AEW star William Regal has clarified the situation surrounding his ring name and why he can use his WWE moniker in All Elite Wrestling.
The wrestling world was stunned at Revolution in the spring of 2022 as William Regal emerged for the first time in AEW, delivering swift slaps to Bryan Danielson and Jon Moxley before bringing the two men together in the beginnings of what would be known as the Blackpool Combat Club.
Prior to that Regal had spent two decades as part of WWE, first as a wrestler then as Triple H’s right-hand man in NXT. It was in WWE that Regal seemingly lost his nobility as well as his other wrestling first name, Steven, as he became William Regal.
Ring names and personas have been tricky subjects in wrestling history with WCW famously being sued by WWE after they introduced Scott Hall and Kevin Nash as outsiders, heavily implying that they had come from WWE to wage war on the Atlanta-based company.
For William Regal, however, there was no difficulty in using his ring name in his post-WWE life as he revealed on his Gentleman Villain podcast, saying:
“I own the name.”
Regal went on to explain how at the back of his WWE contract was a list of names that he owned, noting that William Regal, Lord Steven Regal, and names he had used previously in England are all owned by him.
However, such is his respect for his former employer, there is one situation where he would stop using the name:
“If Mr. McMahon would’ve asked me not to use it, I wouldn’t’ve used it.”
Regal added that if he was to lace up his boots in anger again, that is where WWE could step in to stop him from using the name:
“The only thing that WWE had was a copyright in America and in Europe if I was to wrestle. They could stop me wrestling, if they wanted to, as ‘William Regal,’ but I don’t wrestle anymore.”