Pro wrestling veteran Matt Hardy took to an episode of his “Extreme Life of Matt Hardy” podcast, where he talked about a number of topics including how AEW signing a lot of big names in a short period of time can take the importance off of them and can result in them getting lost in the shuffle.
Hardy said, “Will Ospreay, who was incredible, one of the greatest athletes I’ve ever seen. You have Will Osprey show up. Boom. It’s a big deal. I feel like that is something that should have been talked about for four to six weeks directly after that. Okada, boom, Okada is a big star. Still a lot of the people here in America are probably familiarizing themselves with him, obviously, you know, especially a more casual fan if you understand my idea of the AEW casual fan, people in America that might not follow New Japan Pro Wrestling. So he shows up the next week and I feel like that should have been a big deal there for four to six weeks. We should have really highlighted him. The week after that, boom, Mercedes Mone shows up, and that could have been another big deal for four to six weeks. You had jammed a lot of stuff on the program and into the viewers eyes and I feel like these events could have been longer and taken more time to develop and really highlight how big of a deal it is to get this huge superstar to AEW.“
“Even the buzz that they were working on creating when you had Ospreay, you had Okada, you had Mercedes back to back to back, I feel like Ospreay now gets caught in the Okada avalanche. People are still gonna love him, but I feel like it takes a little bit of the importance off of him. It takes a little bit of the spotlight off of him. Once you do Mercedes, it does the same thing to Okada and a little more on Ospreay. They’re such great, huge, big stars and I feel like when you see them show up on the TV, the next four weeks of your programming, they need to be one of the focal points and nothing else, nothing else new because they are the new deal that you’re promoting, you’re putting on the map, and you need to make them seem as important as they could possibly be. I understand that mindset where they’re like, ‘Oh my God. We gotta get them buzzing this week, we gotta get them buzzing this week, but it isn’t sustainable. I mean, what you’re going to have to get people talking is with whatever story or this arc, you have this character on this journey, you have these characters on, and then eventually once they get to that big match, that is the blow off for the finale of their deal. Then they go out and they tear the house down and have a great match. I feel like that is what has to be done because that is sustainable. Bringing someone in every single week to make the people tune in, I don’t think that’s sustainable.“
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