Tony Khan Discusses Using AEW Dark As A Developmental Program

AEW Dark has gotten longer and longer during the pandemic with upwards of 13 matches taking place each week. 

Before the pandemic, AEW Dark would be highlighted by four or five matches, but with no crowds to stick around, Tony Khan changed the way he utilized the program. 

“The pandemic changed Dark a lot. Dark was always supposed to be somewhat of a developmental show for us but it was also a much shorter show. When we came back and did shows during the pandemic, we used wrestlers in the audience. When they came in, I wanted to give them work. I was thinking at the beginning of the pandemic of all these Independent wrestlers around Florida and Georgia who weren’t working and they would kill to have this opportunity to wrestle on Dark. We could do a bigger version of Dark and it would be more of a developmental than it used to be because without fans in the stands, we could tape as much as we want, I’m just paying for production time but it’s worth it. It keeps the crew working too, which is great. That was my plan, turning Dark into more of a developmental and tape a lot more matches. We develop people from it. There are people that have come in and signed that we have plans for an I wanted to build up and they’ve built their record on Dark,” said Khan on the Pro Wrestling Torch podcast. 

Khan specifically mentioned Ricky Starks and Will Hobbs as two people who have stood out on AEW Dark. 

Both Hobbs and Starks are now aligned on Team Taz with Hobbs joining the group on Wednesday’s AEW Dynamite. 

If you missed anything from AEW Dynamite, check out Fightful’s full report on the show by clicking here.

If you use any of the quotes above, please give a h/t and link back to Fightful for the transcription.