Tony Khan has commented on whether AEW Collision’s time slot was ever considered for ROH.
This upcoming Saturday will see the debut of AEW Collision, a new two-hour weekly wrestling show on TNT, featuring names such as CM Punk, FTR, Samoa Joe, Andrade el Idolo, Miro, and Thunder Rosa amongst others, with the belief being that the brand will introduce some form of brand split.
Speaking with John Pollock and Brandon Thurston of POST Wrestling & Wrestlenomics, AEW President Tony Khan was asked if he ever considered giving Ring of Honor the time slot that Collision now finds itself with. Khan denied that this is the case, although he did share his enthusiasm for the future of AEW, adding that ROH will serve an important role in developing the future stars of the promotion.
“Not for TNT. I think the idea of two more hours of AEW is very appealing. What it meant was that AEW Dark and AEW Dark: Elevation would be coming to an end, at least for now. And they were great shows, and they’ve been huge for the development of AEW and so many great wrestlers from a developmental perspective got their start in AEW on Dark or Elevation and it includes a lot of people who have been champions and a major part of the show now on a weekly basis. I think in the future, Ring of Honor is gonna be really important for the development of AEW and thankfully we were able to devote thousands of matches across hundreds of episodes of Dark and Elevation to really fostering a young roster, building people up, and now I think we have a great outlet also in a sister company with Ring of Honor and our partnership with New Japan Pro Wrestling and other great partnerships, other companies we work with to create possibly excursions or other great experiences for our wrestlers to get experience overseas or domestically.”
-Tony Khan
Elsewhere in the interview, Thurston asked Khan if AEW fans can expect to see Battle of the Belts make a return. The event has had six instalments thus far, with several major title matches taking place on each show.
Khan revealed that Battle of the Belts is set to continue, although it’s unclear at this time as to whether it’ll be taking place on a Friday or Saturday moving forward.
“Yeah. Battle of the Belts will continue, which is great and as for where the next Battle of the Belts episode will run on TNT, whether it be a Friday or Saturday, that’s a great question and (we’re) still talking about that and we’ll have a good answer for you soon.”
-Tony Khan
The aforementioned debut episode of AEW Collision is set to take place this Saturday at the United Center in Chicago, Illinois, with the main event seeing the returning CM Punk team with FTR to take on Bullet Club Gold and Samoa Joe.
As always, we’ll aim to provide any further updates on AEW Collision, as well as future instalments of Battle of the Belts, as soon as we hear more.
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