Cody Rhodes Is Back

Thus far the biggest story of 2022 has by far been the departure of one of AEW's founders leaving the company. Cody Rhodes departed AEW earlier this year for unclear reasons, but what we do know is that soon after Cody left AEW he resigned with WWE. Before leaving the promotion in 2016 the WWE was home Cody for the better part of ten years. I think everyone knew that at some point someone would jump ship from AEW back to WWE and nobody expected that the first person to jump would be Cody. Back in 2019, Cody was at the forefront of the announcement of All Elite Wrestling alongside the Young Bucks and Kenny Omega. 

In my opinion, the best thing that WWE could do is allow Cody to do a few weeks of sit down interviews with either Michael Cole or Jimmy Smith to explain why he came back to WWE and where he's been for the last few years. Cody could start his return in WWE by having a similar run to CM Punk's in AEW where Cody competes against those stars who either weren't in WWE when he last was with the company. 

It would be fair to compare the return of Cody Rhodes to the return of Drew McIntyre who departed the company only to return a few years later with his name value a lot higher then was when he left. I still think it will be a few weeks before fans will allow the reality to set in that Cody is actually back in WWE. Especially if WWE persists to present Cody in the exact way he was presented in AEW that will be just as surprising, because in a way it would be admitting that they did something right. If Night one was any indication then the future is bright, but it is still way to early to pass judgement or push expectations forward for what we will see from Cody in WWE. For now we will just have to wait and see what happens as right now we are at a bit of a Cross Rhodes.