MJF shares first meeting story with Cody Rhodes involving Ethan Page

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Maxwell Jacob Friedman has spoken openly about his respect for Cody Rhodes, who he has called a mentor and a friend. During an interview earlier this year on Insight with Chris Van Vliet, he credited the second-generation star for helping him get signed with AEW and said he stays in contact with the Undisputed WWE Champion. What MJF hasn’t shared before was how he first met Rhodes. That changed on the Thursday (June 18) episode of the Shut Up and Wrestle with Brian Solomon podcast. As is usually the case with the AEW World Champion, the story of his first encounter with Rhodes is a wild one with unexpected twists. “The very first time I met Cody Rhodes was at Alpha-1 in Canada,” MJF told Solomon. “He had told the promoter, who may or may not be Ethan Page, that I was hitting on his sister. Granted, I wouldn’t put it past me, but I actually wasn’t—the sister of Ethan Page.” Friedman said that he ended up in the crosshairs of an angry Page. “Ethan Page walks up to me and goes, ‘Hey man, are you f***ing hitting on my sister?’ I said, ‘Buddy, if I was, you would know. She’d be my girlfriend by now.’ Then we got into it a little bit, and I was just like, ‘Who told you this?’ He goes, ‘Cody told me this.’ I had two options. I could just eat it, which 99.9% of talent in my position at that point — at 19 years old who was an absolute f***ing nobody — would have done. Or, I could confront this guy, who at the time and also now was a big f***ing deal in the business.” Needless to say, MJF decided to speak with The American Nightmare. “So, because I’m an unwell person, I chose the latter. I walked into his locker room. He had his own locker room at this f***ing place. I didn’t knock on the door, I just opened it, and I said, ‘Hey.’ He’s looking at me in disbelief. I go, ‘Why the f*** did you tell the booker I’m trying to bang his sister?’ He was like, ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ I go, ‘Dude, please don’t make me bring Ethan down here. He’ll collaborate.’” The tense moment quickly took a turn, though, according to MJF. “He starts laughing, and he goes, ‘Who are you, man?’ Then we just started shooting the s***. From that moment on, I could tell he got a kick out of me, because especially on the independent level, was probably not used to people talking like that. He’ll be the first person to tell you: Cody Rhodes loves a good white lie. He says it all the time.” From that moment on, the two men stayed in touch. According to MJF, it was after Rhodes noticed that he was getting so many bookings that eventually led to him getting on the inaugural All In card in 2018. “He goes, ‘You’re f***ing booked everywhere. I guess I’m gonna have to watch you tonight.’ After that, we always stayed in touch and that’s legitimately how I got booked for All In, just because Cody was so shocked,“ MJF said to Solomon. “I had no right to be booked for all the shows I was booked for, but I was everywhere.” What do you think, Cagesiders? Did Cody tell a “white lie” about MJF and Page’s sister? Let us know in the comments.