All Elite Wrestling (AEW) official Earl Hebner has addressed the criticisms that have been lobbied at the promotion’s officials. Speaking with the WINCLY podcast, Hebner, who has over 40 years of refereeing experience, addressed his duties and reflected on the other referees’ learning experience.
“They need to have me in their dressing rooms teaching them,” Hebner said.” Right now I’m just doing PPVs because of travel and everything so I’m fortunate to just do the PPVs. What they have is pretty good. We learn every day so it’s not like we know everything.”
When it comes to what he believes AEW referees can do to improve and maintain order of their matches, Hebner pointed to tag matches and 10 counts being too slow: “Sometimes I think with the tag matches there’s too much interference and they bury the ref a lot.”
AEW refereeing has been criticized by some for being inconsistent in what is or isn’t permitted. These flaws have been more noticeable during tag or multi-person matches and are something AEW officials have previously acknowledged in their attempts to improve.
Having been in the industry as long as he has, Hebner was familiar with Cody Rhodes’ father, Dusty. When asked about his relationship with “The American Dream” and his son, Hebner offered:
“It’s great. When I was coming through Dusty was the one who gave me a job. I rode in the truck with Cody when he was a baby,” Hebner shared. “It’s just been awesome to see how Cody has progressed and grown-up. He’s in the footsteps of his dad and every step he makes is Dusty. He’s a great kid and God bless him. He deserves everything he’s getting and going after.”
AEW: Dynamite airs every Wednesday night on TNT at 8/7C. Their most recent pay-per-view, Full Gear, aired this past weekend.
H/T to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.Â
