AEW President, CEO, General Manager & Head Of Creative Tony Khan took to Twitter this afternoon and went back & forth with fans over the debut of Satnam Singh, and some of his responses led to more criticism.
Singh debuted on this week’s AEW Dynamite, aligned with Jay Lethal and Sonjay Dutt. They attacked new ROH World Television Champion Samoa Joe following his main event title win over Minoru Suzuki. The debut was done to help AEW’s growth in India, and to bridge a gap between AEW and the Discovery-owned Eurovision India channel. It was later reported that the debut received very mixed reactions in the AEW locker room. You can click here for our original report on why Singh was brought to TV, and you can click here for the follow-up report on locker room reactions and his training.
In an update, Khan appeared on Busted Open Radio today and admitted that he could’ve booked Singh to debut better than he did.
“I could have done it better. It’s one of those things, I wish I had done it a little differently,” Khan said. “There were things about it I probably should have done differently, now I see in hindsight. To be honest, it wasn’t my idea to turn the lights out but I am the ultimate filter, I’m the person who everything goes through. I put the outline of the show together and when I came in Wednesday, I thought it was the best outline I’ve ever put together, one of them, at least.”
Khan continued and commented on how important Singh is to the company. Khan added that Singh will be a force to be reckoned with now that he’s aligned with Lethal and Dutt. The recent report on locker room reactions noted that some people didn’t think the “lights off, lights on” reveal worked for Singh. Khan noted that the person who suggested this has more than three decades of experience in the business.
“People might not have liked it. Satnam is an important person for us. It was important to debut him in a meaningful way and to show that with Jay Lethal, he’s going to be a force to be reckoned with,” Khan continued. “At the same time, turning the lights out for somebody people didn’t recognize, it’s a great point. To be honest, the person who brought up turning the lights off has over 30 years of experience in pro-wrestling. When they brought it up to me, I was only looking at the pros and I should have thought about the cons.”
Khan continued and talked about discussing Singh’s debut in the pre-Dynamite production meeting.
“We had all these people in the room and somehow not one person when that idea came up brought up the negatives and then when we did it, all of a sudden all of the negatives were very obvious,” he said.
Khan added that while the angle has been criticized, it’s also drew the international attention he was hoping for.
“I think it created a lot of buzz. Satnam’s debut has been the most watched thing out of the show and frankly, it’s gotten international attention I’ve wanted it to get,” he said, adding that the feedback to the angle has been a learning experience for him. “I appreciate what their feedback was and now as I am in my third year of doing this, I would not do that that way again and these are the things you learn going into year three that I would do different in year four or five.”
Khan later responded to a tweet on his Busted Open comments, and things got worse from there.
One fan wrote, “Some people will be mad at this but also complain Tony Khan doesn’t listen to experienced people he hires.”
Khan responded, “Yep I said I came to tv with a show outline, then heard out ideas on such details & I picked the wrong one. I’m amused anyone says I threw someone under a bus to say the idea was from someone of 30 years experience. Who did I throw under this bus exactly? Where’s the mystery bod?”
A different fan responded to Khan and wrote, “All I know is literally all of us have the same amount of booking experience as you did when you started AEW. You aren’t ready for that conversation though.”
Khan responded, “Yeah and that’s why I am the first to say the fans are always right, and that this is a great example that the fans know what they’re talking about”
That same fan responded to Khan and suggested he hire a booker. Khan’s next response brought him significant heat from even some of his supporters as he tried to “ratio” the fan.
“You need to hire this ratio,” Khan wrote.
One fan suggested that they would’ve had Singh appear in the crowd, then have him stand up. They wrote, “I would have shown him in the crowd and then have him stand up. Then you start the build.”
Khan responded, “I saw a bunch of fans say that after the fact, and I realized after that it would’ve worked better than what we actually did. Again, dozens of experienced people in our production meeting and nobody pointed that out, and the idea came from fans. It goes to show how smart fans are”
Stay tuned for more. You can see the related posts below:
(H/T to F4W for the Busted Open quotes)
Follow Marc on Twitter at @this_is_marc. Send any news, tips or corrections to us by clicking here.