WWECody Rhodes has discussed the effect that fewer WWE Live house shows in 2025 will have on wrestlers, along with some of the negatives.
TKO President Mark Shapiro revealed that there will be fewer WWE house shows in 2025, noting that they “don’t need to carry these marginally profitable events.”
He would go on to state that the plan is to run “close to 200” events in 2025, compared to the “roughly 250” in 2024 and 300 in 2023.
In a recent appearance on the Superstar Crossover podcast with Josh Martinez, Cody Rhodes opened up about the change, saying:
“Pros and cons (of WWE scaling back on house shows), you know, a pro is more time for rest, recovery.
“We’re the modern WWE with all the medical protocols that exist in terms of to have the best nutrition, to have the mental clarity, the focus, to be dialed in physically.
“We still very much are a, you know, I guess toxic to a degree but heavyweight. There is a vanity element to professional wrestling and sports entertainment so in terms of everyone’s preparation, that’s a good thing in terms of being able to get that mental clarity to be able to get your time at home but also be able to be locked in on work. To be able to get the best nutrition, the best recovery especially. You know, they have all these things now with the cold plunges, inversion tables, blah, blah…”
“I’m at DDP’s studio now and half the stuff is in here so, but, the con for me is I only get better at wrestling by wrestling. So, that’s a con for me.”
Reflecting on the issue of wrestling in front of a live crowd more frequently, Rhodes would look at how he could mitigate the issue, stating:
“How I can kind of mitigate (that) is I have the Nightmare Factory where we can wrestle and do things and train. But training for wrestling — like, I never believed in wrestling schools growing up because the only way you can really do wrestling is by wrestling in front of an audience. You gotta do it in front of an audience and that will be a challenge for me because I feel like I’ve really kind of slid into the prime of my career and I feel really great. But I know if I take some steps back, in terms of that, I’m gonna have to mitigate it some way and I’m gonna have to find, okay, how do I train for this if I’m not able to do Saturday, Sunday house shows heading into a Monday Night Raw per see?
“I think the majority of the locker room and roster probably looks at it as a really great thing and from a company standpoint, business-wise, it makes the shows when they do come to your city even more special versus just being a given.
“So it’s mainly pros across the board. I just have to find a way to kind of keep the wrestler in me wrestling.”
Jade Cargill has recently discussed the “brutal” travel schedule in WWE compared to AEW saying that the stars have to be “100% in front of” all the fans regardless of jetlag or being “beat up from a week tour”.
Since his return to WWE, Rhodes has been a regular on the WWE Live circuit and has recently been facing AJ Styles at the house shows.
Transcript from POST Wrestling.
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