"I was very happy for him" - Wrestling legend heaps praise on Cody Rhodes' WWE return

AEW star and former WWE Tag Team Champion Matt Hardy has expressed how he feels about Cody Rhodes returning to WWE. While he knows he will miss Rhodes, Hardy stated that he is very happy for the former AEW TNT Champion.

The "American Nightmare" put an end to all of the rumors swirling around WrestleMania when he was revealed to be Seth Rollins' opponent on night one of the The Show of Shows.

Cody Rhodes picked up the victory in his first match back after six years away from WWE. The match was highly praised by fans and critics and was considered one of the best bouts of WrestleMania weekend.

A man that has worked with Rhodes in both WWE and AEW is Matt Hardy, who weighed in with his thoughts on the WrestleMania match on his podcast, "The Extreme Life of Matt Hardy":

“I was very happy for Cody [Rhodes], I thought his presentation was great, it was AEW Cody which was cool and also a big hats off to AEW for creating such an amazing character on their television between Cody and AEW. So I was very happy for him and I they had a killer match, him and Seth Rollins, they really tore the house down.” said Matt Hardy (04:24)

Hardy went into detail about how he and Cody Rhodes have grown very close over the past few years in AEW. One of the reasons being the time and circumstances Hardy was brought into AEW; at the very beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I’ve always had a very good relationship with Cody. I spent a lot of time with Cody, obviously, during the pandemic era. We were stuck in Jacksonville, and you know we would do a live Dynamite and we would also tape the next day the Dynamite for the following week. And then Tony was looking at a lot of footage and content at that time. Like we were doing hours and hours of Dark, like sometimes we would be in Daily’s Place until three in the morning recording stuff for Dark," said Matt Hardy. (03:09)

If you missed the most recent episode of AEW Dynamite, you can read all the results here.

Cody Rhodes departed AEW in February 2022

The wrestling world was shaken to its core when Cody Rhodes departed AEW with his wife Brandi in February 2022. It was a decision that shocked fans around the world as Rhodes was one of the founding members of AEW along with Tony Khan and The Young Bucks.

The details surrounding his departure are still somewhat murky, as neither party has discussed the negotiations after Cody's original contract expired. Rhodes has stated that he could not come to an agreement with Tony Khan and that it was simply time to move on.

Are you happy to see Cody Rhodes back in WWE? Let us know in the comments section down below!

Please credit "The Extreme Life of Matt Hardy" and give a H/T to Sportskeeda Wrestling when using quotes from this article.