Kenny Omega on Cody Rhodes leaving AEW: Wrestling Observer Live 

I hope Cody's first WWE appearance involves him meticulously super-glueing a throne back together.

Hearing Kenny call it the "Codyverse" makes so much sense for the last few years of AEW. This sounds like absolutely the right move for Cody and for AEW.

“This is probably the big thing that everyone’s been talking about since I guess Monday night, Monday afternoon.” “Stone Cold Steve Austin baby!“ 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

In the beginning stages of forming AEW, Cody made it believable that the WWE was the heel and AEW was the face, so in the end Cody did turned heel by going back to the WWE.

This situation is slightly tragic and largely bittersweet. It's clear these are all passionate people who just had different ideas about what AEW should be, and it showed in how Cody's segments felt so different from everything else on the show at times.

Kenny is very well spoken. This is worth a listen.

Idk how there's so many people that absolutely hates Kenny he's such a well spoken humble guy

The most interesting thing to me was hearing Kenny acknowledge the "Codyverse" by name. 😂

Kenny has a great sense of humor

Kenny is so intelligent and such a class act. I could listen to him talk about the business all day. I hope he gets a full time podcast when his career is over.

I always said kenny well spoken intelligent guy, we need more of him in interview

Man, Kenny sounds so calm and colected, I am really impressed how well-spoken he is. Awesome interview.

"We're not an alternative, we're straight up competition". Remember that?

I love how Kenny was like "flight to Saudi" while giggling about how terrible that is

Yknow, if Kenny ever decides to hang up his boots and transition into a full time promoter, I think he'd be really good at it.

Cody was becoming something similar to John Cena in aew and I liked it. The crowd was so against him and he got great reactions. The Codyverse always kept my attention cause I wanted to see how he would get to the World Title. Hope he comes back in a couple years.

There have been outlets framing this as some kind of diss towards Cody, but i don’t get that from this at all. This is such a mature and frankly kind response. I’m surprised he answered to that degree. I don’t doubt there is love and respect however different they thought about things.

Feel like the biggest difference between them was that Cody felt he had people to prove himself to. He wanted to show Vince/HHH what they'd missed. Bucks and Omega never had that same level of chip on their shoulder need to do that.

Kenny is such a nice guy. God bless him 😊

I’m gonna miss cody on dynamite. that sammy vs cody ladder match was amazing . he left out with a banger under his belt

Idk how anyone who is a wrestling fan can dislike Kenny Omega.

This was somehow a very insightful answer while also being very kind and reasonable. I am becoming more and more a fan of Kenny. It took me a little bit, mostly because I was probably tainted by listening to Corny before I had even seen Kenny wrestle. His hand motions and posing in the ring does get a little annoying but there are tons of wrestlers that do that.

I think that is the hardest I've ever heard Dave laugh. But to be fair, the joke was hilarious.

Stone cold bay bay hahaha

to be honest, Cody always sounded like the outsider of the EVPs and I just couldn't see Cody gelling with the others

I truly hope Cody is in talks with whats left of ROH to be a booker there and help them out

Even though I’m a longtime mark, I’ll believe this is a work until Rhodes is standing in the middle of a WWE ring.

Kenny's such a smart guy!

Kenny and the Bucks have never made it a WAR with WWE, because they have no issues with Vince McMahon. They never got screwed over, they weren't brought up in WWE and were offered huge contracts right before the founding of AEW. Cody was the last of the EVPs to sign according to the Buck's book. He wanted more power over booking and Tony Khan wasn't feeling that. I do think Tony needs to focus more on character for a lot of his talent, but that's about it.

Glad to hear Tony is solely running the show now. It just doesn’t work with all those cooks in the kitchen

This interview clears the question that Cody wanted "more power" than he was allowed to be by Tony Khan. He clearly saw a different vision to what AEW is now. But that being said, TK has really improved on their initial plans and completely shot AEW to the moon

If Cody wasnt happy then he should do what makes him happy. Problem is how in the actual fuck does Cody going back to WWE solve any of the "issues" that cause him to leave Aew? There may be a honeymoon period for Cody if he goes to WWe. That said he will not be allowed to bleed (which is one of his favorite things), he will be required to clear every word of his promos with a team (if they let him create them in the 1st place), and he sure as hell wont be able to reach that consistent 5 star match quality he has been chasing for years. I wish Cody the best but I think he is about to make a mistake made by his father back in the late 80s.

