Former AEW star Jake Hager has opened up about his departure from the company, revealing that he grew frustrated with AEW President Tony Khan and ultimately became “very jaded” during his run.
Hager was one of the original AEW roster members, making his surprise debut on the very first episode of Dynamite in October 2019 as part of Chris Jericho’s Inner Circle faction.
Speaking on Chris Van Vliet’s Insight podcast, Hager recalled a tense moment following the infamous “Brawl Out” incident involving CM Punk.
According to Hager, a “boys-only” meeting led by veterans such as Jericho, Sting, Bryan Danielson, and Jon Moxley was interrupted when Khan stormed in. “He wasn’t a professional. After all the Punk shit that went down, the boys got together and we had a meeting, and this was the boys only, no office, right? We’re all like Sting’s in there, Show, Jericho, Bryan, Mox, they’re all standing at the front, kind of like, talking us through this shit, and lo and behold, who comes into the room storming in? Daddy’s little billionaire, and he’s like yelling at us… We were all feeling disrespected.”
Hager added that he regretted not speaking up during the exchange, saying the veterans often felt like “playthings” under Khan’s leadership.
The former World Heavyweight Champion also expressed frustration at what he felt was Khan’s inability to take constructive criticism from his experienced roster. “We had to wait outside his office. His storylines were very good at debuting, but he could never carry anything through. And then it got to the point where I couldn’t tell him anything. He couldn’t take criticism. He was f—ing up, and we’re all just having to deal with it, you know. We all had blood, sweat and tears put into that company. We were all there at the beginning, like we all had our careers behind us that helped build that company, and then we all had to just sit side by side and couldn’t do anything because he wanted to run it the way he wanted to run it.”
Since leaving AEW, Hager has retired from professional wrestling and launched his own trucking company in Florida.
The full interview with Jake Hager is available to watch below.
