Cody On Which Dusty Rhodes Opponent He Was In Awe Of, Andre The Giant As The Midnight Rider

Cody Rhodes grown up in the wrestling business through his father Dusty Rhodes. Cody made an appearance on The Dan Le Batard Show and was asked by Le Batard on if there was a wrestler if he was in awe of as a kid. Cody named Ric Flair even though he was a long rival of his father's.

"I think I was always in awe of Ric Flair. My dad did not smarten me up for the business as a youth. He did not tell me the secrets of the industry. He let me figure it out on my own," Cody said. "I assumed Ric was the guy who broke my dad's arm in the parking lot. Whenever I'd see him, he was always dressed immaculately with the hair, the women [and] the usually big gold.

"I was intimidated by him because he was my dad's mortal enemy, but I secretly thought there was a piece of that that I wanted to be like that. He exuded success."

Le Batard talked about The Midnight Rider and asked Cody if he knew who The Midnight Rider was, which was Dusty under a mask. Cody spoke in a tongue-in-cheek fashion on the identity of The Midnight Rider, but he went into a story of other wrestlers who wore the The Midnight Rider mask including Andre The Giant.

"So there are several masks in the vault, that is my sister's basement, and I can't confirm that he was The Midnight Rider, but I can say when the individual portraying The Midnight Rider was trying to throw people off the scent, he would occasionally have other wrestlers be The Midnight Rider which included Andre The Giant," Cody said. "I have the only Midnight Rider Andre The Giant masks ever, and it's the size of three people's heads.

"As a kid I thought that was an adult head. I didn't get it was his until years later. I got several of the masks, but I can't confirm. Pretty sure though."

Cody and WWE have been in a trademark dispute that continued with WWE opposing Cody's recent trademark filings. Cody has talked in the past about the relationship between the Rhodes family and WWE, and he discussed how WWE has been trying to get their hands on some of Dusty's memorabilia from over the years.

"He was a notorious note-taker, and his notes was the match-making when he was a booker," Cody remarked. "He has a journal for every year, and they're really unbelievable matches that are listed. It listed the amount of people in the crowd, the house, in terms of the gross on money and even on my birthday, at the very bottom of the card, it says my name and my weight. So he was working on the day I was born, and he denoted simply my name and weight, so it's kind of a cool page in the 1985 journal.

"We have everything. WWE has been trying to break into our little vault for years trying to get some of the good stuff. We have a lot of great stuff from Championship Wrestling from Florida, a lot of Gordon Solie personal items and a lot of cool stuff from dad's heyday."

If you use any quotes from this article, please credit The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.