Tony Khan says Vince McMahon "cares about" AEW, credits WWE Chairman as his inspiration
Tony Khan has credited Vince McMahon as his inspiration and claimed that the WWE Chairman does care about AEW.
Khan's management of the company has received a lot of praise from all corners and the AEW fanbase has been happy with his booking of top stars.
On the Le Batard and Friends Network podcast, Khan spoke about how hard he's had to work to get stars and sponsors for his company. Tony also mentioned that Mr. McMahon does care about AEW despite what he says.
“He does care. I read a lot of books about Vince,” Khan stated. “I’ve never met Vince. There was a time when he was building his company in the ’80s. I’ve tried to undertake a similar amount of work, in terms of shouldering a ton of responsibility and taking a ton of one-on one-meetings. You hear about Vince going to convince Hulk Hogan, going to convince individual people to come in and work for the WWF, convincing a sponsor to come on. Vince was taking all these meetings and all this responsibility, and he was a similar age to me, and I think I’m inspired by that," said Tony Khan. (h/t: WrestlingInc)
Vince McMahon can be attributed to helping wrestling achieve mainstream success. He turned WWE into a multi-billion dollar empire, so it's no surprise that an aspiring wrestling entrepreneur like Tony Khan looks up to him.
Vince McMahon recently said Tony Khan's AEW is not competition
During the earnings call for WWE’s second quarter of 2021, Vince McMahon dismissed AEW as competition, saying it is not on the level of WCW back in the day.
“It’s certainly not going to a situation [like with WCW] where it’s the rising tide because that was when Ted Turner was coming after us with all of Time Warner’s assets as well. That was a different situation. AEW is where they are. I don’t know what their plans are, I only know what our plans are. I don’t consider them a competition like I would WCW back in the day, nowhere near close to that,” said Vince McMahon.
AEW is still in its infancy, but the strides it has taken cannot be discounted. The roster is full of talent, there's a megastar of the ilk of CM Punk believing in its vision and a loyal fanbase that will do anything to watch it succeed.