on this knowledge and we can do things like that now, you know.
- [35:38]
Cody Rhodes
This episode is brought to you by mtv. Everything you know about the challenge is about to change. To win it all, iconic challenge vets will have to work with an elite set of new threats. Will they be able to forge a new challenge legacy as a team? Or will the new threats turn on the vets and take them down? America's longest running great sports franchise is back. The challenge vets and new threats all new Wednesdays at 8, 7 Central on MTV. This episode is brought to you by Yahoo. Fantasy. Fantasy football is back. Fire up the group chat. Get those draft boards ready and buckle up. For a season filled with breakouts, busts, overreactions and more. It's all happening with Yahoo. Fantasy. This year. I'm playing on Yahoo. Fantasy and you should too. We are doing a big, big, big ringer draft at the end of August. It is head to head bragging rights. There's going to be a little 10th place team gets get some sort of fun punishment. We are going all out. Yahoo fantasy dropping 28 big new features over 28 days. Giving you more ways to play drafted Win and you can be like us. It all begins August 4th. Stay tuned and get started by creating or joining at Yahoo. Fantasy Football league today@yahooFantasy.com Simmons. There's two ways wrestling's gotten better since the heyday of your dad, one of the great wrestlers of all time. I don't know where he ranks in. See, if we had, like, first take for wrestling, we would just constantly argue about, is this guy better than Dusty Rhodes? Where does he rank between Hogan and.
- [37:01]
Bill Simmons
I feel like I want to pull every time. Media. A lot of the really great media moments that you'll go on and talking to really excellent people always ask the question, what's your Mount Rushmore? And I don't like it. I say, I don't think people realize. I basically say a different one each time. I'm waiting for someone to be like, oh, this guy's full of shit.
- [37:25]
Cody Rhodes
So you just do different form. That's a good word. I like that.
- [37:27]
Bill Simmons
Because how. How can you do that? There's so many eras of wrestling, so many different. And when hardcore fans start breaking in on technical stills, on promos, I guess that's better than just saying, here's the four. And then you get into the situation where it's. You just have to be really generic and be like, well, pro wrestling is about drawing money. So, okay, here they are. We've heard those four before. You know, like, it's.
- [37:51]
Cody Rhodes
You know what it's like. It's like, actors are like this because in basketball it's easier because you actually can come up with a list that's going to look mostly like somebody else's list, right? LeBron and Jordan and Russell, and there's like, certain guys at the top. I think when I think about wrestling lists or actor lists or comedian lists, it's almost more like, who, if you start talking about it, who has to be at least in the conversation as you're talking about it. And it doesn't have to be like 7, 4, 10. But like, Hogan clearly has to be on it, right? Stone Cold, your dad.
- [38:24]
Bill Simmons
So it's so funny.
- [38:26]
Cody Rhodes
It's like a short list, but you kind of know who's on the list. And everybody's list can be different, but everybody's gonna have the same five people.
- [38:33]
Bill Simmons
I just did there. I don't. There's a documentary on Hogan that was coming out, and I did the interview a month ago, and I actually kept saying. I'm like, well, from the business standpoint, your one and twos of. Of that time period up until recently, the one and twos were very clearly Hulk, Steve Austin, so you could interchange them. And up until recently, because we've been blessed that we're breaking all these records. So we'll see how.
- [38:59]
Cody Rhodes
If you're talking about one guy just selling out arenas everywhere who has a dramatic impact and it didn't matter whether they have the title or not. See, Andre has to be on that, too. Andre didn't even need the title.
- [39:11]
Bill Simmons
So you're probably definitely right with Andre. The only issue with Andre, it's a similar issue, I find, with my father, is the data isn't there succinctly. You know, Meltzer certainly tries to do a good job putting data together. Shoemaker, he. Yeah, a lot of people can look at it, but so much of it is lore, and so much of it is fantasy. And there are 60,000 people. There probably was, but now we're really. I mean, the fire marshal is going to tell you how many tickets we actually sold. It's. It's way easier to track now these days. And so I feel like a lot of it gets lost to the lore and part of me. If you've ever seen the movie Big Fish, where. If Big Fish is. That's like my childhood.
- [39:54]
Cody Rhodes
It sounds familiar.
- [39:55]
Bill Simmons
Big fish is Ewan McGregor, right?
- [39:57]
Cody Rhodes
Oh, yeah.
- [39:57]
Bill Simmons
Did I get that right?
- [39:58]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [39:58]
Bill Simmons
Is it Ewan McGregor? I'm sitting here saying it's one of my favorite movies. Yes. But the. The end. The end is. That's the. That's the moral is all these tales he heard growing up that he thought, oh, they're just tales. And then at the. You know, not to spoil it for anybody, but the funeral, you find out, oh, oh, my gosh. Such. So many of these things were real. So I like to think, like, Andre, you're probably very right. And Andre, certainly. I've got books in my basement booking journals from late 70s, early 80s. Yeah. Great stuff. And if you flip them open, there's the card, there's how much money they made, there's how much they made the last time. And then typically on some of these, it will say, andre coming in, Battle Royal. And then you'll flip to where next year, Andre. And always up. Always up. He truly was. You had to come and see him, you know, And Gorgeous George was the first ever to do that.
- [40:52]
Cody Rhodes
And San Martino was like that.
- [40:53]
Bill Simmons
Oh, my gosh. Yeah, Bruno.
- [40:56]
Cody Rhodes
There's some people that had really nice short runs, though. Like, I still feel like Sergeant Slaughter and Iron Sheik was one of the great feuds of the entire last 50 years. And it was only like three, four months, but it really mattered. And the crowds went absolutely fucking bonkers with the USA versus Iran stuff.
- [41:14]
Bill Simmons
Sergeant Slaughter is, I feel, really underrated.
- [41:19]
Cody Rhodes
100%.
- [41:20]
Bill Simmons
He's got a street fight with Pat Patterson in the Garden.
- [41:24]
Cody Rhodes
Oh, that's. It was like Match of the Year.
- [41:25]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [41:26]
Cody Rhodes
Pre.
- [41:26]
Bill Simmons
And you have to. If I told my students about that today, they'd. No clue. Even the people I'm talking about, they wouldn't know Pat. I don't think they'd know Sarge. But I do have a selfish little Sarge moment that I. You would be the first person I've shared it with. But it was. I mean, it gave me goosebumps. Unbelievable. Made me feel so good. And also made me feel like, oh, man, I hope he's right. But we're standing there for the 10 bell salute for the Hulkster, and I'm standing next to Sarge.
- [41:57]
Cody Rhodes
I saw him out there. I was excited to see him.
- [41:58]
Bill Simmons
And he's standing next to me. And afterwards they're playing the video package and we're just out there. And I shook his hand, shook Hunter's hand. And he said something to me. I didn't really hear it. And I think I just said like, oh, yeah, yeah. Just kind of like. And then I heard him and he goes, no, no, carry the ball. And I thought. I mean, it made me feel like 10ft tall. Yeah, it may. I had a promo later that night, and I'm thinking, I gotta go. Yeah, Sarge. Sarge just told me, carry the ball. I better. I better not let him down. I was so. I was so excited. There's a. I got to hang out with the Legends a little bit that day, and I know the circumstances were somber, but to just be around Jimmy Hart, Right? Yeah. To be around Sarge Hacksaw, who I, God bless, love Hacksaw. Jim Duggan. Just. That was really nice to be around.
- [42:49]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah. I was saying we got sidetracked. I sidetracked myself. I was talking about the two ways wrestling's different now, you know.
- [42:56]
Bill Simmons
Sorry.
- [42:56]
Cody Rhodes
No, it's. It's. One is the. The moves in the athleticism, which we talked about, and then the other is the entrances are. All. The entrances are all great. Now you go back and you watch the old ones. Cause I was thinking about that with Hogan when he had Eye of the Tiger, and it was one of the first great entrances.
- [43:12]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [43:12]
Cody Rhodes
The Freebirds had what they have. Leonard Skynyrd.
- [43:15]
Bill Simmons
Well, they were the first to have music. Yeah.
- [43:17]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it was very early on. Only a couple. Macho man had the big. The big grand. But now it's like everybody. And a lot of them are designed for the crowd to be able to sing along at some point in the song, which you have.
- [43:32]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, they did sing along. I had that song forever.
- [43:35]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [43:36]
Bill Simmons
And now they do it.
- [43:37]
Cody Rhodes
Now they get it. Yeah, but that's how I think. Those are the two ways wrestling's better in hd.
- [43:41]
Bill Simmons
So it's. So the songs. Randy was talking about this the other day, Randy Orton, because he was. They sing his song, like word for.
- [43:47]
Cody Rhodes
Word now, and it's hilarious.
- [43:49]
Bill Simmons
New to him.
- [43:50]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [43:50]
Bill Simmons
And he was talking with me about it. And one of the things though, about it is it's really old school, actually. Even though there wasn't music then. The whole point of what we're doing, the whole point, and I don't know if Unreal points this out, and I bet you it does, is we're trying to connect with them. It's not completely sport, it's not completely entertainment. None of it functions, though, without them caring. That's the whole thing. You know John Cena's rule. If they start making noise, he's coming up, he's gonna fight back. To see your guy, see your girl, and then you do a thing. So usually it was something that affected the matches. We'll cheer for such and such the matches. We'll cheer against such and such in the match. Now it's we come, we sing the song, we say whoa. We do the yeet. We. That is as old school as it gets. Actually. It's just done in a very new package because the entrances are so highly produced and part of it now.
- [44:43]
Cody Rhodes
But I remember Road Dog, Jesse James and Billy Gunn.
- [44:47]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. When.
- [44:48]
Cody Rhodes
When wrestling made its big comeback for the WWE after WCW is kicking its ass. But those guys would come in and do the entrance and sing the song, and the crowd lost their mind.
- [44:57]
Bill Simmons
Oh, you didn't know. I mean, literally.
- [44:59]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [44:59]
Bill Simmons
Oh, you didn't know.
- [45:00]
Cody Rhodes
It was like they didn't even need to wrestle so good. It was like, well, I'm just here to do this and sing with you guys.
- [45:06]
Bill Simmons
So if you were wrestling me tonight and I came out and the crowd was really receptive to Kingdom the song, and they were, whoa. And like, crazy. And then they started the soccer chance. The Cody, Cody Rhodes chants. I'd probably tell you, just kick me in the gut. I don't need to do. They seem good with me. They seem good with me. Kick me in The Gut and let them boo you. And we'll just see how long it goes, you know, just because it becomes part of your match now.
- [45:30]
Cody Rhodes
Well, when Punk came back finally to WWE after 72 years of sitting out, but that first time when he walked in and the crowd was just going nuts and singing his song, and he almost didn't know what to do, you could just see he was like, delirious. Like, it almost seems like you pass out. Must be a pretty cool feeling.
- [45:49]
Bill Simmons
It's a pretty cool feeling. And Punk's had more experience with this feeling than I have. But I feel like. And this is something I was just talking about, one of my favorite wrestlers told me as things started to take off for me, he said, and this is right around WrestleMania 39 40, right there in the spot. And he told me that you're on the treadmill now. The reactions are going to be through the roof. It's always going to. Don't take it for granted.
- [46:19]
Cody Rhodes
Right.
- [46:20]
Bill Simmons
Remember the first time that they went nuts and treat every time like it's the first time that they went nuts. And it shocks me how right he was as far as. When you find this. Whatever this elusive thing is that they like about you, it's the most beautiful thing ever. Because then all the flips and the dangerous stuff you're talking about when you do it, it matters so much more. That's why this discussion about moves over moments. No, and that's not the discussion. If you have that connection and you do that really cool thing they like to see, that's box office. And that's real. It's just a. It's just. That's the whole. That's the whole thing. And. And all because you mentioned unreal. And now I really want to see this episode. I think one of the.
- [47:08]
Cody Rhodes
I know, right?
- [47:09]
Bill Simmons
You've seen it. You've seen all five.
- [47:10]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah, I saw them.
- [47:11]
Bill Simmons
I think one of the things that presents itself for wrestlers that hardcore fans may not be thinking, but the really smart, smart, smart super geniuses, as I call them, you know, your Michael Hayes and your Mr. Heymans, there's work that can happen within the work.
