Jim Cornette has claimed that the AEW roster has become too overcrowded with a number of overpaid talents, meaning that it might be time to let some wrestlers go.
Throughout 2021 the AEW roster continued to expand as the company began producing more and more content. The most high-profile example of this was the launch of AEW Rampage in August, giving the company another hour of television time.
The expansion of the roster was heightened by WWE releasing a huge number of Superstars throughout the year. There were also high-profile stars who decided not to renew their contracts. This led to Bryan Danielson, Adam Cole, Andrade El Idolo, Malakai Black and more moving to AEW. There was also the small matter of CM Punk returning to professional wrestling for the first time in more than seven years.
However, with all of the new additions, some of the wrestlers who signed with AEW when it launched, have slid from view.
Speaking on his Jim Cornette Experience podcast, the Louisville Lip, reflected on another round of WWE releases. Although, fans clamour for names such as William Regal to head to AEW, Cornette suggested that it might be time to AEW President Tony Khan to let some people go, as the roster is too big.
“Tony Khan could pick up another 20 people easily by just doing the logical, sensible business thing. To quote Cary Silkin ‘What am I running, make a wish?’ And fire some people of his own! He has still on his roster, his YouTube extravaganza and tapings in closets somewhere that people see on their cell-phones, he’s still got a bunch of people that in no way in the world could benefit the WWE or they would be interested in them in the WWE.
They might go out on the indies and in a few years be worth a sh*t, but right now they aren’t. You could free up, I’ve heard some of the ridiculous amounts that Tony Khan was paying these guys when he first started signing them. As I’ve mentioned before, 5 times what the indies were paying them. What’s 20 x $100,000 a year?
You would save a couple of million dollars, and you would never know who he cut. You would never know they were gone unless you look for them. He’s got too many people and too many unimportant people, he is just too f*cking nice.”
Cornette and his co-host Brian Last then highlighted the case of Marko Stunt. The legendary manager explained that many of the wrestlers that AEW signed in their early days were never good enough to be regularly featured in a promotion of this size.
“I thought he was gone already. Seriously? Just wad some money up, drive down the interstate and throw it out the f*cking window. At the end of the trip, you will have the same thing as if you hired dwarf dong sucker. I know someone out there is going ‘Oh he’s mad at one promotion for firing everyone and he’s mad at the other promotion for them not firing people.’
Here’s the problem, people that the WWE are firing in the large part shouldn’t get fired. So since they are a billion dollar corporation making record profits in a pandemic then [sneers]. But in the case of AEW, they are trying to, and in some cases succeeding in making it look like a real promotion. They’ve got a roster full of guys that never should have been signed in the first place. They weren’t ready and may never be ready and not good enough to be in this spotlight.
That is a good reason, especially as he has paid them for a year or two, to say ‘Call me in a couple of years. We will revisit this. Grow up and see you later.’ It’s been charity money so far, they have given nothing to the company. And these morons are remembered as the building blocks of AEW, but that’s why for the first year all we though was that AEW was a dog and pony show, because that was all we were looking at. A bunch of outlaw, mud-show f*cks.”
The January 12th episode of AEW Dynamite saw the debut of another new face as Brody King finally arrived, joining forces with Malakai Black.
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