Cody Rhodes suffered an injury that deeply impacted his experience during his 2023 Royal Rumble victory. In this years edition of the match, Cody Rhodes made his long-awaited return from injury, entering at number 30 to outlast 29 other men and win the entire Royal Rumble match.
The former AEW star spent 7 months out before announcing his return to the ring. For weeks, WWE exhibited videos of him recovering from his pectoral tear and rehabbing for a return to the ring at the 2023 Royal Rumble. He entered last in the match and last eliminated Gunther to win the match and punch his ticket to Wrestlemania 39.
While it was the highlight of his career, Cody Rhodes revealed that he suffered an injury during the Royal Rumble match. He claimed that he suffered a popped eardrum during the match, which caused him great pain and affected his hearing during the bout. He could not hear the crowd completely during the match, losing some hearing one of his ears.
Rhodes recently spoke to The New York Post about his incredible Royal Rumble victory and revealed that he popped his eardrum during the match. Cody Rhodes did not state when he suffered the injury but given he spent a lot of time in the ring with Gunther toward the end of the match, there is a good chance it happened during this encounter. Accidents happen and there is no blame placed upon anyone for this injury.
“So if you’ve ever had your ear drum popped, it’s a ringing sound, it’s unmistakable, there’s air blowing out of it. I was just tickled by it, hilariously, that it happened because I’m finally back, came back two months early.
“The last thing we need to do is get hurt because you don’t want to be on that medical list. Anyways, I was able to get through it just fine, just a tiny little perforation. The funny thing was on a night that you’re surrounded by 60,000 people in the Alamodome, excited, you’d like to hear them, and I could only hear half of them.
“That was a little bit of a moment. I could feel them, if that makes any sense, but you’d like to hear them more. That was a night that was a bummer not to fully hear it.”
Cody Rhodes on his injury, speaking to The New York Post
Luckily, a popped eardrum is not a serious injury. It should heal in a couple of weeks and should not be an issue going forward for Cody Rhodes.
After winning the 2023 Royal Rumble match, Cody Rhodes set up a match with Roman Reigns at Wrestlemania 39. He will battle The Tribal Chief in the main event of night 2 of the event aiming to win his first ever World Championship in the WWE.
Reigns currently holds the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship. which is a combination of the WWE Championship and Universal Championship. Reigns has held the Universal title for nearly three years and won the WWE belt from Brock Lesnar at last years Wrestlemania.
