Chris Hero was the latest guest on the AEW Unrestricted podcast, where the Knockout King spoke on a number of topics, including whether he thinks he will wrestle for AEW now that he’s working there as an agent. Highlights from the interview can be found below.
How his friendship with Sonjay Dutt led to him getting a job with AEW:
I have known Sonjay Dutt for a very long time, and Sonjay was kind of the go between for a couple of offers that were made for me in the ring in the past year or two. I’ve stayed in touch with Sonjay, I think I first met Sonjay in 02’ or 03’ and we’ve just been buddies off and on for years. I had expressed to him, I had just kind of been telling him what I’d been doing and where I came in and helped out with ROH in the last six months of the Sinclair era. Then I hopped over to IWC in Pittsburgh to help produce and format those shows. Then, this whole thing that I’ve done this year with West Coast Pro. I was giving him tidbits here and there on what I was doing, Collision comes up, they’re gonna need some more people. We have a ton of coaches, but it’s still just a lot. For instance, at the last pay-per-view, I had two segments and then there were two of us that were working to get the segments down, get the times down. It’s just very helpful to have as many people as possible.
Gives details about his AEW contract and how he has not signed full-time yet so he can continue working for West Coast Pro:
So Sonjay had asked if I was interested in that. I was like, ‘Yes, but, this, that and the other.’ So what we worked out was, I would come in for five dates. He’s like, ‘Let me know what your schedule is.’ That was Chicago, there were two in Toronto, and two in Hamilton. Then, once that was done, we kind of reconvened and thought about it long-term. I had a couple of conditions, I didn’t want to give up any of the stuff I was doing with West Coast, I wanted to make my return elsewhere before even thinking about doing anything with AEW because if I end up doing something in the ring with AEW, I want it to be as special as possible and not something that’s done for the spontaneous moment of it and then it’s over and it’s done. That’s where the whole TK tweeting, I’m chipping away at him thing [came from], because I sit next to him at the desk every week.
On wrestling for AEW:
The thing is, it’s never that I didn’t want to wrestle for AEW, it’s just I realized how complex and vast the company is. I wouldn’t be satisfied with just doing a one off thing, whoop, I’m here, I’m there. I would prefer to do something with some thought put into it and that builds for the future. Also, I’ve been out of the ring for three and a half years, I gotta get my head right, I gotta get my body right. Those were my conditions, and [they said], yeah, no problem, we need the help and we’d like your help specifically, so let’s work on a deal and we’ll get you on every Collision except for when you have West Coast, and then maybe you make it up on a Dynamite or an extra pay-per-view or something. So far, so good. It’s been a lot, I haven’t been on the road this much since maybe even before I went back to NXT. It’s been a challenge to hit the road hard again, but it’s been great, everybody’s been wonderful and appreciative but also understanding. I got to Full Gear late because of travel. That sucked, I didn’t like that, but it still worked.
(H/T and transcribed by Fightful)