If this is a giant work, bravo. After seeing Brock Lesnar destroy everyone in the Elimination Chamber and make AJ Styles and Seth Rollins look like geeks, I can't imagine Cody there doing anything of note there. He has to know that.

Crisis on infinite rassling multiverse.🤔

I wish things could've been different, but not everyone is going to stay in x specific company forever. Also I'm glad Kenny is positive toward the WWE workers. Not everyone over there is like Vince or Nick Kahn, or Prichard or Ace.

Codyverse over there doing what ever he does, that’s it in a nut shell.

Cody overreached his grasp to me. I think his focus on being a celebrity was definitely outweighing his overall commitment to the company. I also said this before I think absolutely Tony was pushing back against Brandi and what her goals were in the company and I think she was humbled. I cant speak to how much that had to do with all of this but absolutely no question she was given a tough pill to swallow as far as being a prominent on air figure. Nothing she ever did got over on TV as a matter of fact she hurt the shows she was on. If Cody felt obligated to stand by her that is what a good husband does but from a television perspective she had no value and came across entitled to it.l

It’s a shame Omega vs Cody never happened in AEW

Very interesting point, Cody was really the leader of the revolution. He was the guy who rallied us behind AEW and against WWE, even kept taking shots at them Then he said he would never turn 🥺🥺 then he turned his back on us

If they were all doing their own thing (Kenny doing his thing, Bucks doing their thing, Cody doing his thing), I would say that I was rolling my eyes at a lot of Cody's stuff. His story had some Russo/Jeff Jarrett vibes with some HHH reign of terror. I feel like he legitimately wanted to be the Hogan or "face" of the company and was doing it in a way that Vince does things, shoving it down our throats to the point to where we got tired of it. For me the last straw was Rhodes to the Top and the Go Big Show advertising and the angles around it. Egotistical and self-absorbed. It seemed like the crowd started to feel the same when his belt got thrown back to him and when he got booed loudly for beating Malakai Black. Kenny holding the title, I knew it was leading to making Hangman a star and man did he deliver. The Bucks... same thing, establishing the Lucha Brother, FTR, and showing off the tag-team roster. Cody... depends, he made Brodie Lee look powerful then came back and negated the win. Same with Sammy. Lance Archer should have been the first TNT Champion that night. I still think that this is another Cody angle. However, if he actually did leave, then he did become the Hogan of the company. I still respect him a ton but if he goes back to WWE, it's gone. I would have had the same opinion on CM Punk if he went back to WWE. It's pure hypocrisy.

Sounds like Cody wanted to really go to war with WWE but the other EVPs didn’t want and wanted to do their own thing, still a weird reason to leave the company he started but Idk

In the end I think Cody's vision was "WWE but done right", while the Bucks, Kenny and Tony was something different, more of a mix of the old school of pro wrestling booking and the modern style of professional wrestling, molded by the rise of Independent wrestling and Japanese pro-wrestling. And It makes sense, that's what The Bucks and Kenny have grown up inside of, while Cody was a WWE guy first, with a huge chip on his shoulder and somewhat of a vengeance in his mind for the way his father was unappreciated in WWE in his times there. To Cody is either succeed in WWE or succeeding against it. WWE vs NWA/JCP/WCW. That's what HE has grown up inside of.

Can't wait until Cody smashes a Jags helmet on Raw before jobbing to Roman and becoming Stardust again.

The Codyverse is what led to the fans turning on Cody he was so far removed from everyone and everything else

2 guys i'd always love to hearing speak about life, Kenny Omega & andrew Garfield. They can talk anything about everything and wil be worth listen

Kenny is the embodiment of professionalism, this interview shows it.

“Cody is not a guy I get a Diet Pepsi with in the off time.” Kenny Omega

Knowing now how Cody really thinks, he will probably view this as burial when in reality it was the most diplomatic answer possible. I look forward to the bucks addressing it when they are ready, I think they will be more brutally honest. Kudos to Kenny for addressing it though, im sure it wasn’t easy.

