Author: Chris Stephens

During a recent interview with Wade Keller of the Pro Wrestling Torch, AEW President Tony Khan noted that most of his company’s roster is vaccinated. He also mentioned that the company is hoping to travel Canada or Europe in the future and talent who aren’t vaccinated may have trouble getting across the border.

“I have got, most of the roster in AEW is vaccinated,” Khan said. 

“There have been some places we went where everybody had to be vaccinated. I think when the company starts doing international travel, we’ll see that for say, Canada, for England, places like that, it’ll be very difficult for wrestlers to travel without it,” he continued. 

AEW has not mandated that talent be vaccinated, however. He noted that their situation is similar to the NFL’s.

“I’ve not required it, same with the NFL, same with other wrestling leagues, but it will be a big challenge if you’re not for a lot of circumstances,” he said.  “A great example was the Jericho cruise where all the wrestlers on the Jericho cruise had to be vaccinated.”

According to various reports, vaccination status may have played a role in WWE’s most recent string of roster cuts.

“It was probably a half-dozen or more that did not get vaxxed that were cut,” Dave Meltzer said on Wrestling Observer Radio. “And it was very much part of the reason.”

AEW President Tony Khan recently spoke to Wade Keller of PWTorch. During the discussion, Khan spoke in-depth about his approach to long-term booking.

Keller asked Khan about if he knows who will come out of Full Gear as the AEW World Champion, and if he knows how long the next champion’s reign will be.

“Yes I do, but you never know,” said Khan. “Things have changed. A lot of the plans I had when Jon Moxley beat Chris Jericho, we did do a lot of the things I wanted to do but a lot of the things were not possible because the pandemic hit.”

“I do have plans, you never know how they are going to change. I do have a lot of plans. Kenny is on one of the great runs and I’m not so sure we’re ready to see it end but on the other hand, Hangman is ready and there are a lot of fans behind him.”

“Whatever the result it, it’s not the end for either man,” Khan continued.

1 out of 3 times …

Keller then asked Khan what percentage of the time does he stick with what he has planned and how often do things stray from what he originally had in mind.

“It’s probably 2 out of 3 times,” Khan said. “1 out of 3 times something changes, it’s not what you expected, somebody gets sick, and then you put a replacement in and then that starts going well and you move in another direction. So, I would say it’s probably about 2 out of 3 times if I draw stuff up and map stuff up.”

Khan continued to talk about the supposed “leaked card” for AEW Full Gear. A picture of his notebook from the sidelines of a Jaguars game appeared to show the planned lineup for the event but Khan said those were just ideas and not his final ideas for the show.

“People thought I accidentally leaked the PPV card. They saw my doodle notebook on the sideline but that was just me playing around with different stuff, ideas, I was not even close to done with it,” Khan said.

Tony Khan recently spoke with Wade Keller of PWTorch to promote next weekend’s Full Gear pay-per-view. During the discussion, TK commented on recent additions to the AEW roster.

“It’s so unrecognizable compared to the company that we started with,” Khan said about the current roster. “It’s pretty unthinkable looking around and seeing CM Punk, Bryan Danielson, Adam Cole, Ruby Soho, Thunder Rosa, all these awesome people that weren’t with us when we started.”

He continued touting more of AEW’s talent signings. “Malakai Black, Andrade El Idolo, new faces, and even the people that came in last year. Sting and FTR, Matt Hardy, and so many people have joined us along the way from when we started.”

CM Punk’s impact on AEW business

Khan also spoke about the impact that bringing in CM Punk has had on AEW’s ratings, merchandise sales, PPV buys, and more.

“Our numbers are so much better than they were going into the last few months and there’s been an unquestionable lift since CM Punk came in,” Khan said. “For some reason, I see some people trying to discredit Punk all the time, that he hasn’t been a huge lift to our business and he has been. And he’s only scratching the surface. I have intentionally in working with him tried to hold back a lot of his biggest marquee things, biggest marquee matches and stories.”

“We’ve been getting Punk reintegrated, building him a winning streak, and I think it’s worked great. Again, when you look at the rating we did for our first Wednesday back, that was a really strong number last week and he was such a huge part of it,” Khan continued.

“He’s just lifted our business so much,” Khan continued. He also noted that All Out, with Punk’s debut match against Darby Allin, did the most PPV buys in company history.

TV execs thrilled with CM Punk

“I was on with TNT yesterday, they’re so excited about the direction we’re going and the future of the business and there’s so many possibilities they see for the AEW franchise and he’s one of the big stars they want to build around,” Khan continued.

“The TNT executives also had a great call with Punk and talked to him and they want him to know he’s a really valued member of the TNT Warner Media family, the TBS family.”

If you use any of the above quotes please credit PWTorch with a H/T to SEScoops for the transcriptions.

Tony Khan recently sat down to talk with Wade Keller for an interview on PW Torch and during the discussion spoke about AEW’s live event schedule. He noted the process the company goes through to determine which cities to visit and how often they do so. Khan also spoke about how AEW’s live events regularly outdraw major sporting events.

“It’s not the most scientific process but it involves picking our best markets and looking where we’ve done good numbers and trying to make sure we cover some new markets,” Khan said of how the company determines which markets to visit.

He would continue to speak about the challenge of booking big arenas, noting that Rampages and PPVs are harder to book than Dynamite because they take place on weekends.

“We try to find the best venues, look at available dates at the big arenas, which is a big challenge,” Khan continued. “Wednesdays are sometimes a little bit easier to get the dates compared to Fridays for Rampage or a weekend for a PPV. Those weekend dates can be really challenging to find if they are booked way in advance at most of the arenas.”

Tony Khan On Visiting Markets Multiple Times

Keller asked Khan about going to markets a 2nd and 3rd time. Khan responded that AEW has had a great response when visiting their biggest markets, such as Chicago, Boston, and Philadelphia, multiple times.

“We did start to hit some markets twice through [before the pandemic]. In 2019, we were the #1 wrestling company in the world in tickets sold per event. In 2020, we were off to a great start and doing even better numbers before the pandemic hit,” Tony Khan continued.

“We had actually gone in early 2020 to some markets again and done really well coming back to Chicago and also we were coming back to Boston and Philly and had great advances there. So, it looked like it was really very strong. We had done a sellout again in Boston for our 2nd time through, and pretty close to a sellout in Philly.”

“We were seeing even before the pandemic the markets were ready to see us again and then after we spent over a year in Daily’s Place there was so much pent up demand for our shows.”

On Outdrawing Major Sporting Events

The AEW President also noted that they often draw better than major sporting events in leagues such as the NBA and NHL.

“There’s really a lot of top sports leagues right now that we outdraw and people talk about these big hot sports leagues and right now AEW outdraws a lot of major sporting events on a regular basis,” Khan continued.

If you use any of the above quotes please credit PW Torch with a H/T to SEScoops for the transcriptions.