Former WWE superstar and former Ring of Honor World Champion Cody Rhodes is full steam ahead with his All In project. Rhodes wants Ring of Honor to host a show that can sell out a 10,000 seat arena.
Though names are attached to the show and a date is set, many questions still linger, like how can he possibly draw that size of a house.
It was nearly a year ago that Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter tweeted out that Ring of Honor would not be able to sell out a 10,000 seat arena here in the United States. The last promotion outside of World Wrestling Entertainment to do so was World Championship Wrestling. That promotion went belly up in 2001. The following 17 years saw several promotions try (TNA, ROH) but none were able to reach that number. Enter Cody Rhodes.
Rhodes left WWE two years ago because he was disenfranchised with how he was booked/written. He sought to reinvent himself on the independent circuit. He made a splash in Impact Wrestling and in New Japan Pro Wrestling. Cody decided to sign exclusively to Ring of Honor and even was their world champion for a bit. Cody’s alignment with the ever popular Bullet Club doesn’t hurt either. Cody stated that 2017 was the first year he’s made a seven figure salary. Being able to make that kind of money and earn this level of stardom without the WWE machine behind him says a lot about Rhodes’ hard work and business acumen. That business acumen will soon be put to the test.
September 1st is the proposed date for the All In event.
A venue is still being looked into. However, a large metropolitan area, where people won’t have to fly all the way from one coast to another would be a wise choice. Said town being a haven for ‘smart marks’ also helps. A city that has several large venues would make narrowing down an arena much easier. If the rumors are true about Chicago being their primary target, then I wholeheartedly back Rhodes. But venue is one thing. Talent on the card, that’s a completely different story.
Cody Rhodes brought his Bullet Club cohorts (Marty Scurll, Hangman Page, the Young Bucks and Kenny Omega) along for the ride.
His comrade-in-arms from Hollywood, Arrow star Stephen Amell, will also appear. However, there will need to be a plethora of talent to sell out this show. Cherry picking different rosters (Johnny Mundo and Taya from Lucha Underground, Austin Aries from Impact, etc) can help. Dream matches, like Brian Cage vs. Tomohiro Ishii would make fans salivate at the notion. On the other hand, if they go after the two people that have enough big name status, but are still considered ‘indie darlings’ this will all but guarantee success. Those two people are Daniel Bryan and CM Punk.
Bryan is locked into a WWE contract. His contract doesn’t end until the end of September. Could this be just heresay? If not, would Rhodes be willing to move the date of the event to accommodate locking in Bryan? CM Punk would be a slam dunk. This would be Punk’s first appearance in a wrestling ring since leaving WWE four years ago. It would also be in his hometown of Chicago. I predict it would be the loudest ovation in a wrestling arena in quite some time. Neither man would necessarily need to wrestle. Even just having Bryan do a run in or Punk cut a ‘pipe bomb’ style promo, would entice fans enough to lay down money for a ticket.
I believe that Cody Rhodes should be able to pull off the task he set for himself. He will just need to make sure that there are some dream matches that smarks would never get to see elsewhere, big name stars to pull in a few casual fans as well as a city and venue that will make the audience want to part with their hard earned money. Selling out a 10,000 seat arena to a non-WWE show would assuredly change the landscape of the North American wrestling scene.
