Kevin Kelly has been fired by AEW:
Kevin Kelly, who was part of the AEW Collision commentary team since the launch of the show last summer, has been fired by AEW according to PWTorch sources.
Kelly was removed from the AEW roster page earlier today. AEW taped Collision tonight and Fightful reported that the announce team for Collision was Tony Schiavone and Nigel McGuinness with Kelly nowhere to be seen during the taping.
Kelly’s posts on social media last weekend cost him his job, according to PWTorch sources. Kelly gained a lot of attention when he went on TwitterX last weekend and accused ROH announcer Ian Riccaboni of sabotaging his career and of libel.
“When you go out of your way to intentionally mischaracterize my raising awareness of the global horrors of child trafficking to a fringe conspiracy theory that everyone knows is bulls–t in order to hurt my career and standing in the industry, that at the very least is libelous,” wrote Kelly on X.
Kelly also posted about his dissatisfaction with how he was being used in AEW.
“But the idea of what I bring to the table is lost there because Ian libeled me,” wrote Kelly. “So I sit on the bench, valued by my peers, waiting to get my number called, keep asking why but get pushed aside. It’s okay, because there is no one better than me. Ask the ones that know and they’ll tell you.”
Kelly’s performances were seen as subpar within AEW, including Tony Khan apparently, since Tony Schiavone was called to take over the lead play-by-play role a few months into Collision’s run on TNT.
I can’t believe there’s even drama in this company when it comes to their announcers. I thought Ian Riccaboni was the one that originally recommended Kelly be brought in to begin with, so I don’t know how or why their relationship soured. I’ve seen something or other about Kelly being a “Q” conspiracy theorist as alluded to above, but I don’t know how true that actually is.
And Sasha Banks, who is supposed to be debuting in AEW on Wednesday…
Though she's about to debut for AEW, Mercedes Mone believes she'll be back in WWE one day.
"I know I'm going to be back there [WWE] one day, ok," the former Sasha Banks said while being interviewed on the Kick Rocks wrestling podcast. "So it's not over. Like I said, I have a lot of unfinished business in wrestling in a lot of places."
Mone's line about knowing she'll be back in WWE one day was edited out of the full version of the podcast, but it was included in a clip uploaded to YouTube.
Things You Don’t Say On A Company Press Tour #28.
Nice way of undermining the promotion you’re just about to join as if they’re some sort of stop-gap. I’m sure there’s quite a few people in AEW that clearly feel that way though (Miro immediately springs to mind, and has had a horrible stop/start/stop run since his debut).
I don’t understand why AEW hasn’t explicitly come out and said she’s debuting at “Big Business” because ticket sales so far have been good rather than great. They tried to do a rerun of the CM Punk debut but this time in Boston and it isn’t working out as successfully. If her fans or non AEW viewers knew categorically she was going to be there they may have turned out for it.