- [47:29]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [47:30]
Bill Simmons
If you say, hey, this is all real. This is. Look at this. Then it starts to become hard to figure out, wait, how. Wait, no, that part's real. And that's where you can do work within the work. So you can still. Again, the word that. No one can ever tell me what it means. You can still do kayfabe. You really can. It's just different. And that's the fun experiment we get to take as we lift this veil, but we cover this thing up. I don't know, you know, I just, I think it presents options at wrestlers and maybe the hardcore fans who are a little worried about oh no, they're going to expose it all. And maybe we expose this part. Maybe there's a whole other part you didn't see.
- [48:09]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah. But think about like, what was that documentary they did about Bret Hart wrestling with Shadows? One of the greats.
- [48:16]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [48:17]
Cody Rhodes
Which we cribbed some of that for the Vince McMahon doc. But the, the behind the scenes stuff after the match. Yeah, that was like, holy shit, I can't believe somebody filmed this.
- [48:27]
Bill Simmons
So here's my question for you. Do you think that was a documentary or do you think that was part of it?
- [48:35]
Cody Rhodes
So it sounds like you have a theory.
- [48:36]
Bill Simmons
I have had a. I, whenever I tell somebody high level confidential stuff I use Chris, who's in the corner has probably heard me say this. I say Brett Shawn level. I have never heard from either that it wasn't as real as it possibly could get. And maybe it was. It certainly ended up being real. No doubt. However, I have questions. There was a documentary crew backstage at a company that never ever allows anything like that. There's mics in the room.
- [49:09]
Cody Rhodes
This is amazing. Conspiracy. You've just activated Conspiracy Bill. He's about to take off his T shirt.
- [49:15]
Bill Simmons
This to me is always the work within the work. And Shawn, Shawn Michaels was my favorite wrestler growing up and I'm probably sitting here making him mad. He's still my favorite wrestler. But then you get to him and Hogan when they wrestle at SummerSlam and they're like, oh, you can tell he's.
- [49:28]
Cody Rhodes
Mad at Hogan when he was overselling all the moves.
- [49:31]
Bill Simmons
Right. But is he or is this just seem like the one real thing on the show where you knew everything else was fictional?
- [49:39]
Cody Rhodes
Two things that would be countered. Conspiracy Bill loves this. The loogie that Vince McMahon spat at.
- [49:46]
Bill Simmons
Or Bret Hart spats at him.
- [49:48]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah, at Vince was disgusting and looked like a giant oyster. Nailed Vince. That's the worst bump Vince has ever taken. If that was a bump. Second, Vince did get cold cocked and wobbled out and had a black eye. I don't know how they would have, would have, would have faked that one.
- [50:05]
Bill Simmons
Well, it's pro wrestling. You, you wouldn't have faked it.
- [50:07]
Cody Rhodes
Right.
- [50:08]
Bill Simmons
Let's talk like again.
- [50:10]
Cody Rhodes
So if the whole thing was a word from beginning to end.
- [50:12]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [50:13]
Cody Rhodes
Then part of it is he has to hit.
- [50:14]
Bill Simmons
We're Talking about. You saw Rhea and Bianca talking about there's no way to pull that. It's coming. It's. It's coming. And I mean, this is great.
- [50:24]
Cody Rhodes
I. You really blew my mind with this one.
- [50:25]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, I prepared.
- [50:26]
Cody Rhodes
I don't even want to do the podcast anymore. I just want to go Reddit.
- [50:30]
Bill Simmons
So. Growing up around my dad, I always. When something would happen on TV that felt like a shoot, as we say.
- [50:36]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [50:37]
Bill Simmons
I'd be sitting literally front of the tv, as they say. Like what? Crisscross applesauce or whatever. Watching the tv. I have my Hasbro figures. Even though I was way too old. That figures at that point. I'm watching. And he'd be behind me and I'd always look back like, oh, some. And he just always smile ear to earth. And I felt like in that smile I could tell he knew they were doing some high level work and the whole world was doing exactly what they needed to do. And I was like his litmus test. I was his test on. Because we're talking about Sean again and I don't mean to. I love Shawn so much, but he didn't understand why I liked Shawn Michaels because he was past his run. He was just dad.
- [51:21]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [51:22]
Bill Simmons
But he.
- [51:23]
Cody Rhodes
I think that's funny. He was like critiquing some of your choices.
- [51:26]
Bill Simmons
So he'd never take my joy away, though. He'd always ask, like, what do you like about him? Oh, my. Are you kidding? Look at him. He's smaller and leaner, but he's jacked. And he's. He's able to wrestle these big guys and. Are you kidding? All the chicks like him and like, yeah, the whole. And he never tell me otherwise. He just. And then I remember WrestleMania 12. Bret, Sean, they go the hour and I'm so disappointed. Like, my guy didn't win again. Again. And then. Oh, here comes. They're going to go 15 more minutes. And again I looked at my dad smile ear to ear and I thought, yeah, this is. They got me. They got me. And they just. I don't know. These could all be to conspiracy theory. They could all be true. They could all be total shoots. They really could. But the way I look at it is anything and everything that happens and in the ring, I always look at it with a. That feels like it was part of it.
- [52:21]
Cody Rhodes
One of the best ones ever was CM Punk. When he, when he sat down cross legged. Oh, the pipe bomb went after Cena in a real way. And then people were mad and I. I still don't know how much of that was real and how much of it was talked about beforehand?
- [52:36]
Bill Simmons
I. I like with a pipe bomb, for example. I always. Even though we're getting into it now, I actually. If it's so good, I almost don't want to know. Right, right. If it's so good that. Oh, hey, that. The rest of that show. Oh, that seemed normal, but this is. This. They're going to a place I wasn't expecting, then I don't need to know. It's like the magic, you know.
- [52:58]
Cody Rhodes
What was your first one? Because my first one was when Killer Con broke Andre the Giant's leg. And then they got a whole thing about it. And then finding out way later and working the documentary that it was actually an accident. Killer Khan felt really bad, and it's like, oh, man, why'd they ruin this for me? I thought he didn't intentionally.
- [53:16]
Bill Simmons
I don't know if I had a. I know. For example, Sting got his ribs broken by Vader in the strap match. Oh. But after I saw him, and he was good, normal. But he was also leaving for a while. And then I asked my dad in the car, like, oh, the old.
- [53:35]
Cody Rhodes
He had to leave for a while anyway, so. Injury.
- [53:37]
Bill Simmons
I asked my dad for a while. Well, what's happened? You know, what will he do? He's like, oh, he was just gonna drink milk and the bones will heal. It was just a terrible answer.
- [53:44]
Cody Rhodes
Magically come back.
- [53:45]
Bill Simmons
So. Yeah. But again, so I'd get to the shows as a kid, Doug Dillinger, who was just on TV the other night, WCW's famous security guard used to knock on Goldberg's door. Doug was like, my guy. He'd always print me this oversized laminated backstage pass. And I never want to be backstage. I wanted to go sit. I'd go find an empty seat, and I wanted to see. I just didn't care for the. The mystery of it, because I could tell there's something off. Like, all these guys are shaking Dusty's hand, and they're playing cards. Something's off, but I didn't want to know. It's still magic, you know?
- [54:23]
Cody Rhodes
It was a tough One in the mid-80s was when Hacksaw Jim Duggan, and I think it was the Iron Sheet.
- [54:29]
Bill Simmons
Got pulled over together.
- [54:31]
Cody Rhodes
I was in high school, and I was like, why were those guys together? Most of them. One of them must not have had a car. And maybe the other guy was giving him a favor.
- [54:38]
Bill Simmons
You give yourself all the reasons.
- [54:39]
Cody Rhodes
I was trying to justify it in my head. So you missed. I mean, Obviously because you were too young. But you missed when Dusty's apex.
- [54:47]
Bill Simmons
So most of Dusty's prime is me watching it on vhs.
- [54:50]
Cody Rhodes
Right. I didn't know because I missed most of it too because I was in the wwf, part of the territory.
- [54:56]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [54:56]
Cody Rhodes
And even see him sometimes. And I, you know. But I just. The week to week stuff that made him so great. It was one of the best Mike guys ever.
- [55:04]
Bill Simmons
I didn't know how I missed it over Dusty was. Until we did a show. WCW did a show at the Omni in Atlanta.
- [55:11]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [55:11]
Bill Simmons
And he was the executive producer and I was 8. I mean, at that point I should have started to figure things out. But Sting went out the back door to go to his car. And as we went to step behind him, my dad kind of threw his hand in front of me. He was like, just give him a second. Don't you know? Give him a second. It was strange. And they reacted like crazy for Sting. And I'm thinking like, that's so cool, man. Look at that. All the fans out there. What a cool job.
- [55:38]
Cody Rhodes
Oh, because he knew.
- [55:39]
Bill Simmons
And then my dad went out there and these people lost their minds. And I, Dusty, Dusty. And I just like, I couldn't believe it. Like I get choked up about it thinking about it today. I couldn't believe, like what, like, tell me more. Because we lived in this really snooty part of Georgia, East Cobb. It was like Laguna beach without the beach. So the wrestlers, my dad, we were like the Adams family. We. He'd mow the, he'd mow the lawn and his doctor trunks with Ray Bans that his head was too big for that are like pulled into the side of his head. And the bleach, blonde hair. And Gabe Simpson, you know, from the Braves was on the other side of the neighborhood. And he was like the real sports guy. And then we were the goofy entertainment side of the other neighborhood. But I just didn't know because parents would ask me about my dad and I had no clue. And then I started looking into our own VHS and old school reels and all this stuff. Seeing the Florida stuff, seeing all the Crockett stuff.
- [56:39]
Cody Rhodes
Because it's not like baseball or something where you just look up his stats on baseball reference like, oh, that hit 400.
- [56:45]
Bill Simmons
It really was Atlanta, the city, you know, Omni and I, I don't go there anymore. But Lennox Mall, man, he'd walk into Linux Mall and I mean a riot would start. Just he. He was going to Atlanta, Hartsfield, Jackson, the airport, all the Delta Redcoats rush.
- [57:04]
Cody Rhodes
I mean, no shots fired at Atlanta, but you could argue he's the best champion they've had in the last 50 years. The sports haven't done great.
- [57:12]
Bill Simmons
It's a tricky. It's a tricky.
- [57:13]
Cody Rhodes
It's a little tricky.
- [57:14]
Bill Simmons
I. I'm a. I'm a Dogs fan, so it's always good to cheer for the. The Dogs. Always good. Listen, the Braves are going to do okay.
- [57:22]
Cody Rhodes
You have a weird pro. What's your pro football team? You have something weird.
- [57:24]
Bill Simmons
I'm. I certainly. I'm an Eagles guy.
- [57:27]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah. That didn't get that part.
- [57:28]
Bill Simmons
So it's. It's real easy. And you'll be like, I am college football. This is my favorite thing. Love college football. Was so pumped when Joe Test came to do commentary because I've listened to him a hundred times. But pro football is. My sister cheered for the Cowboys. My oldest sister loved the Cowboys because my family was all Texans, really, minus me. So I'm like a fake Texan kind of. But by the time I was older, the Cowboys weren't the Cowboys like that anymore. The Falcons, you fair weathered it. Look, I continue to fair weather. This is how easy I am. The Falcons as a kid, not great. Jamal Anderson doing the Dirty Bird there you are. Places losing their mind. I'm in. I'm in. I'm a Falcons fan. Doesn't go the way we think. Okay.
- [58:12]
Cody Rhodes
Auditioned a new team.
- [58:13]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. So Michael Vick shows up. Michael Vick season tickets sell out. I was. Michael Vick is number seven jerseys everywhere. It's Michael Vick that goes really deep. Terribly poorly to say the least. And then really did lose like the Franch. Lose a lot of the franchise then. Okay. Maddie. Ice makes it to the Super Bowl. Okay. All right. Arthur Blank's on the field. Okay.
- [58:37]
Cody Rhodes
It's.
- [58:38]
Bill Simmons
Oh. Oh. And it's at that point.
- [58:40]
Cody Rhodes
Get the helmet behind you. Yeah.
- [58:42]
Bill Simmons
Oh, my gosh. Yeah. So. But Brady's bra. So you're gonna. You're gonna hate everything about what I'm gonna say. That's at that point where I just said I'm. If Atlanta gets there, I'll be there. But I'm not. I'm not against them. But I'm really not going to get on the four of them train. So Tom Brady becomes my favorite quarterback.
