After much speculation, it has been confirmed that the FTR with Dax Harwood podcast is coming to an end.
Harwood launched the podcast back in January and the star never shied away from giving his views on AEW and wrestling as a whole. However, this approach has left him on the wrong side of some fans online who have been particularly vocal about his opinions.
Speaking on the latest episode of the show, Harwood confirmed that the podcast would be coming to an end. He explained that he had hoped to do good in wrestling with the podcast, but this had become increasingly difficult.
“So when we started this podcast we just wanted to do good for wrestling. I was looking forward to bringing my thoughts on psychology, in-ring action, what I thought was good wrestling, my love for Bret Hart, and breaking down some of the things that we had done in our careers and some of our biggest moments. Never in a million years – (Harwood then reads a text from Cash Wheeler which praises Harwood for his integrity and honesty).
To a fault, I’ve stood up for what I believe in, and to a fault, I speak my truth. Never have I pointed out or singled out one person and talked sh*t about them – except for Road Dogg, I did but I felt like I owed him that but I could be wrong. I probably didn’t, I probably should have just not said a word but that’s just not how I operate. I had an opportunity to spill my heart on how he made me feel, how he made me feel so minuscule, how he made me feel so small I had to let him know. Other than that, I have never talked bad about anyone that I worked with.”
[…] I want to apologize to not only my fans, I wanna apologize to people who already didn’t like me and fans of, for example, The Young Bucks and fans of Kenny Omega, fans of MJF, or anybody else who I may have upset. I wanna apologize to them because I never wanted you to hate me so much that you would say some of the things you said to me.”
Dax Harwood Admits Backlash Took A Toll On His Mental Health
The AEW star continued by discussing the impact that the negative reaction from some fans had on his mental health. Harwood stated that he doesn’t want his daughter to read some of the things that people have said about him.
“Going into this podcast, I never thought it would happen and I hate that it happened and again, like I told you earlier in the show, I thought I was way more mentally tough than I am but I admit that I’m not and I don’t think I can handle some of the things that are said. I don’t think I want my daughter ten years from now to read some of the things written about me.
Ultimately, we wanted to do good for wrestling and I don’t think that this podcast – as much as we tried – I don’t think the podcast was reflecting that for whatever reason.”
Harwood added that he and co-host Matt Koon felt the podcast was doing “more harm than good.”
“[…] I think we both feel we were causing more harm than good even though we were trying to do good, it just didn’t come across that way. I guess we just didn’t portray it that way. We were more of a detriment to professional wrestling than we thought and we never wanted to do that.”
Dax Harwood and Cash Wheeler recently signed new four-year contracts with AEW and confirmed they plan to retire once those deals expire.
H/t to TJR Wrestling