Zelina Vega is the latest WWE star to join Prototype Talent Agency, according to a report from Deadline. She now shares a roster with fellow wrestling names like Cody Rhodes, Bubba Ray Dudley, and Billy Gunn.
Vega is scheduled to challenge Giulia for the WWE Women’s United States Championship on this week’s episode of SmackDown. Outside the ring, she’s known for portraying AJ Lee in Fighting With My Family and lending her voice to Street Fighter 6.
Cody Rhodes recently opened up about his decision to leave AEW and jump ship to WWE.
After parting ways with WWE in 2016, Rhodes made a name for himself on the independent circuit, teaming up with Bullet Club members The Young Bucks (Matt and Nick Jackson) and Kenny Omega. Their momentum culminated in the success of All In, which laid the groundwork for the launch of AEW. Rhodes, along with Omega and the Bucks, would go on to serve as Executive Vice Presidents of the new promotion.
Cody exited AEW in February 2022 and made his return to WWE at WrestleMania 38.
During a recent appearance on “The Bill Simmons Podcast,” Cody was asked whether he ever viewed AEW as a long-term home or if he always sensed it had a limited shelf life. He said,
“It’s hard to put myself in that spot again. I started to get a sense … Michael Hayes is famous for, ‘Always leave the territory at your hottest.’ I started to get a sense that all wrestling needs change. Guys are going to go from company to company. You have to keep it fresh. I just got the sense that it might be time for me to move into something else. I didn’t know what that was. I remember thinking, ‘Oh, that’d be crazy to be part of the Royal Rumble. To come home.’ I made another home. I got kids at this home, basically, but to show everybody. The first meeting I had with Vince (McMahon) and Bruce Prichard, I didn’t think I was coming back. I was excited to go to that meeting to tell them both thank you. I left on crazy bad terms. No one could leave how I left. They didn’t even sign my release papers. I left in a terrible place. They let it happen, probably out of respect for my dad more than anything. Then I went out and fought so hard. I’m filled with rage. I’m smashing the throne. I’m bleeding. I’m setting myself on fire. I was going through it and living it out for everyone who was watching, but I wanted to tell them both ‘thanks. You guys helped build me and train me.’ I took all those skills and I took them everywhere I went. Every company, every independent, I got to reinvent myself on how I wanted to be in WWE, I got to be that outside. That’s all I thought it was going to be, a sense of closure. ‘Thank you so much for the lessons I never got to thank you for.’ Then it turned into be something else by the end of that meeting.”
He continued, “Maybe that’s a little of it [on whether he could elevate AEW]. I started thinking about writing a book the other day. I was thinking, ‘What would I say? How would I put it?’ There is clearly bad blood, but there is also clearly respect and love. In the end, the way I kind of see it is, if I felt disrespected ever at WWE, that’s one thing. That’s a company that was built…that’s the Yankees, that’s the flagship of it all. If I ever felt there (in WWE), ‘I was a number on a sheet,’ but feeling disrespected at something I built with my friends. We built. Feeling disrespected there, I wouldn’t stand for it. Brandi and I both. I’m so blessed to have her. It was one of those where it was, ‘F**k it. I did way more here than you think, and you’re going to find out the moment I’m out the door.’ I hate saying that with any sense of anger or rage, but I’m like the angriest person you’re ever going to meet [Laughs]. I don’t believe in the cold-hearted backstabby type of revenge. The greatest revenge on Earth is success. I felt like we were sitting on something wonderful, something great. Potentially, what I was doing with the American Nightmare, as a bad guy, a good guy, something in-between, we’re sitting on something magical. If I’m not going to do it in the house that I literally, with Matt, Nick, and Kenny built, then buddy, I’m going elsewhere. Every day, I’m so blessed that Bruce Prichard, Nick, Triple H, and Vince got me back. I get to live it out now.”