- [58:59]
Cody Rhodes
Okay.
- [59:00]
Bill Simmons
Okay. So Tom. I go to the COVID super bowl just to see him throw the ball one time when he's with Tampa Bay, which is an amazing story. One season and they win a Super bowl, whatever it may be. But this is how easy I am. I go to do media for WrestleMania 40 at TI. At the stadium for Philly. And this is a massive, massive sports franchise.
- [59:20]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [59:20]
Bill Simmons
They rolled out the red carpet for me. They did. They let me have a room in the stadium. They had all this media coming in. They gave me all these jerseys and they gave me all this stuff for my daughter, an Eagle. All this. That moment. Kids gifts.
- [59:33]
Cody Rhodes
Kids gifts are a great way to steal something.
- [59:35]
Bill Simmons
100%. And I knew I was going to be wrestling in the center of that field.
- [59:40]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [59:40]
Bill Simmons
The next year. And I had a feeling. I was betting on myself, but praying too. I had a feeling I was going to be in the main event.
- [59:48]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [59:49]
Bill Simmons
So forever the city of Philadelphia. Because Wells Fargo is actually my favorite arena, which is right in the sports complex there. That is. That's going to be. That's my wrestling. Other hometown is Philadelphia.
- [60:02]
Cody Rhodes
You know, I feel bad for the seven NFL teams you didn't root for. Yeah. Well, during the course of that journey.
- [60:07]
Bill Simmons
Well, I, I really wanted. I wanted to root for a lot of people. But listen, it's like wrestling. You get behind somebody, you gotta win. A winning season would work for me. You just gotta win. But yeah, Philly, they became my team.
- [60:23]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah. I'm trying to think what wrestler I've stayed loyal to the entire time. You do usually bounce around.
- [60:27]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. Shane Gillis, the comedian. He's a big Phillies guy. I mean, an Eagles guy. He came backstage and he's all, Eagles up. And I think it's on record now that I'm on board with the Eagles. That's my team. I'm going to. But it's not. I haven't been born and raised, you know, that way. So I was really hoping he didn't call me on any Eagle Nation stuff, you know, like.
- [60:49]
Cody Rhodes
Right. You need to do like a little backstory.
- [60:52]
Bill Simmons
I need to look in real quick before we started talking football. But it was really cool to see because he's so into them and they did become my team. I mean, the fact that I got to wrestle right there on the 50 yard line in the biggest match of my life and.
- [61:03]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [61:03]
Bill Simmons
The, you know, WWE's biggest event ever and that you. I'm linked to that stadium and that franchise.
- [61:08]
Cody Rhodes
I'll allow the. Thank you, favorite.
- [61:10]
Bill Simmons
Thank you. Thank you.
- [61:11]
Cody Rhodes
You know, it's funny, you talk about Dusty having all this old stuff. There are all these pockets of wrestling happening in all these different ways in the 70s and 80s and like, even you think like, Jerry Lawler is just huge In Memphis. Right. In that specific area. He's a God and your dad's a God and like basically the entire South.
- [61:29]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [61:29]
Cody Rhodes
But then when we did the. When we did the Vin stock, one of the revelations and I thought I knew most of the stuff at this point, but the revelation that Vince was choosing between Dusty and Hulk and wanted Dusty first and Dusty didn't want to go. And you were interviewed in the doc, you talked about it, but shocked me. It's a pretty fascinating. Sliding doors, do you think Dusty. I talked about this with Shoemaker, ironically, after Hulk died on my podcast. And we were talking about the three things that basically needed to happen for WWE to blow up, which was cable tv. Vince getting aggressive, trying to beat everybody else. But then Hogan.
- [62:07]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [62:08]
Cody Rhodes
Does it happen with Dusty, you think?
- [62:12]
Bill Simmons
Gosh, I feel like the only thing.
- [62:14]
Cody Rhodes
I could think against him is the accent.
- [62:17]
Bill Simmons
So one of the things that Vince actually told me, I didn't believe the story when my dad told me this story again.
- [62:25]
Cody Rhodes
And then wrestling lore, you never know what to believe.
- [62:27]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, my dad telling me he was slotted for the spot, walked out of the hotel room, never came back because Vince had booked recording studio time. They were going to make an album with Dusty.
- [62:39]
Cody Rhodes
Wow.
- [62:39]
Bill Simmons
All right. I thought, this is complete dad nonsense. Years later, Vince tells me the exact story, tells me how mad he was. Dusty walked out of the hotel room on me and I'm thinking, what this is a. He really was in line to do it. However, part of the story, he didn't say it in a mean spirited way. He said, but it worked out better that I got Hulk and that your dad got to go. Do Jim Crockett Promotions, help build WCW up from the nwa. Him and Rick and everyone of course involved and all the great talented people they had. I think it worked out better. I don't know the answer to that, but I think Hogan was more of the now than maybe.
- [63:21]
Cody Rhodes
I think he made more sense with the Stallone, Schwarzenegger kind of that era. Let's fight. Let's have these superheroes that, that basically fight the villains. He just made more sense.
- [63:31]
Bill Simmons
The phys. I think a lot of it, you could literally chalk it up to Dusty's subverting your expectations with his look. Yeah, was one thing, but the look at the time and where it was going, especially if you look at the AWA, which most people don't realize. Hulkamania and St. Paul at the AWA was happening. So I, I think it was probably the right call. Dusty had a different delivery, a different way of talking people in. And Hogan was Stallone Arnold.
- [64:01]
Cody Rhodes
And Dusty was a little at the tail.
- [64:04]
Bill Simmons
He had beat himself up. He was moving through. Dusty's real prime is. There's very, very little footage of his real. Not prime. But his hottest stuff is Florida Championship wrestling from Florida was early mid-70s. Yeah. Gordon solely and Pac Song and Harley coming in. And that was unbelievable. I mean they were scalping tickets. This is the bucks are. You know, this is Tampa's main sport was. Was really championship wrestling from Florida at this. This brief onset with the armory and the grand. It's crazy. Yeah.
- [64:38]
Cody Rhodes
The only way you would know it was even happening was the wrestling magazines which of course I was always going through in the news.
- [64:43]
Bill Simmons
Oh yeah.
- [64:44]
Cody Rhodes
And they would just have these little articles or photos and that was it. There was no video.
- [64:48]
Bill Simmons
I think. I also think too dad was really proud of the three in the Garden with Superstar. I think he wanted to walk off on the three. I did the three in a city I thought would eat me up, you know, chew me up and spit me out in New York. And they loved me and they took me. I'm good. I'm not going to overstay my welcome. I think he was. When Florida would make those trades. Eddie Graham would make trades with Vince.
- [65:16]
Cody Rhodes
I love when they used to do that. They would just be. I'll send you just make sure he doesn't get pinned.
- [65:20]
Bill Simmons
Send such and such. Do whatever you want. Just make sure he leaves the title or whatever it may be. They had that trust. Vince Senior and Eddie Graham and I. I just thought he probably looked at it because he was so proud of those three. I knew about those three matches before I knew about many things with him because that moment was a video of.
- [65:37]
Cody Rhodes
Those or no msg.
- [65:38]
Bill Simmons
Oh yeah.
- [65:40]
Cody Rhodes
I remember seeing at least one of them.
- [65:41]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. The first one. And I think the bull rope is on there too. The ropes are loose as hell. Superstars flying all over the place.
- [65:49]
Cody Rhodes
I can't believe how much video There is of the 70s and 80s now.
- [65:52]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [65:53]
Cody Rhodes
Like my whole childhood is on there basically. But stuff you just assume would just disappear and you never even know about it again.
- [66:01]
Bill Simmons
That's it. Those. Those garden ones are fun to watch.
- [66:03]
Cody Rhodes
One of the things that was amazing with him was athletic. He was your dad. Like he was like the most deceiving athlete. I wonder like what other did he play sports in high school?
- [66:12]
Bill Simmons
Played everything. And I remember I got really hot at. There's another wrestler who was. He did this interview and he'll never know this because he did this interview years ago where he was like, it's not like Dusty was some sort of athlete. And I wanted to explain to him like, buddy, the whole point was he was an athlete. He didn't look like one. And he could do a standing drop kick. He was the best basketball player I'd ever seen in my life.
- [66:37]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah, he just seemed exceptionally coordinated.
- [66:39]
Bill Simmons
He was just. He didn't look it.
- [66:42]
Cody Rhodes
Isn't there video of him playing basketball? Yeah, so there's, there's some charity game or something, right. And he looks like he's like Charles Barkley. It's the flying by everybody.
- [66:50]
Bill Simmons
Charlotte police Department.
- [66:51]
Cody Rhodes
And if you ask, it's amazing.
- [66:52]
Bill Simmons
You ask like Lex Luger, Sting, who are both in it, just running up and down.
- [66:57]
Cody Rhodes
Just a lot of like post ups where he's just.
- [67:01]
Bill Simmons
If you ask him about it, he said that Dusty had a meeting before where he said, if we lose to the police, you're all fired. And then they just, they just went for it and all these just shots. This is. It was a real bummer that that video exists. And here's why. Fanatics who WWE and fanatics have this great partnership, right? They had me do the Fanatics fest physical events.
- [67:24]
Cody Rhodes
Oh no.
- [67:25]
Bill Simmons
On the same day I'm doing a signing and photo ops and stuff like that. And to me, when you meet the fans, it's the coolest thing on earth. It's my favorite thing. I could do it all day long. If I complain about getting up early, by the end of it, I'm the happiest I've ever.
- [67:37]
Cody Rhodes
I already feel the excuse coming. I'm just.
- [67:39]
Bill Simmons
It's the excuse. You just heard it getting ready. I go out on. The one I was worried about was basketball because I'm thinking like, well, there's footage everywhere today. There's footage of everything in every corner. I'm in my suit and I'm thinking, suits a disaster. I'm not gonna not try though.
- [67:55]
Cody Rhodes
The suit's tough.
- [67:55]
Bill Simmons
I can't say I didn't try. I kind of tried. I didn't not like just phone it and I miss every single shot.
- [68:04]
Cody Rhodes
That's where you blame the pictorial. I just not. I just don't have the same motion yet.
- [68:08]
Bill Simmons
I was legit, like hot at WWE talent relations for a minute, right? I guys, the wrestler out there who they already think is an athletic looks, you can't do that to me. And I didn't. I never said any of this because all of this is my fault. I made like one great like slap Shot, hockey shot, which nobody got footage of, did terrible in the football skills. Golf skills bombed. But basketball, where they're seeing all these clips of Dusty just float like a butterfly and these beautiful layups and this jumper he had. And then I'm out there and it looks like my legs don't like. I, I. It's so bad. And the guy, the MC is going, all right, all right. Okay, let's get. All right, let's get up to Cody. Let's get him one. Let's get him one. And it's so like, I couldn't make. I couldn't get in there. It was so bad. Yeah. But yeah, Dusty was a deceivingly good athlete. He.
- [68:58]
Cody Rhodes
Did he save a lot of his stuff. Because you mentioned, like, you had the journals. Do you have like this. I have a chest of things from.
- [69:05]
Bill Simmons
His career team for the Charter Oak Buffaloes, the Patriots. He went to camp, so he's even going back there. Yeah, he's got. So I've got a program from Patriots where he's listed on the team. Actually. I've got a lot of his baseball stuff because baseball was his better sport. And my nephew, now Kellen, is kind of following that baseball journey. And he's got skills from his dad and pops as well.
- [69:30]
Cody Rhodes
What about the stuff from the 70s and 80s in terms of his wrestling stuff? Yeah. Cause nobody, people just threw that shit out back then and they didn't think to keep it.
- [69:39]
Bill Simmons
I have a lot of stuff. I'm trying to think if we got real good from the 70s. I think the favorite thing I have is a photo album. The photo album was a personal photo album. So it's like him and Dick Murdoch on the boat.
- [69:54]
Cody Rhodes
Oh, wow.
- [69:54]
Bill Simmons
Going from Victoria to Vancouver. And then there's Hogan just randomly in the background as a young wrestler that you. It's these really fun. Him. Ric Flair, when Ric Flair wanted to be rambling. Ricky Rhodes when he was just breaking in the business. And he weighs. I don't know if you ever saw a flair in the 70s pre the back end. Oh, yeah. He doesn't even look like the Nature Boy at all. So those photos I have, we've got some reels, stuff like that. Anything that I find really valuable, actually, we'll send to Ben Brown at wwe, who's the archivist.
