Jim Ross Says AEW Has to Keep the Momentum Going
Jim Ross spoke with Busted Open Radio discussing his role in All Elite Wrestling, the company’s chances at success and more. Video and highlights are below:
On his role in AEW: “Well, they’re going to squeeze all the juice out of the fruit that they can. They are going to use me in every way possible as far as doing things organized, and getting their infrastructure together with all the VPs that they got. I was kidding Cody Rhodes about, ‘How many VPs you got now? Like four, five, eight? I didn’t want to be a VP, I could have been a VP. I don’t care about that. I said, ‘I’ll be a senior advisor, I’ll help as many guys as I can. So I think that Tony Khan is depending on me … to be kind of the consigliere. To kind of help him with a lot of things that are new to him. Now, he is a bright son of a gun now. The kid is pretty smart, but new experiences, you need a GPS or else they are going to BS you.”
On whether the talent in AEW will be willing to listen to him for advice like slowing down in the ring a bit: “They might not be. I’m not saying if they are. There may be pushback on my side, and I have no problem with that either. I can prove my point to be right. I can help them improve their matches psychologically, if you incorporate selling at some point in their life, and staying from the eye-rolling bulls**t, and be real. I know that there is a lot of charismatic guys who have their comedy bits, but don’t have comedy from bell to bell. I don’t even want them to interrupt the matches to go to commercial break. If it was a legitimate sporting event, ‘Well, it’s the bottom of the second and the Yankees are up 2 – 3, we’ll be right back.’ What? ‘Here comes the Mick[ey Mantle], but we’ll be right back.’ Nobody would do that. It’s an expose. Same with not having time limits. How can you have a sporting event without time limits? Are you kidding?”
On whether the AAF’s failure makes AEW nervous about maintaining success: “Well, maintaining is not a surprise. With every promotion, after you come off a big run or whatever, maintaining momentum is key. That was always one of the main points of discussion in my WWE days, is how can we come out of ‘Mania with some momentum, and where is that momentum gonna come from? What ideas do we have here with momentum that is tangible that people to want to come out and see? That’s always an issue. You have to maintain momentum, and the only way to do that is to have a good product. I’ll be honest with you, and I love football as you guys know but I didn’t watch any of those [AAF] games. And I don’t know why, it just didn’t pop up on my screen at the right place or time. But no, I am not worried about anything. The Khan family is not undercapitalized. I think Mr. Khan is worth around $8.4 billion. And as long as they keep making car bumpers and own the Jaguars and the Fulham soccer team in the UK, they’re in good shape. So I’m not worried about it.”
