Summary

Cody Rhodes said he feels honored by strong reactions from both fans who cheer him and fans who boo him.

He said he wants to avoid being consumed by the split reactions and described developing thicker skin over time.

Rhodes also said he does not want to ignore fans who are not with him, but does not want to lose focus on supporters who are already invested.

The source text notes he is set to defend the Undisputed WWE Championship against Randy Orton at WrestleMania 42.

Cody Rhodes crowd split adds edge to his WrestleMania 42 title build

Cody Rhodes leaning into mixed reactions creates a concrete consequence, his WrestleMania 42 build with Randy Orton now carries more emotional range than a standard one-note babyface presentation.

With Rhodes publicly stating he can operate in that space, WWE has a clear lane to present him as resilient without changing his current alignment.

Quotes

Quote from Cody Rhodes

"That’s the thing. I’m honored by it. I’m honored by the passion of both sides of the coin. What I would like to do and to honor those who are so excited and those who are so not, however you’d put it, is I want to make sure that I’m not gotten to by it. I think with everything I’ve been through and everything in the business, you hear people say you got thick skin. I can definitely say I have thick skin now, because I used to not have thick skin."

Cody Rhodes later went on to say:

"I don’t want to say no, but there’s a really great line, you watch Rick and Morty? What does he say? He says something about, ‘I don’t care that you boo me, because I’ve seen what you cheer,’ and that is very much my approach often. I spoke about this recently with the big dude from Barstool, Brandon [Walker]. I spoke about that Leslie Knope Parks and Rec episode about bowling, where she spent so much time on the guy who was never going to vote for it in the first place. Unfortunately, you do that to discount your own, the people who are already there for you, but I don’t want to be against them either, if that makes any sense. I think John had it perfect, and watching John, having my own skin really, really beat up and thickened up over the course of my career has made it so that I think I’ve got the lane I can run in and make something very entertaining for both sides of the coin."

Sources

As reported by Fightful.