- [70:25]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [70:26]
Bill Simmons
Because it's sitting in my basement. It's better that you. I could always get it back. I just want. It's better that somebody takes care of it, because if you go to the warehouse in Stanford, I mean, They've got.
- [70:37]
Cody Rhodes
Oh, they have like a seven hall of Fames in there.
- [70:39]
Bill Simmons
Right. And the things you don't know are valuable. You open up and it's. It's Pat Patterson's booking journals. This is the most valuable thing in here, guys. It's just. It's in the corner, you know, just. There's some real special stuff.
- [70:49]
Cody Rhodes
I remember when did the Andre thing. They brought us back and it was like, here's Andre's shorts from wrestling.
- [70:53]
Bill Simmons
And you're like, ah, I got a good Andre one.
- [70:55]
Cody Rhodes
Okay.
- [70:56]
Bill Simmons
I can't confirm or deny that Dusty was ever the Midnight Writer. I should preface it with that. But if he was the Midnight Writer, the Midnight Rider, as a ruse to get people off his scent, other Midnight Writers would show up. Hey, I know it's you, Dusty. And then the next thing you know, there'd be Andre the Giant.
- [71:12]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [71:13]
Bill Simmons
Or someone who looks like him wearing a Midnight. Oh, it can't be Dusty, right? This guy. This isn't. No, this isn't the guy who's been winning these matches. So when I was younger, I went downstairs and I put on a Midnight Rider mask in my basement, and it was the size of this, like. Yeah, this table. And I remember as a kid thinking, oh, that's what. My head will be that big when I grow up. Not realizing that that was an oversized giant.
- [71:38]
Cody Rhodes
The Giant.
- [71:38]
Bill Simmons
The Giants Midnight Rider mask. Yeah.
- [71:40]
Cody Rhodes
Size 8 and 3, 4.
- [71:42]
Bill Simmons
Unreal. Unreal. Because my sister has more memories with him than I do with Andre, because him and Dusty were pretty close. But that's one that. I mean, when anyone describes him, the type of giant he was, he was a real giant, that's for sure.
- [71:54]
Cody Rhodes
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- [73:36]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, 2007.
- [73:38]
Cody Rhodes
And then they trap you at the Stardust gimmick. Everybody knows all these stories at this point, but did you, did you start feeling like this, this ain't happening for me? Or were you thinking, this is going to happen for me and I'm in the wrong spot and I need to fix and solve this.
- [73:57]
Bill Simmons
Man.
- [73:58]
Cody Rhodes
Because I remember the Stardust part. I was like, oh, man, I don't know if this one's going to work.
- [74:02]
Bill Simmons
I think I took pride in the first six months. Year, which it should have only lasted six months. A year. I think I took pride in, hey, this is like the wrestler opportunity to make the most of something. The classic. Okay, you got chicken shit, you're going to turn into chicken salad. The classic. Every wrestler who was ever good took the thing and ran with it. Polka dots is a great example on the old man. I think I took pride in the beginning. And then it still felt like a thing that, oh, no, I'm locked out.
- [74:38]
Cody Rhodes
You start looking at the roster and going, all right, that guy, I'm not getting by him.
- [74:42]
Bill Simmons
I. I had a list. I had a list of all the roster, the show I was on, and, like, next to Dolph Ziggler's name, I remember I wrote abs, I. I had these. It was a list of things that I thought, all these guys are better than me.
- [74:54]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [74:55]
Bill Simmons
And I didn't realize the worst thing I was doing was competing with those guys was not the answer. I was feeling sorry for myself. Super pity party. All the time I was losing my relationship with people who I had worked years prior. I had wrestled Triple H at a SummerSlam as part of Legacy. And now we can't even get two words between each other. Backstage, I was really just kind of developing into a bad apple. And no doubt the booking was terrible.
- [75:22]
Cody Rhodes
Oh, bad chemistry guy.
- [75:23]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. So everything was going bad, and I was. And I think I even wrote it. I was starting hate a place that I loved, and maybe the most mature thing I could do was I'm gonna leave and hold onto the good stuff here. No doubt. There's plenty of. The booking is terrible. There's plenty of issues here. But also, I'm not helping myself at all. I'm becoming the worst me. As I get older, I take more and more of it on me than I do put it on Vince or Hunter or whomever. I try to put more on me about it. But I think the thing that bummed me out the most was I talked to my dad every day, and I told you he babied me and thought I was just so good. And I had a great athletic career growing up as an amateur wrestler. And he just saw things in me that I guess I didn't see. And that was the thing I was most ashamed of, was that that happened. And then he died. So my dad didn't get to do any of the good stuff for his dad, Virgil Sr. The Plumber. You know, he passed away before the American dream had took over and really even got a good start. I think he'd had a couple matches and getting beat up by Fritz in Texas and stuff like that, but he hadn't had his run yet, or even a first run, whatever it may be. That's the thing that bummed me out the most, is I wanted to give my dad the WWE Championship. There's nothing fake about that story and that quest. I. Yeah, this was the thing you didn't get. I'm gonna be the one to get it for you, and we can have it. And to this day, I still feel like immense shame over. He just missed everything. I couldn't get out of that spot. I felt trapped. I was trapping myself. God bless Brandi for putting up with me during that period of time. And I needed to get out. I've heard Nick Khan say it before. I had to go away to come back and be seen as an adult. And I don't know if I see it that way, but there's certainly some truth to that. I was a kid when I started there. I was 20 years old when WWE hired me and I.
- [77:28]
Cody Rhodes
Well, sometimes you have to think outside the box when you're on your own.
- [77:32]
Bill Simmons
Well, it was.
- [77:32]
Cody Rhodes
I felt that way. By the way, when I got my. I left this. Where's the Boston Herald? Over there. When I left that place and I had to figure out to write a column and I'm just on my own, I just kind of had to fit. But it made me better, made me ready for the next thing. You probably had some of that.
- [77:48]
Bill Simmons
Well, you bet on yourself.
- [77:49]
Cody Rhodes
But you also had the. You have to start thinking like you're booking everything, you're figuring out everything. There's a strategy piece that you probably hadn't really considered before.
- [77:59]
Bill Simmons
I used to strategize in my mind and the thing I'd always find myself saying, and I hate saying this, but this is during Stardust. I'd always find myself saying, I'm smarter than these people, I'm smarter than this. Why can't I get out of this? All of these guys taught me stuff. I worked with them all on a peer level. They taught me stuff. And I can't. Somehow none of it's working. I can't. So when I left, it became this kind of amalgamation of all the things I'd learned from Dusty, from John, from Randy, from Hunter, from Sean, from Undertaker, all these guys who I wrestled. And in the end it's kind of like you're talking about figuring out writing this column. In the end, I feel like it had to be me.
- [78:40]
Cody Rhodes
It just clicked.
- [78:41]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. Maybe it was all that help, maybe it was all the feedback finally come to one. But. But in the end it has to be my voice, it has to be what I want to do.
- [78:48]
Cody Rhodes
And, and well, you needed, you needed some momentum too. That wasn't just this is the Rhodes kid. And yeah, you needed, you created your own thing. Yeah, it was really cool and different. You bet on yourself.
- [79:01]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [79:02]
Cody Rhodes
The promotion you had felt different than WWE and in like these little different ways. And then, you know, it just was a home run. Nobody had really challenged the WWE like that. And, and what, 20 years?
- [79:14]
Bill Simmons
No, I mean since. Since the doors closing on wcw.
- [79:18]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah, but that was like, that was a challenge. A walking corpse for three years.
- [79:22]
Bill Simmons
Exactly. Very short lived in a sense. And for me, I was very almost volatile in how I came at it. I had love and you're like, this.
- [79:31]
Cody Rhodes
Is my one chance. Yeah, I'm not, I have no way. I'm not doing this right.
- [79:35]
Bill Simmons
I had love and I had Reverend reverence for wwe. This is the house that built me it. But, man, I really wanted. I woke up every day thinking, I want them to know what I could have done. I want them to know what I could have done. Which is why it's fun to talk about now. Because they came back and got me, which wasn't on my. That was never part of the master plan. Sometimes what people look at and be like, oh, he always was going back.
- [79:58]
Cody Rhodes
And Nick Khan was always talking about it. I, I, he was telling, he would tell. Like the freaking gardener getting Cody in a year.
- [80:04]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. No, I, I kept making it appear that I had a plan. I had a plan. But really I wanted to make as much noise and disrupt as much as I could. And I can't ever think of anything because I was talking about the two things and momentum and all that. In the beginning, I found some of the best people around me who were feeling the underground elements of that. And really the three that I'd always cite and I'd feel uncomfortable if I didn't Matt, Nick Jackson, the Young Bucks and Kenny Omega, that group. And Kevin Owens, God bless him, he's probably going to hear this pod. He's responsible for it because he linked us all together. And that connection of my name and my equity and their skills and their moxie and the drive and just that anger that I had and what they had, all of that just set up a situation that couldn't fail. Couldn't fail. And also at the time, Triple H doesn't realize he's a big part of this because at nxt, he's bringing in every good hot gun off the independents.
- [81:06]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [81:06]
Bill Simmons
So it's not about legacies, it's not about tenure at WWE anymore. It's about who has the hot hand. So it was a matter of, like, well, let's. I'm going to be the hot hand, and I don't know if I'm going to come back with it. What are we going to do? And, you know, we're off to the races with it at that point. But that was a really huge part of all the skills I had, combined with really great people around me. Really great timing. Great timing.
- [81:27]
Cody Rhodes
And you never really talked about leaving.
- [81:29]
Bill Simmons
Aew, but it felt like it's locked behind a paywall.
- [81:33]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah, apparently it is. But did you feel like that had a shelf life or was there a moment during that run where you felt like this was home? You're going to be one of the building blocks of this, and that was going to be the rest of your life.
- [81:47]
Bill Simmons
Gosh, it's Hard to kind of put myself in that spot again. But I started to get a sense of, you know, Michael Hayes is really famous for, always leave the territory at your hottest. I started to get a sense that all wrestling needs change. Guys are going to go from company to company. You got to keep it fresh. Guys are going to go down for a minute, then they're going to come, whatever it may be. I just got the sense that it might be time for me to move into something else. And I didn't know what that was. I remember thinking, oh, that'd be crazy to be part of the Royal Rumble, to come home, because, you know, I've made another home. I got kids at this home, basically. I got a lot, you know. But to show everybody, because the first meeting I have with Vince and Bruce Pritchard, I didn't think I was coming back. I was excited to go to that meeting to say, and this is going to sound crazy. I wanted to tell them both, thank you. I left on crazy bad terms. No one can ever leave. Like, I left because of how I left. They didn't even sign my release papers. Like, Chris probably could sue me over, you know, Like, I was. I. I left in a terrible place. They let it happen because of probably more respect for my dad than anything. And then I went out and I fought so hard and filled with rage. I mean, I'm smashing the throne. I'm. I'm just. I'm bleeding. I'm setting myself on fire. I was just, I don't know, going through it and living it out for everyone who was watching. But I wanted to tell them both, Banks, you guys helped build me and train me, and I took all those skills and I took them everywhere I went. I took them to every company, to every independent. I got to reinvent myself on how I wanted to be here in wwe. I got to be that outside. And that's all I thought it was going to be. A sense of closure, a real sense of thank you so much for lessons I never got to thank you for. And then it turned into be something else by the end of that meeting.
- [83:48]
Cody Rhodes
But, you know, was the fear. Like 2022 at AEW is going 2024 is basically be the same thing. And you're just running back years, but nothing. You're not elevating anymore. You're just kind of. You're kind of here, and you can't go here. Gosh, I know that that was my perception from afar.
- [84:06]
Bill Simmons
No, nothing. Yeah. And I feel like maybe that's. Maybe that's a little bit of it. I think I started thinking about writing a book the other day. I've never even really considered writing a book, but we've done some fun stuff.
- [84:20]
Cody Rhodes
I think it would go well.