A lot of people here pointing out that the Bucks took some shots, but in their defence, that was mostly on BTE. Cody was out there on national TV smashing thrones, taking out golden shovels, and teasing pedigrees.

i wonder what Cody's vision was... one day I hope he returns and the departure would be an obvious good way to get out of his no title challenge stipulation and would also allow him to get rid of the cena heat he had built up.

This is really interesting, and thinking back now it was mostly Cody who tried to make a war. While I do think that might have worked to bring in some anti WWE fans in im not sure it was the best way to go in the long run. Mox I think mentioned WWE once or twice and so has Punk, but Codey smashed up a throne!! Wrestletalk called anything Codey was in the "Cody Zone", and again looking back now the Cody bits of the show were almost separate from everything else. Perhaps its a good thing Cody is either doing other things or taking a break who knows until its confirmed. AEW needed Codey at the beginning and without him and ALL In AEW probably wouldn't exist, but AEW now will be just fine without him. Good luck to him.

I don't hate Cody but while he's had a lot of fantastic matches and segments he's also been apart of many of the worst things AEW has done and the fact that the fans were so split on him proves that his ideas weren't the greatest and not to sound rude but pretty much everything Brandi did was awful. Meanwhile just about every time Omega or the Young Bucks have been on TV it's been pretty good or great. Kenny was apart of the bomb not going off but that wasn't his fault at all whereas Cody's weigh in(even beyond the scale which wasn't his fault), England VS US promo, weird Ladder match booking(the one Scoprio Sky won) and more were all Cody's ideas. I could totally understand Tony Khan not resigning Cody if one of his conditions was to get more creative control or influence over booking. Don't get me wrong though Cody contributed a lot of great stuff. His match with Dustin was the best match on the first show, taking himself out of the world title picture elevated the TNT title, his promos were always delivered well even if the messages were unpopular, the open challenges were consistently good, he put people over all the time, and his ladder match with Sammy was a fantastic finale. I just think don't think the guy should have more influence in booking especially if Brandi is apart of the deal. Tony Khan should have the final say in everything but if wanting more influence in booking wasn't a reason why he left though then I guess none of this matters anyway though.

I don't hate cody, to me he was actually becoming something in AEW and one day he would have been a mega superstar. He has a lot of heat but after all the hard work he did in each match, who could say he was not trying harder than anybody. I thought that soon he would reach the top and then nobody could deny his toughness and skill. I thought that is what he was doing. But he's really gone back to WWE. Give it a few months, there is no way the fans will see him as a star to watch as a champion over Reigns. SMH. Hell, since AEW came out i don't even watch WWE clips on youtube. I ain't going back to watch Cody's tragic downfall over there.

Cody lost a lot of leverage by refusing to turn heel. Could have been the biggest heel on AEW and I completely understand why he didn’t want to turn.

Kenny is so well spoken.

Kenny is just awesome

Feelings changed as soon as WWE offered Cody more money. We call that a “sell out” I hope WWE puts in on a polkadot onesie and jobs him out to the NxT 2.0 guys.

Let's be real for 2 seconds: there will be many, many departures from AEW in the future that will shock us all (and many will end up in WWE). It's the nature of the business. I wouldn't be surprised if Omega left AEW in the future as well. That's just how it goes.

What doesn't make sense to me, is that Cody apparently left AEW because he no longer has any creative say, to go to a company that he will have ZERO creative power when it comes to anything.

Great insight to the situation.

At this point im begging all the gods and higher powers in the world for Kenny to not just leave when his deal is up. I love him in AEW and I want him here where I know he will be treated with respect

this makes me wonder about the elite vs cody backstage heat even more even if they say "there's no heat"

yeah so true about Cody being the one pushing hard at the whole "WWE Vs AEW" thing. thats what makes it so weird

Man, every time I hear kenny speak he comes across as such a lovely guy. legend.

Wow, you expect vague politician-esque answers but Kenny went into detail! Although interesting to hear that the divide appeared to be about whether there was an implicit or explicit "war" with WWE... Young Bucks are just as guilty as Cody for taking shots at WWE, admittedly mainly on BTE, but they were never subtle and usually pretty on the nose.

