Eric Bischoff praises current 38-year-old RAW star for giving up $800,000 contract to leave WWE

Eric Bischoff was on the 83 Weeks with Eric Bischoff podcast, where he spoke in depth about a certain 38-year-old RAW star and praised him. He also praised the superstar for leaving WWE and giving up a lot of money.

WWE superstars on the main roster have a six-figure contract guarantee, with the amount being earned depending on drawing power, popularity, and of course, negotiations. Even if a superstar isn't in the desired position they are on the card, earning a good, six-figure salary is hard to walk away from.

Eric Bischoff thinks 38-year-old Cody Rhodes will have the greatest story in all of professional wrestling when it's all said and done, and praised him for walking away from what he estimates was a $700,000-$800,000 contract when he left WWE in 2016:

"Once the story has been completed, sometime after WrestleMania, I think we'll probably be able to look back and go 'Wow, what a journey'. Maybe the most interesting journey in terms of a professional wrestler, ever. Ever. To go from the number one wrestling company in the world, where he's making a significant amount of money."

He continued:

"I don't know what he was making in WWE [in 2016], what was his gimmick, Stardust? I'm guessing if he was in the middle of the card. based on what I've heard over the years, he's probably in that 7 to 800,000 [dollars] a year category, which is a lot of money. But he left that security as a very young man in WWE and left AEW to take an even bigger risk going back to WWE. And it all worked out for him, or it looks like it's going to." [7:06 - 8:13]

You can watch the full video here

Eric Bischoff says Cody Rhodes did what his father would do when he left WWE in 2016

Although Cody would eventually go on to make more money outside of WWE, it wasn't about the money at all.

Cody Rhodes revealed that Triple H, in particular, was upset at his departure in 2016 because of what the company had done for his father. Cody had to explain that he wasn't his father but a different person altogether - something that The Game would presumably understand later, if not immediately.

Eric Bischoff stated in the same conversation with Conrad Thompson that he said that the decision Cody Rhodes made to pack his bags when he wasn't happy in WWE and then pack his bags again in AEW was something his father Dusty Rhodes would have done.

Using a quote from the late great Dusty Rhodes, Bischoff stated that one has to ride the lightning bolt and jump onto another one before it hits the ground.