- [84:21]
Bill Simmons
And I think that's the. I was thinking of. What would I say? How would I put it? Because there's clearly bad blood, but there's also clearly respect and love. And in the end, the way I kind of see it is if I felt disrespected ever at wwe, that's one thing. That's a company that was built. Look of this glass, you know, that's the Yankees. That's the flagship of it all. If I ever felt there, you know, I was a number on a sheet, maybe, but feeling disrespected at something I built with my friends and that we built feeling disrespected there, I wouldn't stand for it. And I think Brandi and I both. I'm so blessed to have her. It was one of those where it was. It like I did way more here than you think. And you're gonna find out the moment I'm out the door. And I. I hate saying that with any sense of anger or rage, but I'm like the angriest person you're ever gonna meet. I'm always.
- [85:32]
Cody Rhodes
I'd like to be in the top five. Right, right. So when you said that, I was thinking about when I left espn, I was like, okay, guys, you're gonna say, right, Same thing. Like, it made me so ready for the next thing.
- [85:42]
Bill Simmons
To me, the greatest. I don't believe in, like the cold hearted, backstabby type of revenge. The greatest revenge on earth is success. And I felt like we were sitting on something wonderful, something great, a huge potentially with what I was doing with the American Nightmare, as a bad guy, as a good guy, as something in between, we're sitting on something magic. And if I'm not going to do it in the house that I literally with Matt, Nick and Kenny built then, buddy, I'm going elsewhere. And every day I am so blessed that Bruce Prichard, Nick and Triple H got me. Vince got me back. Because I get to live it out now. I get.
- [86:24]
Cody Rhodes
Well, you know, it's funny the way you laid it out, because I watched the first couple episodes of Netflix has this big cowboys documentary.
- [86:30]
Bill Simmons
Oh, yeah, yeah.
- [86:31]
Cody Rhodes
That's coming. And it's about the Jerry Jones era. So I made. I made them send me a couple episodes because I want to watch it.
- [86:37]
Bill Simmons
You get all the stuff, huh?
- [86:39]
Cody Rhodes
Well, I just Badger people, man. I just badger people and they. I break them down eventually. But the Jerry Jones, Jimmy Johnson thing, where Jimmy Johnson brings them in, he's building through the team, through the draft, he's coaching it, he's doing everything, and they have real success, they win. But at some point, there's a little bit of a schism. And the schism comes down to Jimmy Johnson be like, dude, you brought me here to do all this. Like, this is. Let me do my thing. And Jerry, as they had more and more success, started to think he was a little more involved with the success than maybe he was. And just coincidentally reminded me of your.
- [87:15]
Bill Simmons
Situation, maybe at aew, probably similar. And if it hurts even more when you're tasked to do something when somebody sees it with their own eyes. But then I don't look at any of it. I said I was really angry and raged. I don't look at any of it with really any negativity. And here's why. I got to be part of WWE again, right?
- [87:39]
Cody Rhodes
It all worked out great.
- [87:40]
Bill Simmons
And I got to be part of wwe. We're talking about Austin and we're talking about Hogan. Two of the greatest ever to lace up their boots and draw people into the arenas. And every one of those records has been broken. And I got to be in the matches that broke those records. I got to stand across from Roman reigns at 39. I got to do it again. I got the quarterback spot at a company where I was last in the combine. And I am very grateful. That's why I have such trouble articulating. And that's why I want to write this book, because.
- [88:14]
Cody Rhodes
No, it makes sense.
- [88:15]
Bill Simmons
I'm very grateful for, hey, okay, this schism happened, but the outcome is I got to be with the biggest game in town. And not only did I get the spot, I got to show them I could do it, you know, because what are we in now, three, Three years or four?
- [88:31]
Cody Rhodes
I'll say it more simply, it was a good career move.
- [88:34]
Bill Simmons
Good career move. It really was.
- [88:35]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah. Good career. You join and all hell's breaking loose with Vince, which I'm not going to put you in the position to talk about here.
- [88:42]
Bill Simmons
And then you don't want to put my media training to attach.
- [88:44]
Cody Rhodes
Well, I just like you're just. Because some. Because when you do interviews like this and then people are like, why don't you ask them about this? It's like. Because you're going to give a shitty answer. Like, nobody, neither of us want to talk about it. It is what it Is.
- [88:54]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [88:55]
Cody Rhodes
No, you can Google it.
- [88:56]
Bill Simmons
Well, sometimes you give a shitty answer and then somebody will ask, ask a follow up, and the next answer is even worse.
- [89:03]
Cody Rhodes
Right.
- [89:03]
Bill Simmons
Like, it just goes. It's just like, there's no answer here.
- [89:06]
Cody Rhodes
You know, it's.
- [89:07]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [89:07]
Cody Rhodes
Vince was there almost 50 years and now he's not. And we. We all know what happened. Yeah, but you have that, and then you have your. You get hurt. So you. You. It's like two things. Like, is this? And you start to think, like, is this, Is this, Is it? Am I. Yeah, my snake bit here. What's going on? And then everyone thinks you're going to win WrestleMania. You don't. Yeah, but I thought that was kind of really smart in retrospect, that you did. Yeah, I think that was well played.
- [89:33]
Bill Simmons
You'll be the second person, but probably the first people ever hear this. I had Jelly Roll on my podcast recently. It hasn't come out, but I asked him what his most complete song was. I don't know why I thought that was a good question. I was like, you know, where you felt like you were checking every box, all your skills, and I told him, my favorite match is WrestleMania 39, which is the one where it doesn't happen.
- [89:58]
Cody Rhodes
It was really smart.
- [90:01]
Bill Simmons
I probably would have been pumped to win, certainly. Gosh. But there's something about that night where things were happening in the arena that had. Or the stadium that had never happened. He's got me in the guillotine choke.
- [90:15]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [90:16]
Bill Simmons
And you hear these old timers, and God bless them, I love them. Talk about, just stay right there and the people will react and they'll connect. When you've seen the amount of cool flips and awesome stuff, sometimes that seems like, I don't know, maybe that's not real anymore. And then in that moment, I remember I'm just slowly wiggling my head out and I can hear an entire stadium where the sound goes up, start to move. And I thought, oh, man, they're into this.
- [90:44]
Cody Rhodes
How.
- [90:45]
Bill Simmons
How blessed am I that they're into this? And it just. When it's that good, it feels completely real. Everything seems real. Roman is the greatest enemy of my life. And I'm trying to climb a mountain that's impossible to climb. And that just acoustic moment, for me, it made it my favorite match of all time.
- [91:01]
Cody Rhodes
That's cool.
- [91:02]
Bill Simmons
I couldn't tell anyone that, though, because it was the saddest ending. And then, like, walking right back. But, yeah, it's my favorite match.
- [91:08]
Cody Rhodes
Roman's a good example of somebody who had to eat some shit and it made it better. Like that's a great example of, I'm going to show you guys, oh, you think I got handed this or this was too early. Fuck you.
- [91:19]
Bill Simmons
How many years of Roman where he was in the spot that he was getting booed? It was a couple. More than a couple. It was like three or four.
- [91:27]
Cody Rhodes
He wasn't quite ready yet.
- [91:29]
Bill Simmons
But all that's happening.
- [91:30]
Cody Rhodes
But it helped him.
- [91:30]
Bill Simmons
Right. And so this is when people today complain about Roman and oh, he's barely ever there. He's paid so much. Whatever may I always think, guys, do you see the run he had, who he went through, what he went through? There was probably nobody on earth equipped with it and had the will and drive like a Roman. So if he's decided, hey, I'm coming a few times, I'm going to look great, people are going to lose their mind. Superman punch spear. That's a gift to us. It's a gift. When he shows up, I think people forget that, that he, he basically earned the right to call whatever shots he wants. I. I think very highly of.
- [92:15]
Cody Rhodes
He's great. He's great in the ring, he's great in person.
- [92:18]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [92:18]
Cody Rhodes
And that, the other thing, I've been to a lot of these now over the years. Presence is a thing that it's not a stat.
- [92:25]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [92:25]
Cody Rhodes
Somebody comes in and you can feel it. People either have it or they don't.
- [92:31]
Bill Simmons
He definitely has it and he had.
- [92:32]
Cody Rhodes
It even when they were trying to. Vince saw it I think pretty early. Like this guy has it and he just pushed him out. But I think ultimately, I think anybody who really makes it, you have to walk out to a 60 to 80,000 seat stadium and carry it somehow.
- [92:48]
Bill Simmons
He's another one.
- [92:48]
Cody Rhodes
It's not just music.
- [92:49]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. He's another one. That reminds me of Dusty a little in a sense that his athleticism is also. That he could do a whole lot.
- [92:58]
Cody Rhodes
You're right. Undertaker is the all time example though of athleticism. Undertaker was like Dr. J, like when he would do the walking down the rope thing. How many people on the planet could do that?
- [93:09]
Bill Simmons
And just the, the. Well, even harder thing is hook the top rope fall backwards over and land on his feet because he could never.
- [93:14]
Cody Rhodes
Come off his feet that early 90s.
- [93:16]
Bill Simmons
Oh man.
- [93:17]
Cody Rhodes
Undertaker is out of control.
- [93:18]
Bill Simmons
One of the great athletes. How you know is he's positioned as this monster zombie killer, what we would assume a heel.
- [93:24]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [93:24]
Bill Simmons
And then. Oh no. People love Undertaker. He's a. We're just putting with Bad guys. We don't have to make him a baby. Just put bad guys and the idea. And yeah, just. There's very few people who ever earn the respect that Undertaker has. And. And I, I came to a show at MSG. I think it was 14.
- [93:40]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [93:41]
Bill Simmons
Gold dust. Dustin was wrestling and he said when I got there, he says, are you coming backstage? I said, I'd love to. He goes, well, I need you to meet Undertaker before you do that. So that was a thing. I said, hello. And he's super nice. I'm 14.
- [93:54]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah. He was almost like the bouncer of the entire locker room.
- [93:57]
Bill Simmons
Bouncer. I always used to. Because he's such a cowboy. To me he was like the sheriff. Yeah, he's legit like the sheriff. So when he shows up at WrestleMania 40 in my match, for any like younger fan that's like. But what Undertaker. To me it made perfect sense. Sheriff's coming in to even the odds, help out a good guy in need. It was just, yeah, he's. He had more respect than most people I've ever seen in a locker room. I mean, to this day he's such a great locker room leader.
- [94:24]
Cody Rhodes
More fun to be a bad guy or a good guy.
- [94:29]
Bill Simmons
Everyone's going to tell you, bad guy. But I think that's because they haven't experienced what good guy can really be. Bad guy is fun because you can fall on your face and make a spot out of it. Bad guy is fun. You can stumble on your words in a promo and make a moment out of it. Bad guy is fun because traditionally a bad guy leads the match. But a good guy or good girl that they are actually invested in that they came, they're wearing your shirt, they've got signs. There's all this argument always about, oh, Cody, turn heel. Will he turn? I don't think so. They can boo all they want if certain people decide like, yeah, Cody's a heel to me, but I don't think I'd ever turn because it's just too much of a connection with those who were on board with me.
- [95:17]
Cody Rhodes
I think it's harder to be a good guy.
- [95:19]
Bill Simmons
So that's the thing. I think it's harder. But once we got on harder to.
- [95:22]
Cody Rhodes
Pull it off, I guess I should say.
- [95:24]
Bill Simmons
And for a while they were extinct because they just wanted anti heroes and social. Like edgy. So too, yeah.
- [95:30]
Cody Rhodes
TV and wrestling always married.
- [95:32]
Bill Simmons
Oh my God, yeah. An edgy social, you know.
- [95:34]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [95:35]
Bill Simmons
All everybody, every heel out there has got the best social media and the best one liners. That leave most babyface like dick in hand. What do I do? You know what I'm saying? Like, yeah. So you've got to be a really good baby face. You have to kind of rise above it, and that's very hard. Jey USO I look at as probably a great example is most so, so popular. And it's not easy. It's not easy to make that connection with him. And I feel like it's even harder to keep it because babyfaces get beat up a lot on tv. And to me, it's just such. It's such a gift. I certainly.
- [96:11]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah, you're selling the Villains. Yeah, it's the. The first when. So Bob Backlin, when I got into wrestling, yeah, he was champ for like five years. He was.
- [96:22]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [96:22]
Cody Rhodes
And he was like the perfect guy for back then because he was just the vessel to have all these awesome bad guys that they had because they had all, like, they had great villains and, you know, he was an all American guy and he had the crew cut. But it's hard to have runs like that. Cena did it forever. But even as it was happening, the crowd was like, he was polarizing in the moment.
