Tony Khan Discusses Sting’s Current Run in AEW
In a recent interview on Talk Is Jericho, Tony Khan discussed Sting’s run in AEW, his favorite AEW storyline thus far, and much more. You can read his comments below.
Tony Khan on critics of AEW Dark’s length: “We bring in people to give them tryouts, and we are giving a lot of independent wrestlers work, in addition to the tryout people that we want to get a look at and put in specific matches. There are other people – we are trying to put the top people from Dynamite in get-over matches on Dark. You want to get some local people and keep them working because there’s no independent shows for all these people around Florida and Georgia like there used to be.
On his relationship with Sting and his current run in AEW: “I had a prior relationship with Sting. He didn’t reach out to me until his agreement expired. I knew him and he has a great son, Steve Jr,. who was a great tight end at Kentucky. He is a really very nice young man. He tried out for the Jags, and he had a knee injury. Also, I don’t think they utilized him enough at Kentucky because he was a good player and definitely someone who deserved a look in the NFL. He had a great tryout with us. I think if he had come in healthy, he could have had a good chance at being a good NFL player. He is a really nice person too.
“I had talked to Sting back then, probably over five or six years ago. So, I’ve known him a long time. He’s a great person. When he became available, it made all the sense in the world, and I thought it would be great to sign Steve to an agreement to come in. We talked and now we’re doing exactly what I wanted to do and what he wanted to do. I think it’s worked out great. It’s great for us, and he’s really happy too. He’s been really optimistic, and I think he’s having a really good time.
On his favorite storyline he’s booked in AEW: “My favorite one by far I’ve ever done start to finish is the entire PAC vs. Orange Cassidy thing. There was no time to build it because you had to do Kenny Omega vs. PAC in an Iron Man, and I didn’t want to step on it one bit. The perfect way to do it was to let Kenny and Hangman have their story, but let PAC be in the background. It ended up being one of the greatest pay-per-views ever because what it did – Kenny and Hangman had their story, and there was enough TV time for Kenny to also have a story with PAC that was gonna build to the Iron Man Match right before the pay-per-view. Kenny, within four days, did two of the greatest matches I’ve ever seen.
“So, my thing was, there was PAC vs. Trent, and there was the six-man with PAC and TH2 vs. Orange Cassidy and Best Friends. So, I really wanted to have the footage in the background and PAC was still in this thing with Kenny, but in the background, there would be enough there when we needed to flip it real quick to go to PAC and Orange Cassidy…..then getting into that with those guys, it’s not the best storyline, but it ended up being something very cool. It led to a great match, and then it was a great way to establish the Orange Cassidy character. Put him in a big match where even in defeat, we built a great star.”