"He's micromanaging to an extent that I don't know Vince McMahon ever did" – Jim Cornette discusses Tony Khan taking away creative control from AEW EVPs
Tony Khan has taken away creative control from his AEW EVPs, and Jim Cornette believes it's a level of micromanagement not even WWE chairman Vince McMahon has displayed.
Jim Cornette on AEW EVPs Losing Power @TheJimCornette youtu.be/R3Zc78ZpvNE via @YouTube
According to bodyslam.net, Tony Khan has taken away creative powers from his EVPs in AEW, although pitching ideas and suggestions are still encouraged. Legendary historian Jim Cornette wondered if Tony Khan would be able to shoulder this much responsibility since, besides AEW, Tony is involved with other sports as well.
"Apparently the story is going around that Tony Khan has taken the creative control away from the erstwhile Executive Vice Presidents of AEW namely the Hardly Boys, Kenny Olivier and my old ex-friend Cody Rhodes but, apparently, this is the report. He's taken creative control from them, they still have input, but he's the final decision maker. What was it before? What was he doing? 'Hey Cody, you're in segment 5, let me know what you're gonna do,' was that it? EVPs come and go, it's gonna be interesting when they have outgrown their semi-usefulness. The one thing we've pretty much established is that, as long as that company exists, whether it's 4 years, 40 years, whatever the case, Tony Khan is gonna insist on being the booker. After that controversy with Castor Oil a few weeks ago, if he's approving the raps The Acclaimed do on the way to the ring, then he's micromanaging to an extent that I don't know Vince McMahon ever did."
Jim Cornette also said that going to the granular level with AEW could become too much for the AEW boss.
"Now, I'm not saying if all that management is perceptive or good, but I'm saying he's going down to the granular detail at this point, and one would have to think that there's a lot of things to do, he's supposedly an executive with a football team, he's supposedly an executive with this and that and now he's doing the wrestling thing from start to finish and bla bla bla, does he sleep? Sooner or later he'll have to even if it's in a hospital bed when you take on too much responsibility," Jim Cornette said.
Jim Cornette believes Tony Khan being the sole booker might have helped AEW shows
Jim Cornette is not easy to please, but AEW and Tony Khan, who has been a long-time admirer of the former Midnight Express manager, have done an admirable job in Cornette's eyes lately.
The former Smoky Mountain Wrestling booker believes that the recent improvement in AEW could've been a result of Tony Khan being in charge of AEW creative completely.
"Is the sudden trend towards actually putting stars out there to do what stars do and not overcomplicating everything; is that a byproduct of taking away this creative control, or is it just blind luck that the people came along to do their own segments? Because, we still see, one segment looks like it could be on Monday Night RAW when 10 million people were watching it, and the next segment looks like it's on cable access with the folks in Indiana watching it, or should be. So, I'm not sure yet if Tony has taken the creative control away from his EVPs. Then what has changed? The only matches I see changing are the matches involving Punk and Danielson and, etc. that would know better than to do foolish stuff to begin with," Jim Cornette said.