Tony Khan has reiterated that he has no intention of becoming an on-screen character in All Elite Wrestling saying that writing that way means potentially “disappearing up your own butt.”
Khan has spearheaded AEW’s rise as a new company in the wrestling world since its inception in 2019. As the man in charge of the whole operation, it’s Khan who has the final say on the creative direction of the company.
Speaking on Barstool Sport’s Pardon My Take podcast Tony Khan discussed learning from the past and from the mistakes of others in the wrestling business.
Khan explained:
“I’ve learned from the pros and the cons, and I think some of the things that went wrong for WCW, in my opinion, were the creative control. They gave creative control to a lot of the wrestlers, and some of the storylines were asinine. Some of the ideas were great, but it was a very disorganized show. And when they brought someone else in from the WWF to be a writer named Vince Russo, he made it ten times worse. He took a problem, it’s like they had a massive hangnail and he just chopped off the arm. So that was part of the problem.”
For Khan, another reason so many promotions fell by the wayside is the management structure. Tony Khan has no intention of booking by committee saying one voice at the top is paramount.
Tony Khan continued:
“Another major, major issue for them, in my opinion, was the management. Most wrestling companies that have been really successful over time have had one supreme commander at the top, who’s like owned it, booked it, done everything. Run the place, run the management. Whether it was Vince McMahon for years, organizing everything, Cowboy Bill Watts, Eddie Graham, Fritz Von Erich, and countless others. And so I think that made sense as a business model, and I told Kevin that. It’s like the strong management WCW didn’t have, I can provide.”
Tony Khan concluded by discussing his own role on the TV show. While Khan has joined Tony Schiavone on ‘paid advertisements’ on IMPACT Wrestling, he has no intention of being a regular on AEW television.
Khan stated:
“I’ve done stuff on other wrestling shows that kind of promote AEW and cross over. But that’s kind of the line I don’t want to cross because I feel like you disappear up your own butt when you start writing that way.”