MJF On Ex-WWE Stars In AEW: Wrestlers Are Journeymen, We Follow The Money
Maxwell Jacob Friedman discusses wrestlers from WWE joining AEW.
AEW was made to be an alternative to WWE. For the most part, they have consistently been that but as the promotion gains more notoriety, and as WWE continues to release more talent, more former WWE Superstars are being signed to All Elite Wrestling.
Maxwell Jacob Friedman, as one of the AEW pillars, is not worried about this because he says that all of the pillars continue to be used properly and get regular exposure on television.
“Guys like me are drawing the highest numbers, guys like me are on TV every week,” MJF told Ariel Helwani. “Guys like Sammy Guevara just had the TNT Title for an incredible reign, as much as I hate his stupid face. Darby Allin is on TV weekly. Again, another emo, loser, scumbag, huge star in our programming. Jungle Boy’s currently Tag Team Champion. So, to those people [who believe AEW signs too many ex-WWE names], what I would say is, that’s a bad-faith take. Now, are we bringing in professional wrestlers that have been in other ‘territories’ and companies? Yes.”
MJF, a student of the game, says that it is simply a part of wrestling tradition to explore different territories and go to where the money is.
“We move around, we go where the money’s at. Right now I’m where the money’s at for me… for now. So to those bad-faith takes, because that’s exactly what it is. It’s bad-faith takes, professional wrestlers, we go where we feel we’re going to be handled best and where we feel we’re going to make the most money, where we feel we have an opportunity to become World Champion. So if people want to come over here to go for, in my opinion, the most important world title in all the professional wrestling right now, the AEW World Title, then how can you not respect that and understand that?”
Elsewhere in the interview, MJF echoed these sentiments when talking about Cody Rhodes’ next career move. Read more here.
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