- [96:42]
Bill Simmons
It's funny today because, like, Jon for so long was booed in certain markets, cheered in others. He really was so unique in the. You felt strongly about him. You weren't getting up and leaving. You were going to boo. You were going to cheer today. I feel like we are so. Our attention spans are a little shorter when they start booing a good guy. People think it's time for a. No, no.
- [97:03]
Cody Rhodes
It's just flip them to me.
- [97:05]
Bill Simmons
To me. Yeah, I just call it an away game. I always know, too. I know when it's an away game. I'm. Hey, we're going into their arena tonight. It's an away game. Wrestling John right now, heading into SummerSlam.
- [97:16]
Cody Rhodes
That freaking traitor.
- [97:17]
Bill Simmons
Right, right, sure.
- [97:19]
Cody Rhodes
So how dare he kicks you in the balls.
- [97:21]
Bill Simmons
How dare. And then how dare he make a shirt for every city featuring every sports team and every. We have to celebrate the farewell while he's in this nefarious state of mind. That's why on Smackdown this past week, we talked.
- [97:36]
Cody Rhodes
How dare he sell his legacy.
- [97:39]
Bill Simmons
Well, so we talk about, like, what's. What's real, what's not. I'll tell you something that says as real as it gets. Last week on smackdown, give me carte blanche what I want to say in my promo. What I said in my promo was very simple. Just be the real John Cena. They're already happy for you. They already love you. You spent years building equity with them. I could care less. Stop if you got to boo me. If you say, let's go, Cody. Cody sucks. If you. I'm fine. Well, I'll take it. I got raised in the industry to be able to take it. But let's be you if this is your last SummerSlam come like it's your first be you. And then I don't have to stare at a sea of Nothing's weirder than you're my favorite wrestler. Somebody telling me you're my favorite wrestler when they're wearing the entire scene of uniform, the entire farewell, I'm like, all right, well, yeah, thanks. Didn't help me tonight, bud. But so for me, I want him to be John. And I don't know, he's the most unique soul there is in the industry. We'll see what we get.
- [98:37]
Cody Rhodes
That was way too magnanimous because that guy is a jerk. He sneak attacked you, right? Let you down. He let down all the.
- [98:45]
Bill Simmons
Let Travis Scott fans.
- [98:49]
Cody Rhodes
That whole Travis Scott kind of. He took some liberties, didn't he?
- [98:53]
Bill Simmons
No, no, Travis, I. Travis Scott. I feel like if you're a wrestler and you can't take getting slapped in the face, you're not that great a wrestler.
- [99:01]
Cody Rhodes
Okay.
- [99:01]
Bill Simmons
However, the mark just looked really bad, so it was one of those where I couldn't. The next few days, everybody's like, what happened? Right. I don't. I don't know. I don't know. There's a clear fan video of just. It just happens. It's just part of it.
- [99:14]
Cody Rhodes
Do you get mad that the Paul brother is actually good at wrestling? I think it's bad for wrestling. He just steps in and he's, like, immediately doing crazy moves. I don't know.
- [99:23]
Bill Simmons
If he had just stepped in and could immediately be as good as he was, I'd be furious.
- [99:27]
Cody Rhodes
Could he put the work in?
- [99:28]
Bill Simmons
Oh, one of the hardest working people I've ever seen. And the other thing is, really, if you consider him a heel, that's okay because the guy is a complete, like you keep saying, jerk. Logan is as prickly as it gets. However, his story of doing the work is as accurate as it get. And his secret weapon is Shane Helms. Shane Helms, who's a producer at wwe. They're attached at the hip. They're talking wrestling. They're training wrestling. He took it as seriously as anybody ever. I have a feeling he's good. He's going to end up being world champion or WWE Champion at some point and the Internet will explode and we'll all be fine. We'll be. We'll all. We're going to be okay. But he is very special. As legitimate as a prick as you could meet though in a sense like, oh, this is. This is.
- [100:15]
Cody Rhodes
It's a slap.
- [100:17]
Bill Simmons
Cheers to this. But I love having him on the team. He is as valuable. I mean, he is. He is a massive asset to wwe. Going to be a future champion for sure.
- [100:27]
Cody Rhodes
This episode is brought to you by Viori. Look, I'm not a big let's hype up workout clothes guy, but Vuori, I gotta say, total game changer. Been wearing a lot. If you see me power walking around Los Angeles, probably gonna see me wearing some Vuori Sunday performance joggers that they have. It's made with four way performance stretch fabric, one of the most comfortable things you own. You will wear them everywhere, I promise. All you have to do is go to viori.com Simmons and you get 20% off your first purchase with Viori. V-U-O-R-I.com Simmons enjoy. Free shipping on all US orders over $75 plus free returns. Exclusions apply. Visit the website for full terms and conditions. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Building a good support system is kind of like putting a championship team together. You want skilled teammates who have your back. They're going to lift you up and help you reach your goals. And now might be the right time to add a BetterHelp therapist to your team. BetterHelp is convenient and affordable with access to over 30,000 therapists with a wide range of specialties. Build your team with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com billsimmons to get 10% off your first month, that is. Betterhelp.com Bill Simmons what's the maddest you've ever been in the ring at somebody as you guys were going back and forth and it got actually in a way where you're like, I'm going to actually fight this guy after we're done. Maddest I've ever been. Have you had one? Because they did this. They covered this on Unreal where it got a little. It got a little testy with Charlotte and what's her face. I'm blanking. Who did she wrestle? Tiffany.
- [102:03]
Bill Simmons
When they got.
- [102:04]
Cody Rhodes
It kind of went back and forth and it got to a point where Triple H actually had to get mad at them on the show. That's in the show.
- [102:12]
Bill Simmons
Is it unreal or is it. It's an unreal kind of. From a conspiracy level. What do you think?
- [102:15]
Cody Rhodes
I don't know. Conspiracy. Bill bought off total real. It seemed relatively real.
- [102:21]
Bill Simmons
Brett. Sean, like where do you, where do you put it? It was real. You're saying.
- [102:25]
Cody Rhodes
See, mostly real.
- [102:26]
Bill Simmons
Okay, okay. Mine was like an 8 out of 10 real. 8 out of 10 real. Okay. Mine was not even in the ring. I did commentary. Me and my brother did commentary on a tag match as the Rhodes brothers. And they had told jbl. And I don't know who the they is, but they had told JBL to eat me up on commentary. And oh, he did.
- [102:46]
Cody Rhodes
And it was like a roast.
- [102:48]
Bill Simmons
It was not even like a rose. I remember he said, he asked me a question, I said, I replied with, honestly, I'm about to make. My answer goes, no, I want you to lie to me. And then he just kept going. And I'm again, nothing makes me feel weirder than when you're supposed to protect the good guy. Yeah, but you, but then also it's like, hey, if you're, if you don't know how to defend yourself, you're not going to be that good of a good guy or whatever it may be. I learned a lot. JBL is one of my favorite people ever. But I remember that night. That's the most I've ever thought, okay.
- [103:17]
Cody Rhodes
You just want to hit him over the head with something.
- [103:18]
Bill Simmons
Well, I just wanted to explain, like what, what's the point? Are you and I wrestling? Are you, Are we wrestling? Because if we are, that was great.
- [103:26]
Cody Rhodes
But we're not testing you.
- [103:28]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, and he tested me and I'm okay with that test. And I failed that test. Now that I look back at it, I'm totally okay with that test. I'd probably want to test somebody too. But I failed that test, which again, as older I get, the more I started to put the impetus I put it on me that this was, these were my screw ups. I said I was ready and I couldn't handle JBL on commentary. Maybe I wasn't ready.
- [103:47]
Cody Rhodes
How do you do. You don't have to name a name, but how do you do a program and plan out stuff with somebody you don't like? Like if you're doing a match like you're doing like, like a six week arc with somebody and you actually have to spend some behind the scenes time.
- [104:02]
Bill Simmons
You do it with more love and commitment than you do with somebody you do like you, you Interesting. Yes.
- [104:08]
Cody Rhodes
So it's like fake friendship.
- [104:09]
Bill Simmons
You. I, I mean, hey man, how you doing? I think you, like, hate the guy. There's just a lot more of. When you're talking a lot more of this so that you know I'm serious. He knows I'm so that because. Okay. If you come backstage at RAW or smackdown, you'll see wrestlers shake hands to a level that's like, what, why? Why?
- [104:32]
Cody Rhodes
You've shaken.
- [104:33]
Bill Simmons
We've shaken hands three times. Why are we shaking hands? My trainer, Al Snow, I remember him asking me, he said, he said, you know why we shake hands? Thought it was a simple answer. We respect each other. It's about respect. He goes, yeah, you know, that's one of it. He goes, the real reason, though is we need each other. You're supposed to pick me up, slam me, look like you hate my guts and want to murder me. I'm supposed to get up safely and we're supposed to do that the next night.
- [104:56]
Cody Rhodes
Well, and you're putting your life in somebody else's hands.
- [104:58]
Bill Simmons
You're putting your life in someone else's hands. And wwe, I think, is more of a team minded unit than I've ever seen before. There are plenty of people who dislike each other. There's plenty of people who I. Oh, he's great. Love him. But never has it been more uniform. In terms of. Hunter is really good. Hunter and Nick are really good about. This is the direction. This is the direction. We're a team, we're all going. And that's not just the wrestlers, that's the whole company. Everybody gets on board with the team. So it's really. You just go at it with more love and commitment than you would if it was one of your buddies. Okay, One of your buddies. You can almost like jey. USO kicked my head off the other night on Raw. It was a replay of it. My whole face moves. It's like a boxing punch. I loved it. Right?
- [105:47]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [105:48]
Bill Simmons
But when you're working with someone that maybe there's not that trust and empathy and love with, then you go at it a little differently. But that makes great tv.
- [105:56]
Cody Rhodes
Who do you think is next generation, generation below you? So I'm gonna say in the 24 to 29 year old range to look out for. Who do you have your eye on? Anybody.
- [106:08]
Bill Simmons
There's so many guys, by the way.
- [106:10]
Cody Rhodes
I think, I think Rhea Ripley is incredible.
- [106:12]
Bill Simmons
Unreal, huh? And not to plug the.
- [106:14]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah, no, but I mean, I, I really like in person.
- [106:17]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [106:18]
Cody Rhodes
Probably the, the, the most presence of any female wrestler I've seen. And also really talented.
- [106:25]
Bill Simmons
I don't know how old she is, I think Ria. Well, that's, that's good.
- [106:28]
Cody Rhodes
She's probably in her prime, though. That's good.
- [106:30]
Bill Simmons
She's in wrestler prime, I think Ria's.
- [106:32]
Cody Rhodes
But there's no, there's no younger one.
- [106:34]
Bill Simmons
Where you're like, whoa, oh my gosh. There's more women training to get it in the business than there are men.
- [106:38]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [106:39]
Bill Simmons
So right now at the Nightmare Factory in my school, all my favorite students, I'm waiting for a guy to come along and finally have the skills. You know, I'm trying to think of a young up and comer at wwe because there are many.
- [106:51]
Cody Rhodes
Because there's probably some NXT stuff, right?
- [106:53]
Bill Simmons
Dominic Mysterio will end up becoming a massive. He already is. But dominant, has a connection with the audience and the work is coming. It's kind of reverse. The work is coming. But he's.
- [107:06]
Cody Rhodes
It gets heat, I gotta say. You can feel it in the, in the crowd.
- [107:08]
Bill Simmons
He also works with people that are really. He can see some. His father's the greatest example.
- [107:14]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [107:15]
Bill Simmons
When you around people like that, you learn things that no one can teach you. Right. And other than someone who is. I don't want to use the over word, but somebody who's extremely popular, someone who's over. So Dom is someone definitely to look out for in terms of specialness. My gosh. And then there's just a whole. I mean, if you look at nxt, Oba, who's coming up. Oba's really special. Ricky Saints, Ethan Page. Who. He's another one that if you, you meet Ethan Page, you. He could be 50 or he could be 25. He's, he's, he's, he's got a really unbelievable skill set. That's what I like the most about the. The WWE currently is that if someone was to move to go. We've got people ready. We've got people ready now. It's going to take time. We're talking about Roman. Takes time and takes years. My dad used to say it takes two years for a guy to really connect with the audience. Cena will tell you it takes five years for a guy to connect with the audience. Right. So that, that, that, that bastard. But, you know, the. I think we've got a lot of. Sean's really trained a lot of people, really. Right. But there's a lot.
