Cody Rhodes Quotes

I came from the independent scene, and I've wrestled in front of a crowd of four people in a car lot in 104 degrees in Fayetteville, North Carolina.

Paul Heyman works with Brock. The magic works between Brock and Paul because of their dynamic and their chemistry.

We value the independent wrestling scene, and it's our goal to strengthen it.

When I was a little kid, WWF was all I had access to. After a year or two when I found the indies and could watch wrestling live, it was just as big a deal to me as WWF.

When you get a record attendance for What Culture Pro Wrestling - or just recently with Matt Cross, we did a record attendance for Next Gen in Tennessee. These are various brands. They're not rinky-dink. They're small - they're not WWE - but their soul is there.

Was I a fan of WWE? Yeah, of course, but I knew it was not going to be a thing for me, until NXT came to the foreground and a lot of my friends who I was competing against on the independent scene were getting signed.

I don't have the same knack for the business end that my old man did. Recruiting people has been tough. I don't envy anyone in that spot, especially some of the great non-WWE promoters like 'Evolves' Gabe Sapolsky, Beyond Wrestling's Drew Cordeiro, or Markus Mac at All Pro Wrestling.

House Hardy - myself and Brother Nero - are pioneers. My style of booking during early independent bookings was very similar to what 'Ring of Honor' later became, which is what WWE later became.

Competition is always good, but I truly believe that 'Lucha Underground' has nothing to do with WWE or their programming. We are completely different, you know. And, in a way, we have more to offer.

Every wrestling show is now designed to be the greatest show ever. In contrast, the NWA show is different. It didn't tire people out to watch, something was allowed to register. It is the exact antithesis of planned, big budget, choreographed, scripted sports entertainment, and that is what makes the show so different.

I like doing the shows with Ring of Honor, but I don't want to leave Japan.

It started with Dragon Gate USA, where I started as a guy on the pre-show and wasn't promised anything. I kept coming and doing what I do and ended up on the main show and eventually won their championship.

The fact is, there's a ton of opportunities out there now for professional wrestlers which, when I was coming through, weren't really there. The only game in town realistically was WWE, and it was very, very difficult to see yourself working anywhere outside of that.

For the majority of my career, I worked everywhere but the WWE.

I was really confident when I left WWE. I was confident that I would have a good time, and I was confident that I could wrestle differently than perhaps people saw me in the last few years with WWE, but I definitely wasn't prepared for this level of everything.

I love what I'm seeing out there with Pro Wrestling Syndicate, Northeast Wrestling, Big Time Wrestling, and WildKat in New Orleans. There is a lot of good stuff out there.

Promoters saw the potential in me and the value in me. It was because of companies like Evolve, PWG, Progress, and Beyond Wrestling. Those are the big ones that gave me a push and made my name worth something on the indies.

To me, the best part of coming up in that, kind of the last era before it went that way with the FCWs or NXTs, kind of the farm system, is that, you know, wrestling Jimmy Valiant in front of 10 people in Cleveland. We didn't touch. I think we did two things, but we were out there for 20 minutes.

I was at House Of Hardcore for Tommy Dreamer. Good guy, great guy, great eye for talent - that's why he booked me.

Hell, I would love to work with El Torito somewhere and somehow on the indies or down in Mexico. Something like that.

Ring of Honor has always been a company that focuses on youths and being a true alternative.

For me, Philadelphia was always kind of that city you traveled to as an independent wrestler. I traveled there once or twice a month, doing that seven-to-eight-hour drive from Cleveland to Philly just to try and make a name for myself.

Wrestling has gotten crazy lately in that guys can really make comfortable, good livings outside of WWE.

At 15, I refereed my first match, and I was training at my dad's school even prior to that, so the only thing that I was concerned about - I guess the only thing that made me reluctant and was the reason I was in L.A. and the reason I went to acting school - was I thought maybe I wasn't big enough - physically big enough - to compete with WWE.

I did a year and a half of independent wrestling before I got into the WWE. It was nothing really. I didn't make the towns. I don't even say I was an indy wrestler.