Jim Ross called some of the biggest moments in wrestling history, and even in recent years has been at the announce desk for AEW’s most famous moments. However, it was Tony Schiavone, Excalibur and Taz who called the dawn of the MJF era at Full Gear.
The legendary announcer called the first half of the show, before handing the reigns over to Dynamite’s regular announce team to bring it home. Speaking on his Grilling JR podcast, Ross explained that the decision for him to only work half of the show was made by Tony Khan.
Jim Ross Would Have Liked To Have Called Full Gear Main Event
The WWE Hall of Famer said that he was impressed by the show, and was pleased to see MJF walk away with the World Championship.
I enjoyed it. You know, Tony Kahn wanted me to work the first six matches, and I did. And then I was done. And I’d like to have worked the last match. You know, obviously as a fan, as a broadcaster. Certainly, I’m a big fan of Jon Moxley, and I was kind of thinking it was going to be MJF’s night, just seemed like it was time. We’ll see how that works out, I hope it works out great, we’ll see.
You know, MJF’s got to take ownership of the championship and the great leader that we need him to be, he looked great. He was in great shape, or the best shape he’s ever been in. So it was interesting in that respect, I thought they had a solid match. I watched the match back on my iPad because I went back to the hotel when I was finished with my assignment…
So it was an interesting deal, I don’t normally leave early, but I was done, finished, and did what I needed to have done and we move on, so I liked the show. I thought it was a good show. I liked the early first half that I did. The matches I thought were pretty damn strong, some stronger than others, that’s just the nature of the beast. But I thought it was a good show, I really did, I enjoyed it. I thought the talents worked their ass off.
But it was well booked matches, all seemed to have meaning, the dots are always being connected well, so I thought that was a good scenario. So it was fun, it was fun. I would like to work more but that’s always going to be the case you know. I’m no ballplayer, I want to play, so I was happy to do what I did and hopefully the folks enjoyed, it seemed like they did. I got some positive feedback, but you always get one or two people you know say something stupid. T
he one that I thought was most humorous was that the second half of the pay-per-view was good because JR was not on it, isn’t that nice? So nice people, and they got to tag you into you know, you got to tag you as they call it, kids call it.
But anyway the look, it was what it was. It was a fun show to do. I was happy to work with Excalibur and Taz. Then Schiavone came in and just expelled me at the end. That was the plan and so I thought it went okay.. I was really proud of the effort everybody made, crew, office everybody had a good night when they needed it.”
In the main event MJF pinned Jon Moxley to become AEW World Champion for the first time. However, the win didn’t come without controversy. With two referees down and the bout descending into chaos, William Regal turned on his charge Moxley by handing some brass knuckles to his rival.
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