Tony Khan is focused on two big goals for AEW heading into 2024, just its fifth year of existence.
The company president is looking to replicate the success of AEW All In at Wembley Stadium in London as tickets go on sale Friday and secure a “very lucrative” media rights deal with AEW’s coming due.
AEW sold 81,035 tickets – the most in the history of wrestling — for All In last August and saw an attendance of 72,263 for the biggest show in company history.
It’s something Khan wants to cement as a yearly destination event.
“I want to go back and build and have that tradition of doing the biggest stadium show of the year in Europe and having people from all over the world travel to London for that show,” Khan said.
Media rights, however, are the most important piece of business a wrestling company can do.
AEW already has five hours of television over three shows on TNT and TBS, but hasn’t had a true new deal since it launched “AEW: Dynamite” on Wednesday in 2019.
Its rights were extended in January 2020 on a four-year, approximately $175 million contract that included the addition of “Rampage” for Friday nights, according to the Wrestling Observer.
Since then, AEW has added two more hours of live TV in June with Collison on Saturday nights.
Khan sounded optimistic about what’s on the horizon.
“A huge milestone for us will be in 2024, we will have our media rights agreements domestically put in place and we have all these great relationships all over the world,” he said. “The very lucrative U.S. media rights will be settled in 2024 and that’s very exciting for us.”
The addition of Collision has made it possible for AEW to launch the Continental Classic tournament, as it will need to feature six matches on average per week.
The 12-man, round-robin tournament – similar to New Japan’s famed G1 Climax – will conclude at the World’s End pay-per-view at Nassau Coliseum on Dec. 30.
It’s something Khan wanted to do before, but the added TV time and having Bryan Danielson cleared to compete after fracturing his orbital bone finally lined up for the tournament – which will be an annual event.
“Bryan Danielson was at the top of the list of people I would want in this tournament,” Khan said. “It’s something we had talked about years ago that he’d always wanted to do a round-robin tournament and I always wanted to produce an AEW round-robin tournament.
“Now felt like the perfect time. Especially this year, I felt like the calendar was always good for it but it was challenging previously with three hours of television, and these are the exciting possibilities that adding Collision this year creates now.”
The Continental Classic is also an attempt to unify the Ring of Honor world championship and New Japan STRONG championship, currently both held by Eddie Kingston, with the new title for the tournament winner to crown one touring champion.
That person will defend all three champions across Ring of Honor, AEW and New Japan and the titles will be defended in the tournament each year.
The 12 competitors in the tournament, such as Jon Moxley, Jay White, and Swerve Strickland, were selected with that idea in mind as each member of the field has either wrestled in New Japan before or is capable of wrestling its style of match.
“There’s a lot of championships in wrestling and a lot of opportunities to create inter-promotional rivalries and cooperation and with the relationship between AEW, ROH and New Japan Pro Wrestling it made a lot of sense to have New Japan and ROH involved with [their] championships unified with the Continental Classic winner,” Khan said.
All of it comes at a time when AEW saw its attendance figures for its weekly TV shows trend downward year over year during the second and third quarters, but Khan is optimistic with average attendance up in the fourth quarter compared to 2022.
Collison, which featured CM Punk from June through July before his firing, is averaging just 399,500 (0.11) viewers over October and November after averaging 456,000 (0.14) over August and September.
Khan believes the downturn could end up being a long-term viewing trend because of the impact of college football, NBA and college basketball during this time of year.
“Being on Saturday, that’s a big change from the launch in the summer and college football competition is very challenging and we’ve held up well,” Khan said. “I think when the competition is taken into account it will be a pattern because this is our first year.
“I’ll expect that we’ll see growth. Year in and year out, as long as we’re doing Saturday wrestling you have to account for the strength of college football. In November, basketball really ramps up and there’s even more competition on TV. It will be important in their first year with Collision we establish these cyclical viewing patterns that become the norm.”
In another challenge, AEW heads into December with popular world champion MJF dealing with a significant injury as Khan confirmed reports this champ has a torn labrum.
For now, MJF will work through it and is scheduled to defend the title against Samoa Joe at Worlds End – the company’s first New York pay-per-view.
“He’s injured and he’s a very determined person, he’s an incredibly hard worker,” Khan said. “He’s become a fighting champion and he wants to fight so he’s gonna fight on. … I respect MJF for fighting through a hard injury.”
Khan would not comment on the status of the suspended Jack Perry after his backstage incident with Punk at All In or the Young Bucks’ in-ring status after friend Brandon Cutler announced Matt and Nick Jackson were stepping away from wrestling for a bit.
The next big moment for AEW will come at Worlds End.
With Double or Nothing happening in Las Vegas every year and All Out traditionally in Chicago, Khan isn’t ruling out making Worlds End a New York-based show moving forward with advanced ticket sales doing well.
“I think looking at the calendar and the time it’s certainly an intriguing possibility for a major event in the Northeast and could be specifically New York,” Khan said. “Certainly on Long Island, we have seen great results for the inaugural World’s End.”
On QT Marshall resigning from AEW and citing a “new direction” by the company
“I really, really like Mike [Cuellari], QT. I worked with him for a number of years. He has very high aspirations and rightfully so. He’s a very talented person. He’s got a great mind for wrestling and he’s a very talented wrestler. He cares a lot about the people around him. He’s a very giving person. He also does want to have an in-ring career and I think that’s important to him and he is someone that offers a lot to any company and I have only very positive things to say about QT.”
On if Swerve Stickland had elevated himself in the world championship conversion
“Swerve is one of my personal favorite wrestlers and somebody that I have believed in since AEW signed him. … We believed he’d be important for our future. We presented him as a star since then. He’s been a world tag team champion and he’s been very successful as a top singles star.
“I think Swerve in any match in any situation is a great pick. He’s definitely one of our top stars that the company is really behind. I’ve always personally believed in Swerve and if you look at his development on television since he arrived he’s been a constant focus of the company and he’s developed steadily and it’s through his hard work the connection he’s made with the fans. Swerve is a rising star of the moment and for the future and one of the great assets in AEW.”
