Young Bucks and Cody Rhodes pledge to run 10,000 seat arena on their own in 2018, ROH exclusive statement on the show (w/Radican’s Analysis)

PWTorch has independently confirmed Pro Wrestling Sheet’s report that The Young Bucks (Matt & Nick Jackson) and Cody Rhodes will be running a self-financed wrestling event in 2018. Originally, Dave Meltzer had tweeted earlier this year in response to a question on Twitter that ROH wouldn’t draw 10,000 fans “anytime soon.” Cody responded on Twitter to Meltzer writing “I’ll take that bet Dave.”

The Young Bucks and Cody Rhodes have been working on promoting an event that would draw 10,000 fans since that time. Last weekend, Cody Rhodes tweeted a photo with The Young Bucks and Marty Scurll on location at a 10,000 arena they were looking into to run potentially use to run the event.

Pro Wrestling Sheet noted in their original report that the list of locations where the event might take place include  Chicago, London, San Francisco Ontario, and California. PWTorch reached out to multiple sources and The Young Bucks and Cody Rhodes have multiple companies willing to help them finance their event. One source noted that ROH was willing to finance the entire event.

According to multiple sources, Cody Rhodes and The Young Bucks want to promote this event on their own because it would truly be a unique event where they aren’t running under the banner of any pro wrestling promotion. Even though Cody Rhodes and The Young Bucks are both under exclusive U.S. deals to Ring of Honor, sources close to the party noted they were going to run the event with or without the support of Ring of Honor.

When asked for a statement about Ring of Honor’s stance on Cody Rhodes and The Young Bucks running a show independently, ROH GM Greg Gilleland issued the following release exclusively to PWTorch:

There’s no doubt that these guys are amongst the best in the industry right now. Their commitment to ROH is superb and they’ve been great contributors in taking this company to the next level. In fact, Supercard of Honor 2018 is already on pace to beat the attendance record set last year and the fans will not be disappointed.

This 10,000 seat dream show is something that these guys, as well as ROH, feel really strong about achieving and we are glad to support them to help make those dreams come true. Really, the fans are the number 1 stakeholder here and the ultimate goal is to return value to them. This has the potential to really be something special for The Young Bucks, Cody, the Bullet Club, and ROH, but most importantly – the fans.

Radican’s Analysis: This has been a developing story for several months behind the scenes and it seems like The Young Bucks and Cody Rhodes are moving full steam ahead to run a 10,000 seat venue. It’s going to be interesting to see how they promote the event, as they are going to need to come up with some huge names and matches to fill an arena that big. 

The Young Bucks and Cody Rhodes are extremely wise businessmen and the three of them working together on social media to promote the show will likely generate a ton of buzz. To reach the 10,000 fan threshold they are going to have to find the right match and the right city to run it in. The markets that they are looking at to run in are all strong wrestling markets, so it will be interesting to see what market and venue gets selected for the show. 

Another interesting aspect of all of this is that ROH is supporting an event that won’t run under the ROH banner. I applaud The Young Bucks and Cody Rhodes for their D.I.Y. spirit, but it is a bit surprising that they are taking the ball and running with it on their own as opposed to ROH booking and promoting the event.