Rhodes continued to share that he took four baby aspirin before entering Hell In A Cell, but after a few minutes into the match, he began to feel the pain in his pectoral muscle. This led the Undisputed WWE Champion to explain that the promotion is not focused on taking risks that will put their talent in danger, especially with professional wrestling becoming more athletic.

“We can navigate around things like that and give somebody a break if they need it. You just have more athlete-conscious people today…modern wrestling is insanely fast with an insane amount of rotations, flips, high spots, whatever you want to call them. It’s not getting any slower. It’s only going to get more dangerous and more wild. So, if we’re not doing it safely, we’re going to kill our own business,” he stated. “It’s not like the golden 80s where a guy smoking a cigarette does 10 push-ups and goes out there and tears the house down.”

Although Rhodes is pleased with talent safety in WWE, he admitted that he misses the days when the roster was required to wrestle over 200 days a year and would lobby to make it happen again, but gave credit to Triple H and company President Nick Khan for creating a healthier system for their stars.

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit “ALL THE SMOKE” with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.