- [108:21]
Cody Rhodes
So Sean was your guy. He was your favorite.
- [108:23]
Bill Simmons
I said, I've talked about him way more on this pocket. He was my favorite growing up. Yeah.
- [108:27]
Cody Rhodes
Because I went to the Boston Garden, WrestleMania when Tyson was the referee, and Sean had, like, basically a broken back. And they did the match.
- [108:36]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. And he.
- [108:38]
Cody Rhodes
He sells it. He does. Like, you. You wouldn't really know. You Knew he wasn't 100%, but you wouldn't really know the match end. It went dark.
- [108:44]
Bill Simmons
But did you know he was 100%?
- [108:46]
Cody Rhodes
Carry him off.
- [108:46]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. Did you know he was 100%, or was that the story going around the building that day?
- [108:50]
Cody Rhodes
Are you conspiracy billing me again?
- [108:51]
Bill Simmons
I think he's the best in the business at giving you something else. I just said, oh, he was sick. Because my dad on the couch behind me, I heard the kid's really sick and he's pale and he's backstage and they show him. I think it's him, Hunter and China, they're all walking. And then he goes out there and he looks super pissed off. He's also throwing his head into the steel steps with that weird toxic grit we were talking about. He might have had a bad back. He did. I mean, he clearly.
- [109:19]
Cody Rhodes
He had a. He disappeared for, like, two years.
- [109:21]
Bill Simmons
He might have had all those things. He might have had. I think it was bronchitis. Was the rumor going around in the. In my home? Or he might have just been Shawn Michaels and creating magic out of magic.
- [109:33]
Cody Rhodes
Unreal. You really give us the unreal.
- [109:36]
Bill Simmons
That's why if any fan is worried about Unreal, the work within the work, I will never. I don't let Chris Van Vliet, who's a wrestling podcast guy, he asked me one time the scariest question anyone's ever asked me in a podcast, and I didn't know how to answer it. He said, you seem like you're always in character. You're always wrestling, you're always talking. He goes, are you ever not? And in the moment, I realized, oh.
- [109:59]
Cody Rhodes
No, I think you're really like this, right?
- [110:01]
Bill Simmons
I think I am, too, but I might be too deep in Andrew Schultz. I do his podcast, and he's like, oh, he's just wrestler talking. And I'm thinking, am I? Am I? I don't know. I grew up in this. It's so hard for me, in turn, to determine, like, where are we at with all this? So, yeah, that was a scary question.
- [110:19]
Cody Rhodes
That was the weird thing. I remember Hunter came in. He has so many names. What do we call him? Paul? Triple H. Hunter. Like, what do we go with?
- [110:27]
Bill Simmons
I say, and I think it's the worst choice. I say Hunter, but then I hear others say Paul, but I don't know him as a Paul. And Then I see. I hear people like, hey, Trips. And I don't think I'm cool enough to hit him with a.
- [110:40]
Cody Rhodes
Trips.
- [110:41]
Bill Simmons
Hey, Trips.
- [110:41]
Cody Rhodes
Trips.
- [110:42]
Bill Simmons
Oh, yeah. So.
- [110:43]
Cody Rhodes
But yeah, I think Magic Johnson's teammates called him Buck. Like. Yeah. Like this extra nickname that. It was like a special nightclub for the.
- [110:49]
Bill Simmons
I just say Hunter.
- [110:50]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah. He came in to see us, like when I was at espn Grant. We did a pod.
- [110:54]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [110:55]
Cody Rhodes
And just being around and watching, like, different. The different version of him, I was like, oh, I think this is probably who he actually is. Like the low.
- [111:03]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [111:03]
Cody Rhodes
Soft spoken, kind of intense guy.
- [111:06]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [111:07]
Cody Rhodes
But then you see him in wrestling, he's a completely different human. You seem like you're around the same at all times.
- [111:13]
Bill Simmons
I mean, I'm a big fan of his. When I left, I was doing things to. I tried to steal a lot of his playbook. In terms of the EVP role. For example, I've modeled a lot of stuff after Hunter, but I find it if I don't ever have the chance. This is a perfect chance to. He is probably one of the top three. He's one of the most important people in my professional life. And it's like, I didn't know he was until so recently.
- [111:46]
Cody Rhodes
The first time you left, wasn't he, like, kind of shocked?
- [111:49]
Bill Simmons
Yes.
- [111:49]
Cody Rhodes
He's like, really?
- [111:50]
Bill Simmons
He shocked. And he was one of the first people to text me when I won a world title outside of wwe. Hey, good job. He had no reason to be watching that show. And maybe just the fact that he kept tabs on me, but all that kind of shame I had over not being able to do have this run that I've been so blessed to have that my dad never saw. I do take some solace in the fact that I get to be around Hunter because they were tight. So if my dad was to wake up and walk in the room and see Hunter and I holding my hand up at Wrestlemania or at these press events or things of that nature, there's something special about that. I don't know if it was destiny or what, but Hunter's been extremely. I watch him at all times almost because I love how he operates at wwe. I love how he runs the team. And, you know, part of me inside wouldn't mind another shot at. I'd love to try behind the scenes stuff. Right.
- [112:51]
Cody Rhodes
Well, if you get behind the scenes again, I. I'm just. The two championship belts are too confusing.
- [112:57]
Bill Simmons
2 chance.
- [112:58]
Cody Rhodes
So like a world title championship and then the world. It's like just. We need to call one of them like the WCW belt just like make it easier in my head. I'm, I'm.
- [113:07]
Bill Simmons
You need one. You need one title, huh?
- [113:09]
Cody Rhodes
I, I, I like the old days when it was the WWF title and the Intercontinental title and we had the two titles.
- [113:15]
Bill Simmons
You're not wrong. Do you know the reason why two titles? It's not wrestlers and it's not the booking. You know why we have to have those for the two different shows. For the two different shows. It's them. It's their fault. It's. Well, we want the champion on our show. All right, well this is that champion. And then so, but can you imagine.
- [113:31]
Cody Rhodes
If the NBA did this where it's like yeah, Oklahoma City won the title. But the, what's the, what's the thing they do in Vegas? The Commissioner Cup.
- [113:41]
Bill Simmons
Oh yeah.
- [113:41]
Cody Rhodes
Cup was elevated. It was the same level. And it's like there's the Commissioner cup title, the Milwaukee Bucks.
- [113:47]
Bill Simmons
I'll say one thing about the two titles that helps us though is the guy who's wearing the world title and the guy who's wearing the WWE title always are looking at each other of the thought like I'm better than you or I want to be better than you. I want to. And when you get to a live event like say you're just doing a non televised live event, well, who's on last? Right. That's the. So there's a again the real competition that sits under.
- [114:10]
Cody Rhodes
That's day one, day two. Because SummerSlam's two days. Yeah. So what's the better day? Because like when I went to WrestleMania, I went to day one. Day two's the, the prestigious day. Right. Or does it they both days.
- [114:22]
Bill Simmons
So they both are technically main events. So that's not a lie. When we say, oh, WrestleMania main event.
- [114:27]
Cody Rhodes
Which day would you rather be on?
- [114:29]
Bill Simmons
Sunday.
- [114:29]
Cody Rhodes
Okay.
- [114:30]
Bill Simmons
And that's just again back to old school wrestler toxic. I want to be the last thing they see before they go home. And well, I like the two day.
- [114:39]
Cody Rhodes
Thing because I, I went to the famous with my son. The New York WrestleMania that was. I think I'm still there actually. I don't. The long died. Yeah. The one that was like seven plus hours.
- [114:52]
Bill Simmons
This MetLife was.
- [114:53]
Cody Rhodes
I think I'm there still right now.
- [114:54]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, those. Well that's why we have two nights.
- [114:56]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah. And it was the longest day of my life. My son, of course, loved it. Didn't pee once and was locked in.
- [115:01]
Bill Simmons
He was locked in.
- [115:02]
Cody Rhodes
Locked in.
- [115:02]
Bill Simmons
Well also I love. He didn't pee one time.
- [115:04]
Cody Rhodes
He Was.
- [115:05]
Bill Simmons
He was.
- [115:06]
Cody Rhodes
Didn't want to miss one thing.
- [115:09]
Bill Simmons
Night one. There is a. If a wrestler's told you're on night one, often they might say one thing outwardly, but inwardly, night one is a huge opportunity because the crowd is prime. Yeah, it's prime. And I feel like it makes it so that night two. If you're a night two guy, it's a lot harder. Now bar has been set. We just saw. How are you going to. And then when a good night one guy ends up on night two, they're in the same position. So there's a beauty to night one as well. There really is. I like. So I've had four WrestleMania main events. My mom only would say it's three because she doesn't count night one, but she's not. Oh, interesting. I count night one.
- [115:50]
Cody Rhodes
Tough credit.
- [115:51]
Bill Simmons
Yeah, well, she's as tough as they get. I mean, she grew up around Andre the Giant and Dusty Rhodes, so very little I've ever done has impressed her. But when I can get her, it's pretty solid.
- [116:04]
Cody Rhodes
So you need Pretty solid, but you need the. Need the title back.
- [116:10]
Bill Simmons
It's funny when you're around someone who was around the business, my dad, and married to him the majority of his professional career, and still says things like, I was sad you lost the title. I was sad. And then still ask you things like, oh, that's nice. He gets carried around. Yeah. Oh, my God. It's great for moments like this.
- [116:29]
Cody Rhodes
Could have brought it today. Bring it today.
- [116:30]
Bill Simmons
Everyone takes a picture with it. It's a whole thing. But it's. It's. It's sad, though, when she calls you then, hey, how you doing? Well, good. Yeah. It's just. She's still. She's still. I guess it's real to her, you know, that's hard.
- [116:45]
Cody Rhodes
The worst part is losing the title. But then you have to figure out when's the right time to do the. The roll. The roll out of the ring. Oh, the walk of shame. It's like a roll of shame.
- [116:57]
Bill Simmons
I yelled at somebody on my walk of shame. Somebody was telling me to go side ramp, which is also lovingly called by Production Losers Lane. And I will. I would. I would rather take a $25,000 fine than ever Walk side ramp. I will get main ramp. I will walk up the ramp with my sad face.
- [117:19]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [117:19]
Bill Simmons
And I will, because I want to feel every bit of that.
- [117:21]
Cody Rhodes
Do what? Do the look back depends on the sad look back. Wondering what happened.
- [117:27]
Bill Simmons
I think sad look back sometimes that might be their moment. And if sad look back takes away from their moment. I just want to know that I walked down this thing and I'm walking back up it now, win, lose or draw, that's. That's, that's part of it. So, so many poor. It's never their fault. I apologize to them in advance. If you tell me to go side ramp, you're gonna have to hold the show 30 seconds. Cause I'm not going side ramp. It's. I, it's as odd as that is, that is where I draw the line. I will not be going side ramp. But that's all that moment is. It's. It's their moment. You roll out, you know, and we.
- [118:01]
Cody Rhodes
Have to go because I kept you too long. But I did want to ask you why. Why managers? Why we just don't have more of them and why it feels like the most unexplored terrain in wrestling. Like, why couldn't Shane Gillis do like a three month. He just starts managing somebody, getting involved, doing, doing stuff on the mic. How did we get away from this? Cyndi Lauper, way back when, when she got involved and did a little thing and it was really fun. I don't know why we're not messing around with this more.
- [118:30]
Bill Simmons
I think managers, it's a great question. It boils down to. Nobody wants to train to be a. They don't want to be a manager anymore. For example, Bobby Heenan and J.J. dillon, two of the greatest managers ever to Jimmy Hart and other outstanding. They trained. They could also be wrestlers. They could take a bump. They probably were referees at some point. They were everything.
- [118:53]
Cody Rhodes
So if you're a manager, you're gonna at some point take a couple bumps.
- [118:56]
Bill Simmons
Exactly. So today people will be like, well, how do I train to be a manager? No, you train to be a wrestler and then maybe wrestling determines that you are a manager and that you can help build somebody up or help get heat for somebody or be a. Like Bobby Heenan was be a mouthpiece for somebody.
- [119:11]
Cody Rhodes
I don't forget about the smoking hot managers. Ms. Elizabeth was an iconic 80s person.