Issa work!

He speaks so eloquently and in a positive light.

If this is just a work, it’s being done at a high level.

Kenny, "I'm up next year. Done!" KENNY OMEGA TO WWE CONFIRMED!!!!!

I read the big quotes and thought this would be Kenny just verbally wailing on Cody, but actually hearing it is a very different thing.

Totally bummed we aren’t getting that 5 star Brandi Rhodes/Paige Van Zandt iron woman clinic

Kenny Omega you are one of THE BEST WRESTLERS TO EVER DO IT.LOVE YOU AS A WRESTLER 2 THUMBS UP

In 2 years we'll see Cody back in AEW with his departure spun into a storyline and all anyone will be talking about is whether or not it was all a work with WWE being used as a pawn for a greater storyline.

This is actually pretty well articulated but guessing he is omitting some stuff

This is very telling

Kenny Omega's contract is up next year? Finally something to be HOPEFUL about.

Kenny is so well spoken

I find it interesting with all of the theories, no one has mentioned this. I know alot of guys who totally freak out when they have their first kid and think only about making as much money as possible to support the family. This may just be a basic mid life crisis that every guy goes through. Re-evaluating his choices and where he is heading. I am sure WWE is waving alot of $$$$ and he may want to pursue the acting and tv side where he doesn't take the physical beating or put in the same kind of hours.

note image of cody does not have the neck tattoo

What a thoughtful answer.

Who are the “original 4” Kenny mentions

The best work in the history of professional wrestling.

So those rumors of the riff between EVPs was obviously true. I feel like Kenny said so much without really saying it “We always got along professionally but he’s not the kind of guy I’d go grab a Pepsi with after work, “last I heard he was on flight to Saudi Arabia, whatever makes you happy I guess”.

What Cody did for AEW and lending more credibility out of the gate was invaluable. After a short time, I had no idea why he was there. It wasn't even part of the show anymore. I am pretty sure things will realign in the future and I don't hate him. It's obvious AEW tried to make Cody's stuff work, but it absolutely didn't fit and that really sucks because the stuff he and Dustin did out of the gate is classic, five-star storytelling and wrestling and no one can take any of that away. It's just nuts how much classic stuff AEW has now.

Kenny was definitely toeing a very proper line in what he was saying. You can tell he is a very intelligent person and was choosing his words very carefully.

fine w me.. im tired of seeing nightmare family wrestlers anyway

Normally, not a fan of Kenny. But he’s breakdown of Cody’s situation is very good. Really intelligent. I respect he’s breakdown on things

I liked Cody that first year and a half in AEW vs WWE felt like WCW vs WWF it was awesome now all these old WWE guys come and it doesnt feel like the same anymore AEW or AEW vs WWE anymore

hard to go back and listen to those early Cody promos now. Just sounds like a guy who's full of it.

Kenny is beginning to sound more and more like Edge with every phone interview I hear.

Bro yall are so weird no matter the reason of him leaving he clearly did what's best for him as a human being why can't yall support that?

I wonder what was in that blood contract that made Cody sign possibly WWE

The thing about not wanting to be competition ... you don't decide who sees you as competition and who doesn't ....... The fact is when you're running a business that produces the same product as someone else you are competing with them. Most people will favor one brand of X over another even if they actually like both products.

I like Cody. I think he is an incredible performer. And this is complete speculation: but I could totally see him being hard to work with...having ideas that doesn't really 'fit'. There were definitely elements to Cody's and Brandi's story arcs that felt very all over the place and lacking a clear narrative focus.

It's definitely not an issue about money.. It's now an issue about Cody's massive ego, clamouring for absolute booking power, and protecting his wife from criticisms on her head-scratching booking on the shows.

Essentially, Kenny Ratified What Everyone Thought. Cody Wanted More Control & That’s Why (I Was Wondering) Tony Started To Have More Of A Presence Online & On Screen To Show He’s The Boss & Cody Developed His Own Thing Programming-Wise To Be On Par. Sometimes Success Produces Bad Fruit…

Kenny is such a sweetheart.

Fav Wrestler for a reason

I really assumed these guys were all alot closer

I love Kenny