Former AEW Star Reveals They Trained at WWE Performance Center Last Year

All Elite Wrestling has retained the bulk of its day one roster, but the company is far from a mirror image of its inaugural AEW Double or Nothing show. The biggest change has come in the form of Cody Rhodes’s exit, as the former AEW Executive Vice President left the promotion that he helped start in early 2022. Cody wouldn’t be away from wrestling for long, as he returned to WWE just two months after his final AEW match. The American Nightmare retained just about every aspect of his presentation, from his logo to his now-iconic “Kingdom” theme song, but did lose his fight camp.

In AEW, Cody was often flanked by the Nightmare Family, a collection of wrestlers and legends that Cody trained with. Names like Arn Anderson, “Diamond” Dallas Page, MJF, Lee Johnson and others often made up the Nightmare Family. While most of the group were friends, the Nightmare Family did include some family in the form of brother Dustin Rhodes and wife Brandi Rhodes.

Dustin still wrestles for AEW, but Brandi exited the company at the same time as Cody. Considering she occasionally wrestled alongside Cody in years past, questions arose whether Brandi would ever appear on WWE TV with her husband.

“We did a little trial,” Brandi told Fightful regarding her brief WWE Performance Center stint last year. “How does this whole thing work with a baby and a bus and traveling?”

Testing the waters aside, Brandi confirmed that her full-time wrestling days are in the rear view.

“Becky Lynch can do it (be a mom and a full-time wrestler). Let me just say, Becky Lynch can do anything. Brandi, however, kind of kind of threw in the towel after that,” Brandi continued. “It was really fun. It was really great, but I could tell pretty quickly, it wasn’t going to work for this family to travel together and be on the road. I’ve got a little girl who’s extremely social and active and like was itching to start doing school and things like that. I was just like, ‘You know what? I was planning on throwing in the towel like a year from now anyway. So what’s one year, really?’”

There is the opportunity for Brandi to make a one-off appearance, but she noted that she will never be a full-fledged member of the roster.

“I always joke and play around on social and stuff, saying things like, ‘If Cody ever really needs me, I’ll be there,’ and that’s really just in that capacity,” Brandi added. “I mean, if Hunter [Triple H] ever needs Steph [Stephanie McMahon], I’m sure she’ll show up, but is she gonna go for the Women’s Title? Probably not.”