- [119:17]
Bill Simmons
Oh my gosh.
- [119:17]
Cody Rhodes
For all teenage boys, I would love.
- [119:19]
Bill Simmons
For there to be managers everywhere.
- [119:23]
Cody Rhodes
Just bring them back. Just experiment. During the dead part of the WWE schedule, I just feel like they should start trotting them out.
- [119:29]
Bill Simmons
I'm really trying to think of an example of somebody who would be an outstanding manager. But I mean, so here's another reason why. And this is this. You're going to hate this answer, but this is a true answer why. Maybe there's no managers anymore. Yeah, it is hard to be a manager when Mr. Heyman, when Paul Heyman's on the show because he's so much better than everyone.
- [119:48]
Cody Rhodes
But that's. That. That tells me there should be more managers then.
- [119:51]
Bill Simmons
Well, there should be someone trying. There should. You know, so when we had.
- [119:55]
Cody Rhodes
Paul Heyman's been involved in some of the best wrestling moments of all time.
- [119:58]
Bill Simmons
Oh. And he's partly a mind behind some of these moments, but, you know. And then you had Cornette back in the day, who was such an outstanding manager for his guys and really helped. I just feel like more guys who get into wrestling schools and go to NXT or whatever, don't be afraid to look into that. It doesn't mean it's the end. I mean, I was.
- [120:17]
Cody Rhodes
When I was growing up, we had Blassie, we had Lou Albano, we had the Wizard.
- [120:21]
Bill Simmons
The Grand Wizard. Yeah.
- [120:23]
Cody Rhodes
We had Jimmy Hart.
- [120:25]
Bill Simmons
Yep.
- [120:26]
Cody Rhodes
There were some bad ones, but. And then there was. Missy Hyatt was popping up and you laid Texas.
- [120:30]
Bill Simmons
All those managers you just laid out were there for Macho, who's going to be Macho's manager. And then instead of picking any of the greats, he picked Liz. I remember she walks in and it's shocking. He didn't go with the ones he had.
- [120:43]
Cody Rhodes
A great gimmick that's sitting there for somebody. You had. I liked when you did your. I'm so handsome. Don't touch my face. Yeah, I like that one. But I like the super rich. I think that's sitting there for somebody. The Million dollar man in 2025. That gimmick is just sitting there for somebody.
- [121:03]
Bill Simmons
Here's what it would also take to get a good manager. You need a young talent who wants to take care of his manager. Because often it looks like the manager takes care of the talent on screen.
- [121:12]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah. The relationships, the stuff behind the scenes.
- [121:15]
Bill Simmons
You have to make sure your guy gets there. They're older at this point. Your guy gets there, your guy's okay. He's happy in his life. He's happy to be on the road. I don't know if a lot of young guys are looking for that person that they could have.
- [121:29]
Cody Rhodes
It's almost like getting a dog.
- [121:31]
Bill Simmons
It's very much like there's a dog out.
- [121:33]
Cody Rhodes
I have a manager. I got to go everywhere with this guy.
- [121:35]
Bill Simmons
But that's the thing. If it's going to work, you've got to go everywhere. It's like a tag team. You be you and I become a tag team. Well, then we have to drive to the show.
- [121:43]
Cody Rhodes
People in the 80s felt that we're like, fuck, I got Captain Lou Albano 100% fly with this guy. They were showered in a week and a half.
- [121:50]
Bill Simmons
Hunter talks about all the managers that Vince suggested that he hated.
- [121:54]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah.
- [121:55]
Bill Simmons
And then ultimately they found China and that they were off and running. So it does have to be a good fit.
- [122:00]
Cody Rhodes
You have to, you know, the rich guy manager or rich guy wrestler thing sitting there for somebody.
- [122:04]
Bill Simmons
Logan Paul with a manager would be really good. Logan Paul would be really great with a manager.
- [122:09]
Cody Rhodes
Like a former hedge fund crypto guy who cashed out and now he just really wants the word.
- [122:13]
Bill Simmons
Crypto amongst wrestling fans is we're booing. If I, If I ever did a. If I ever did a manager, I would have them not. I wouldn't speak. I'd have them speak. I would no longer speak anymore.
- [122:25]
Cody Rhodes
If I ever had a couple like Kane, there were a couple of wrestlers that just relied on the manager to talk.
- [122:30]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. That's the other thing. That's a big question that there's a whole room of people like, well, this guy. Oh, we forgot about Slick.
- [122:34]
Cody Rhodes
That was another manager that.
- [122:35]
Bill Simmons
That's. I think it's okay that you forgot about Slick.
- [122:38]
Cody Rhodes
He's great.
- [122:39]
Bill Simmons
No, no, Slick was a great. He was a great man.
- [122:41]
Cody Rhodes
He had some good ones.
- [122:42]
Bill Simmons
There's so many good managers.
- [122:44]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah. And there's come back managers. That's my big note.
- [122:46]
Bill Simmons
It's a freebie in front of a live crowd. Oh, the manager gets tossed out. The ref gets to do this whole thing. It's a freebie. That's a free reaction.
- [122:54]
Cody Rhodes
Guest manager is great too. I like the Shane Gillis just popping in for two months, doing one back and forth promo where he's just roasting somebody but then just kind of being around.
- [123:04]
Bill Simmons
I think if you get a manager today who's a bad guy manager, the audience needs to let up a little bit on the cancel. They need to be able to get, get a little buck with it, get a little wild. Because if we are, if we're not, let's do it. If we're not able to get heat, then none of this works. And it's just, we're all friends, just, hey, good guys.
- [123:22]
Cody Rhodes
Wrestling, you know, that shocked me. So I went to the Netflix LA in January.
- [123:27]
Bill Simmons
Oh, yeah.
- [123:27]
Cody Rhodes
When Hogan came out and he got booed.
- [123:29]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [123:31]
Cody Rhodes
And he didn't read where the room was. And flip, which I thought was, was. I was like, oh, he's just too old now because in the old days, he would have read the room.
- [123:41]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [123:41]
Cody Rhodes
But like, oh, the room's going this way. I'm gonna zag. And be like, how dare you guys, Brother.
- [123:46]
Bill Simmons
He powered through.
- [123:47]
Cody Rhodes
Yeah. Because. Because the Rock's done that a couple times where he's. Oh, the room's going there.
- [123:53]
Bill Simmons
All right.
- [123:54]
Cody Rhodes
I'm just gonna zag. Which is like. It's like wrestler ESP almost.
- [123:58]
Bill Simmons
Right before he went out, Hogan and I, we had a conversation backstage, and he had Real American Beer. He was talking about the beer. He had a duffel bag. Like a custom real American beer duffel bag with a bunch of beers in it. And I wanted to try one of them. I thought, oh, I want to try one of Hulk's beers. And I talked to him, and then he decided he was going to give me the whole duffel bag. So I had this whole refrigerated duffel bag. And because he was there with his son Nick, and I. I'm so blessed that I got that moment because I thought the beer was good. I thought the beer was good. But my bus driver, thankfully, he's not driving, drinking these while driving, but that's his beer. Wow. And that bag is still on the bus. It wasn't like a thing that. Like some swag that didn't make it. That bag is his bag that he's. He's about it. So it was a nice gift I got from him because I didn't, you know, I didn't know things were going to go like they did. But, yeah, I got the Real American Beer duffel bag.
- [124:51]
Cody Rhodes
What was the number one most starstruck you've been by a wrestler?
- [124:55]
Bill Simmons
It might have been him when he came to WCW when I was a kid. Because seeing him, right. I'd only ever seen him, really on tv. Gosh. But. But I didn't get it. It's a real weird answer. The most starstruck and more scared I ever was. Oh, man. Dr. Isaac, that guy was no close. Oh, I say close. But Shockmaster, Harley Race, Harley Race, Shockmaster was married to my Aunt Bobby, so I wasn't scared of Shockmaster at all.
- [125:25]
Cody Rhodes
Is that true?
- [125:26]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. And Berkeley, this is just some fun lore for you guys. Berkeley, his son is the beloved we love. Berkeley is the timekeeper at ringside. He's been that for many years. Yeah, he's very good at his job.
- [125:39]
Cody Rhodes
So Harley Race, Harley Race was the.
- [125:41]
Bill Simmons
First I felt like Harley Race, who was older and Vader's manager at the time, seven time NWA World champion. I felt like he could still be NWA World Champion. He looked like Harley Race.
- [125:50]
Cody Rhodes
There's. There's a couple guys where you just feel like these are the guys you want on your side of a bar. And 1:30 in the morning, I think he's like number one, right. They always used to talk about how he could kick everybody's ass, you know?
- [126:03]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. Himaku. I feel today, like, it's an easy choice if you're going into a bar fight. You hear all these creative answers, like, I'm just going to take Chad Gable because he's a former Olympian alternate. And then any of the Samoans, we're winning the fight, we're going to. You know, I don't have to even get up. Like, yeah, you got him. Oh, like one little fake kick at the end, like. Yeah.
- [126:23]
Cody Rhodes
So I think Undertaker probably had a 15 year run there on the 90s 2000s, where it's like, that's your. That's your choice in the dark alley.
- [126:30]
Bill Simmons
Yeah. I mean, you could get creative with it. There'd be some fun choices. But to me, I'm. Some of these athletes I'm around, I'm like, ah, nah, just Chad Gable is. Everyone's getting twisted up. And no, it's not going to be violent. He's just going to put him down in that uncomfortable, humbling type way, you know?
- [126:43]
Cody Rhodes
Right. Yeah, that's smart.
- [126:44]
Bill Simmons
Yeah.
- [126:45]
Cody Rhodes
This was great.
- [126:46]
Bill Simmons
This was so much fun.
- [126:47]
Cody Rhodes
Good luck. Good luck with that freaking turncoat jerk.
- [126:50]
Bill Simmons
Cena, I love how upset you are with him.
- [126:53]
Cody Rhodes
Well, he let down two generations of children.
- [126:57]
Bill Simmons
I'll be upset if he doesn't show up. Like the John we all know and love. I'll be upset if we just get this.
- [127:03]
Cody Rhodes
Maybe he can come back to some sense of human normalization on his fan base.
- [127:09]
Bill Simmons
Jon is a man of his word. The reality is, 11 shows left, he might be that wrestler that, like, oh, yeah, it's gonna. Oh, no. And he's gone.
- [127:19]
Cody Rhodes
Well, if we've learned anything in the history of professional wrestling, it's that nobody ever actually retires. So I believe it when I see it.
- [127:25]
Bill Simmons
You. And I think that one you will see, he might be the one person who is more serious than ever about its time. You guys, Are you. You.
- [127:33]
Cody Rhodes
Unless there's some, like, Stone Cold, like, had a neck injury, like, he had to stop, you know, like if there's some sort of physical thing where it's like, you can't do this anymore, but for the most part, part to walk.
- [127:43]
Bill Simmons
Away, I don't even think we'll see Jon returning in cameo roles. I think he this is it.
- [127:49]
Cody Rhodes
Wow.
- [127:49]
Bill Simmons
Which is why at SummerSlam I'm very excited because as much as we'll know.
- [127:53]
Cody Rhodes
Maybe he should retire and think about some of the choices he made over the last year.
- [127:57]
Bill Simmons
Do you tell him? You. You tell him.
- [127:59]
Cody Rhodes
You know, letting down entire arenas of kids crying.
- [128:03]
Bill Simmons
Kids crying.
- [128:04]
Cody Rhodes
Really terrible.
- [128:05]
Bill Simmons
Hit me with my watch too.
- [128:07]
Cody Rhodes
Great to spend time with you in person.
- [128:08]
Bill Simmons
Thanks for doing this Bet on Yourself club. Yeah, we're in it.
- [128:13]
Cody Rhodes
All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Cody Rhodes. Thanks to Eduardo and Gahao as well. I'm maybe coming back on Sunday. I will definitely have a podcast over the next seven days. Don't forget about Rewatchables on Monday and I'll see you in a couple days. Must be 21 plus in President select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 + in President D.C. gambling problem. Call 100 Gambler or visit rg-help.com, call 1-887-897777 or visit ccpg.org chat in Connecticut or visit mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit gamblinghelplianma.org or call 800-327-550 for 24. 7 support in Massachusetts or call 1-877-8-HOPE NY or text hopeny in New York.