Alan “5” Angels’ AEW status has changed, and it has been established that, as of tomorrow, June 30, when his contract ends, he will be a free agent and no longer be tied to the company.
PWMania.com reported that Angels had deleted any mentions to AEW from his social media bios, altered his profile picture to an all-black image, and tweeted, “Excited for what’s next.” Additionally, it was reported that Angels was expected to continue working for AEW on a per-night basis.
In a follow-up, Angels confirmed to Fightful Select that his contract expires on June 30. According to Angels, he was informed approximately a month and a half ago that the company would not be renewing his contract. Angels also stated that the per-night offer was made to him, but he declined it because he believes there is currently a greater possibility for growth outside of AEW.
“My contract, I was told about a month and a half ago, that they are not going to re-sign me,” Angels said. “They did offer me a per-appearance, which I decided not to take, just solely based off what I thought was best for me. I feel there is more room to grow outside of AEW, right now, at this point in my career. It’s nothing against AEW or Tony Khan or any of the higher-ups in the business. It’s a personal thing. I feel, me going on the Indies and showing people what I can really do and showing people that I am a good fucking wrestler, I feel that will raise my stock — not saying it’s impossible to do that in AEW, but I guess the perception, how fans perceive Alan Angels, is, I’m the bottom guy in Dark Order and I feel I can change that outside of AEW. It’s possible in AEW, but I feel it would take longer. On top of that, I never got to have a great indie career. I was on the indies for three years, got lucky, and got scooped up. As a wrestling fan, being an Indie wrestler and doing cool ass Indie shows, that’s a thing I want to do. There are plenty of places to make money in pro wrestling right now. That’s not to say that I won’t be back in AEW, maybe I will, I don’t know, but that’s pretty much it. They offered me something, I felt it was better for me not to. That’s all it was.”
Angels also discussed this week’s “excited for what’s next” tweet he sent and the responses it received.
“I put out the tweet, I didn’t really mean to put it out as a teaser or whatever. I didn’t expect everybody to freak out about it,” he said. “It was literally just a normal tweet, at first. Then I saw some people speculating some stuff and I was like, ‘You know what, my contract is up in a few days, I’m just going to run with it.’ Then I turned my profile picture black, took the AEW out of my bio, and really just stirred the pot because I love watching people freak out on social media. People were hitting me up, asking if I was okay. Yeah, I’m fine, I just like watching people freak out on the internet.”
After failing to reach an agreement on a new contract, Stu Grayson, another member of The Dark Order, left AEW in May, and now Angels has followed suit. Angels was asked about reconnecting with Grayson on the independent circuit.
“I’m open to whatever. If anything, I’d like to have a match with him,” Angels said. “Whether that be at C4 or wherever else he wants to go. That would be my main thing. If somebody wants to book us for a tag, I’m open to it. I’m still wearing the Dark Order hat, it’s not like I’m kicked out of the group or whatever. I have a New Japan show, it’s already taped, with Uno as a tag. Stu leaving was a big thing for all of us and maybe was part of all of it. I’m open to do whatever with Stu.”
The NJPW match that Angels references to is their first-round match against Aussie Open in the competition to determine the first-ever NJPW Strong Openweight Tag Team Champions. The match was taped on June 19, although an air date has not yet been announced.
[email protected] is the current booking email address for Angels. Stay tuned to PWMania.com for more.
You can check out Fightful’s interview with Angels below:
