Tony Khan Wanted To Sign Swerve Strickland When AEW First Launched

AEW star Swerve Strickland recently spoke with Amitai Winehouse of The Athletic on a number of topics including his upcoming AEW World Championship 3-Way Match this Sunday at Revolution against “Hangman” Adam Page and current champion Samoa Joe.

During the interview, company president Tony Khan also spoke about a number of topics including how he wanted to sign Strickland when AEW first launched, but he had just been signed by WWE.

Khan said, โ€œAfter his (Swerve Stricklandโ€™s) first match against Tony Nese on AEW Rampage, Chris Jericho walked back to me and said, โ€˜This guy is really amazing. Where did you find him?โ€™ Iโ€™ve been watching him for years. I wanted to bring him into AEW when we first launched, but he had just been signed by WWE. Swerve is a wildcard. We saw that Swerve is a breakout star. He won the Tag Team Championship in his first year and went on to have a massive 2023 while being showcased as a singles star. The idea was to showcase Swerve in feature positions with the intent and belief that crowds all over the world would buy into him. I believed heโ€™d become very popular.โ€