AEW world champion Jon Moxley was this week’s guest on the AEW Unrestricted podcast along with hosts Tony Schiavone and Aubrey Edwards. The Purveyor of Violence spoke about a variety of subjects, including his big title win over Chris Jericho, the COVID-19 pandemic hitting the world, and providing fans with a distraction during these turbulent times. Highlights are below.
On his big title win over Chris Jericho at AEW Revolution:
Crazy that it was only in February, seems like a million years ago. I was in a sea of people all touching each other and everything, and the world has completely changed, but that’s the weird part, it’s so different,” Moxley said. “It was just a good day. I just had confidence going in the whole day. Just felt good about everything. My wife was there because back then, people could get together. Some friends of mine were there. It was just a good positive day all around it. Just kind of came in feeling like I was already the world champion at the beginning of the day. I had all this momentum behind me, and the fans behind me and just felt good about everything. It’s just about going out there and execute. To be at the last match of a AEW PPV is always going to be a challenge too because there’s just so many amazing wrestlers and blow-away matches on every single one of our shows. Me and Chris kind of had that big-fight atmosphere, like a big boxing PPV is what we were trying to achieve and with the choir and everything singing Judas felt like a big moment, like a big sports moment. It’s just all positivity all around. It was just a great night, and then everything went to s–t.
On how quickly COVID-19 came and finally getting some fans back at Daily’s Place:
I won the title on a Saturday. That Wednesday, a couple days later, we’re in Denver in front of people still, and the very next week was when everything went to hell. I’ve only appeared in front of actual fans as champion one time except for the limited amount of fans we’re finally allowed to have at Daily’s Place now. I forgot that that was even a thing because you don’t even notice because it’s not a packed building. There’s staff, and we got the wrestlers out there too. I didn’t even notice it at first that we had fans in building. I forgot that we were going to have 500-600 people whatever in the building. I think I was coming out for the contract signing with MJF. I walked out, and I heard like, [Moxley makes cheering sounds]. I look up at the people, and I see people with signs and everything. And I got pumped up. I was like, ‘oh that’s right. We got fans back in the building.’ I got an extra pep in my step, and then we’re doing this contract signing and verbalizing back and forth. I had to take into account like, oh, we gotta pause, and they’re going to chant stuff, and they’re gonna cheer and boo and everything. And I was like, ‘oh man, this feels great. This is how it used to be,’ but hopefully, we’ll be able to keep doing that safely and get a little more and a little more and a little more people in. And one of these days, we’ll have full arenas again, but who knows when that’s ever going to be.
On being world champion during the pandemic and giving fans a distraction:
This run, I happened to be the guy that is kind of tasked with carrying the torch during at least the early part of a pandemic,” Moxley noted. “Hopefully, it’s over sooner than later. It is what it is, but I’m a guy that can send a message of I get beat up and everything all the time, and I got to overcome all these challenges. I can send a message of, it’s cheesy, but you get knocked down, pick yourself back up and so forth. I’m not going to sell this pandemic because if I do it, people are watching me looking for a distraction, and they get to watch AEW Dynamite and escape their problems for a night or whatever. So I’m not selling this pandemic. I’m gonna just keep trucking on the face of adversity.
Full interview can be found here. (H/T and transcribed by Wrestling Inc.)
