AEW is a great thing for the professional wrestling business and they have made it a competitive business yet again as another option for talent to choose which promotion they want to work for. AEW is a wrestling company which was founded in 2018 and they have been running live shows from 2019 which means it has been more than 3 years that this company has been on TV and till now they have done really well for themselves by getting some of the top wrestling talent there is to offer.
WWE during the initial years of AEW was always looked at negatively and it was believed that the new company would be the new number 1 but it has been 3 years and nothing of that sort has happened and there are a few reasons for it. AEW by now should have been a viable number 2 clocking in a million viewers plus every week based on all the stars they have and they should also have been more financially viable. So, let’s discuss the reasons why AEW will always be number 2 when compared to WWE
It will not get the reach and the views WWE has
The main reason AEW will never be number 1 as long as WWE is around is that fact it has been 3 years and their flagship show Dynamite has not been able to bring in 1 million viewers every week based on the talent they have for example Jon Moxley, Kenny Omega, The Young Bucks, Samoa Joe, Bryan Danielson, Paige, Chris Jericho asking others. And AEW has not been able to fill an arena with more than 15,000 and WWE continuously sells more than 30,000 tickets for big PPVs and almost 10,009 seats for Raw and SmackDown. They get 2 million viewers for both Raw and SmackDown and AEW will never reach that. And the pop culture reach that WWE has as it has been recognized by all the major sports leagues and big time celebrities come to have Matches like Bad Bunny, Johnny Knoxville, Logan Paul etc.
Triple H will make it more one sided
Till the time Vince McMahon was around running WWE, AEW had the support of the fans the company for the fans but it only lasted more than 2 years because as soon as Triple H was appointed the Chief Content Officer of WWE, the tides turned and now WWE is looked as the company for the fans and that was impossible to think even a year ago. Now all the top superstars who are in AEW who left WWE because of Vince McMahon want to come back and this year many of them will return like The Revival or Andrade Almas and many more. Triple H will make WWE the clear number 1 this year based solely on the Royal Rumble and WrestleMania where WWE has already had their highest gate without announcing a match for WrestleMania 39.
Backstage Dramas and founders leaving AEW
2022 was not a good year for AEW when it comes to the backstage stuff because there was so much drama behind the scenes. Firstly Cody Rhodes left the company and he was one of the founders of AEW and for him to leave was a huge telling point and he returned to WWE and it was a huge loss for the company. Then there was the whole CM Punk drama from the media scrum and the brawl that happened backstage and CM Punk left AEW and that impacted their business a great deal. 2023 is looking better but they will be far behind.
Also Read: AEW a threat to WWE
