Tony Khan recently spoke with Wade Keller of PWTorch to promote next weekend\'s Full Gear pay-per-view. During the discussion, TK commented on recent additions to the AEW roster.
\"It\'s so unrecognizable compared to the company that we started with,\" Khan said about the current roster. \"It\'s pretty unthinkable looking around and seeing CM Punk, Bryan Danielson, Adam Cole, Ruby Soho, Thunder Rosa, all these awesome people that weren\'t with us when we started.\"
He continued touting more of AEW\'s talent signings. \"Malakai Black, Andrade El Idolo, new faces, and even the people that came in last year. Sting and FTR, Matt Hardy, and so many people have joined us along the way from when we started.\"
CM Punk\'s impact on AEW business
Khan also spoke about the impact that bringing in CM Punk has had on AEW\'s ratings, merchandise sales, PPV buys, and more.
\"Our numbers are so much better than they were going into the last few months and there\'s been an unquestionable lift since CM Punk came in,\" Khan said. \"For some reason, I see some people trying to discredit Punk all the time, that he hasn\'t been a huge lift to our business and he has been. And he\'s only scratching the surface. I have intentionally in working with him tried to hold back a lot of his biggest marquee things, biggest marquee matches and stories.\"
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\"We\'ve been getting Punk reintegrated, building him a winning streak, and I think it\'s worked great. Again, when you look at the rating we did for our first Wednesday back, that was a really strong number last week and he was such a huge part of it,\" Khan continued.
\"He\'s just lifted our business so much,\" Khan continued. He also noted that All Out, with Punk\'s debut match against Darby Allin, did the most PPV buys in company history.
TV execs thrilled with CM Punk
\"I was on with TNT yesterday, they’re so excited about the direction we’re going and the future of the business and there’s so many possibilities they see for the AEW franchise and he\'s one of the big stars they want to build around,\" Khan continued.
\"The TNT executives also had a great call with Punk and talked to him and they want him to know he’s a really valued member of the TNT Warner Media family, the TBS family.\"
If you use any of the above quotes please credit PWTorch with a H/T to SEScoops for the transcriptions.
