The honeymoon is over for Cody Rhodes ahead of WrestleMania 41

The problem with catching the car

We are exactly nine days away from the main event of WrestleMania 41 Night 2. Las Vegas is already plastered with giant billboards of Cody Rhodes wearing expensive suits and looking stoic.

Allegiant Stadium is going to be packed to the rafters on April 20. The pyro budget will probably rival a small country's GDP. But as we barrel toward the biggest weekend in wrestling, a very uncomfortable question is hanging over the WWE Championship scene.

Is Cody actually the guy, or is he just keeping the seat warm?

Look, I get it. The story finishing at WrestleMania 40 was incredible. The Avengers-style run-ins with Undertaker and John Cena. Seth Rollins taking the chair shot. It was perfect professional wrestling.

But that was a year ago. The chase is always better than the catch. Being the hunter is easy because the fans desperately want you to catch the prey.

Once you have the belt, you become the status quo. And the status quo in WWE right now is weird.

A year of playing second fiddle

Let's look at Cody's title reign since last April. He started hot. That match against AJ Styles at Backlash in Lyon was legitimately fantastic. The crowd was unglued.

But then the summer hit. We got that bizarre champion versus champion match with Logan Paul in Saudi Arabia. We got the endless, grinding feud with Solo Sikoa and the discount Bloodline.

Cody spent half the year playing second fiddle to family drama that didn't even involve his own family. He felt like a guest star on SmackDown.

That is my biggest issue with how Triple H has booked this run. Cody is the WWE Champion, but he rarely feels like the main character of the television show.

Roman Reigns held that belt and the entire company orbited around him. Every segment, every promo, every backstage interaction felt like it was leading back to the Tribal Chief.

With Cody, we get a lot of pandering. He comes out, asks the city what they want to talk about, hands his weight belt to a kid, and cuts a promo about finishing stories and honoring his dad.

It was endearing in 2023. It was necessary in 2024. In 2025 and heading into 2026, it is starting to feel incredibly manufactured.

The John Cena vortex

This is the classic babyface trap. WWE gets a guy who is universally loved and they immediately sand off all his edges. They did it to Seth Rollins in 2019. They did it to Drew McIntyre in 2021.

Cody is dangerously close to falling into the John Cena vortex circa 2010. The fans in the front row are wearing his merchandise, but the hardcores in the back are starting to roll their eyes.

At the Royal Rumble in January, the crowd reaction to Cody was solid, but it wasn't deafening. When CM Punk's music hit, the dome shook. When Cody's music hit, it was a polite, appreciative pop.

That is a terrifying metric for a top guy.

The entire program with Solo Sikoa at SummerSlam felt like a placeholder. Solo is great, but nobody bought him as the guy to end Cody's reign. The match was a 25-minute slog of interference, ref bumps, and predictably overcome odds.

It was the exact type of booking that made people hate John Cena's Super Cena era.

Think back to Diesel in 1995. Kevin Nash looked like a million bucks. He had the size, the look, the cool factor. He won the belt at Madison Square Garden in eight seconds.

But as soon as they strapped the rocket to him, they stripped away everything that made him cool. They made him high-five kids and smile for the cameras. His title reign was a disaster at the box office.

Cody is a much better worker than Nash, obviously. But the principle remains the same. You cannot take a guy who got over by being a rebellious, fiery underdog and turn him into a corporate politician without losing the core audience.

Vegas will not be kind

WrestleMania 41 Night 2 has to be a reset.

The Bloodline is still lurking. Roman Reigns is still the biggest star in the industry. The shadows they cast are massive.

When Cody walks down that absurdly long ramp at Allegiant Stadium, he cannot just have a good wrestling match. He has to command the stadium.

He needs to prove that he is not just the guy who beat Roman Reigns. He needs to prove he is the guy who replaced Roman Reigns.

Those are two very different things. Buster Douglas beat Mike Tyson, but he didn't replace him.

If Cody goes out there and works a safe, predictable main event with standard near-falls and the usual babyface fire, it won't be enough. The Vegas crowd will turn on him. They want blood, drama, and consequence.

Vegas is a smart crowd. It is a smark city. Allegiant Stadium is going to be filled with people who fly in from all over the world, paying exorbitant prices for tickets and hotels.

These aren't the casual fans who watch Raw in the background while folding laundry. These are the sickos. These are the people who analyze frame rates on television broadcasts and track private jet flights.

If Cody comes out on Night 2 and tries to feed them standard babyface platitudes, they will eat him alive.

Look at what happened to Batista at the Royal Rumble in 2014. Look at Roman Reigns at WrestleMania 32 in Dallas. When a smart crowd decides they are bored with the chosen hero, the atmosphere becomes toxic incredibly fast.

I am not predicting a full mutiny. Cody has built up too much goodwill over the past four years for a complete rejection.

But apathetic silence is worse than boos. If the main event of WrestleMania 41 ends to polite applause, it is a catastrophic failure.

The path to redemption

The path forward is actually quite simple. Cody needs to bleed.

I don't necessarily mean literal blood, though a crimson mask in Vegas wouldn't hurt. I mean emotional blood.

He needs to look vulnerable. The story of WrestleMania 40 was about finishing his father's legacy. The story of WrestleMania 41 needs to be about his own survival.

Whoever he is standing across the ring from on April 20 needs to push him to a place he hasn't been since that Hell in a Cell match against Seth Rollins.

He needs to abandon the polished, politician persona. Stop worrying about the exact phrasing of your promo. Stop worrying about hitting your cues perfectly for the television cameras.

Get angry. Get desperate. Show us that the thought of losing this championship keeps you awake at night, staring at the ceiling in a cold sweat.

The clock is ticking

The honeymoon phase ended a long time ago. The fans gave him his flowers. They bought the t-shirts. They cried with his mother at ringside in Philadelphia.

That transaction is complete. We owe him nothing more.

Now, he has to justify the investment. He has to prove that putting the company on his back was the right call.

Night 1 belongs to the nostalgia acts and the dream matches. John Cena is waving goodbye. CM Punk is doing whatever CM Punk does best.

But Night 2 is the franchise. Night 2 is the cornerstone of the entire WWE business model.

Cody Rhodes wanted to be the face of the company. He wanted the pressure. He literally tattooed his own logo on his neck to force people to look at him.

Well, congratulations. Everyone is looking.

At 11:30 PM in Las Vegas, there will be nowhere to hide. No Avengers to run down the ramp and save him. No narrative crutch about finishing a story.

It will just be a man, a ring, and 70,000 people waiting to see if he actually belongs at the top of the mountain.

If he delivers, he cements his legacy. He shuts up the critics who think his title reign has been a placeholder.

If he fails, the fans will simply move on to the next shiny object. Wrestling fans are notoriously fickle. We love the chase, but we get bored with the champion.

Cody Rhodes has exactly nine days to figure out how to be interesting again. The clock is ticking.