“If it hurts even more when you’re tasked to do something when somebody sees it with their own eyes, but then, I don’t look at any of it…I said I was angry and enraged, I don’t look at it with any negativity, and here’s why: I got to be part of WWE again. I got to be part of WWE, we’re talking about (Steve) Austin and (Hulk) Hogan, two of the greatest to ever lace their boots, and every one of those records have been broken. I got to be in the matches that broke those records. I got to stand across from Roman Reigns at (WrestleMania) 39, I got to do it again. I got the quarterback spot at a company where I was last in the combine. I’m very grateful. That’s why I have trouble articulating it and why I want to write this book. I’m very grateful because, this schism happened, but the outcome is I got to be with the biggest game in town. Not only did I get this spot, I got to show them that I could do it.”
Simmons stated that it was a good career move for Cody, who agreed by stating, “Good career move.”
Last Thursday, Terry Bollea, better known as Hulk Hogan, passed away at the age of 71.
During a recent appearance on the “Stories with Brisco and Bradshaw” podcast, Jimmy Hart recalled being with Hogan during his last WWE appearance in January at the WWE RAW on Netflix premiere in Inglewood, California. He noted that Hogan was visibly upset after being booed by the crowd during the segment. Hart also spoke about Hogan’s political beliefs, saying that Hogan had supported Donald Trump, believing he would “straighten” the country out, and added that he felt Hogan had been proven right. He said,
“Speaking of what you’re talking about now, that’s what happened to us when we went to Los Angeles. You hear so much about that, but I’m gonna set that straight too in my opinion… Here’s the deal, I’m not a Democrat or Republican. I’m just a jabroni. Hulk (Hogan) knew that, okay? So I didn’t go with him to the Republican Convention or anything because, you know, not because I wanted to hide or wasn’t for (Donald) Trump or wasn’t for (Joe) Biden or anybody. I’m just like I said, jabroni so… We were going to Los Angeles. Now, going in there, which I kind of told Hulk, I said, ‘Wow.’ I said, you know, ‘Blue state! Red state!’ I said, ‘Woo!’ You know? He had a Trump-Vance t-shirt on which he did some pre-publicity, right? I’m going, ‘Oh my gosh, this is gonna be good.’ We’ve got Kamala Harris down the block with her big thing going on. So we come flying into L.A, baby. So we come in there, he’s got that Trump-Vance t-shirt on. We get out, man, then we go and all of a sudden I hear a few of the people like, ‘Boo, boo. Trump –’ I’m going, you know what? This doesn’t feel right. ‘Jimmy, don’t worry about it.’ ‘Okay, Hulk. That’s okay. Don’t worry about it.’ So we go in there and we do our little rehearsal and stuff like that and my job is just to wave the flag, brother, wave the flag. Don’t let it hit the ground. Wave that flag. I’m just waving the heck out of it. So we go out, we kind of get a mixed reaction, and you know this, you can have 500 people cheering you and one person booing you, but I’ll be darned if that one person outshine the dag-on 500 cheering for you. You know how that works, right? So we go out, so it’s kind of a mixed reaction, but it’s a little bit more boos than anything. But that devastated him and we got in the back, he said, ‘What do you think happened?’ I said, ‘Hulk, it’s simple. Blue state, red state. Trump-Vance.’ I said, ‘I’m okay with it.’ He goes, ‘What are you thinking?’ And I said, ‘I’m okay. I felt like I was managing The Hart Foundation against The British Bulldogs or the Killer Bees…’ But that bothered him because of that and I said, ‘Well, surely people are gonna realize what that was for.’ Then the next week, we’re in Texas and it’s all cheers. But, that always bothered him. It sure did.
Well, he did (take the fallout from it). He said, ‘Jimmy, I have to do it.’ He said, ‘I just have to do it. I think this is the right thing. He’s gonna straighten this place out. He’s gonna do it,’ and so far, Hulk’s been right. It’s looking pretty darn good.”
