Britt Baker highlights AEW's growth as a key way to rally together.
Over the past several months, AEW has made some headlines for a variety of reasons due to backstage drama, ranging from CM Punk's brawl with The Elite (Kenny Omega and the Young Bucks) to reported tensions between Baker and former AEW Women's World Champion Thunder Rosa. Still, AEW continues to grow; the company has sold over 60,000 tickets for AEW All In: London, its upcoming show at Wembley Stadium.
Speaking to Jim Varsallone of the Miami Herald, Baker was asked how she navigates some of the reported drama behind the scenes. She first emphasized that AEW's continual growth means a lot to her, as she has been with the company from the start.
“It’s really, for me, as being the first female signed, and one of the day ones, the OGs, every big announcement that AEW, it really shakes me to my core in the best way possible that I’m a part of this, I’m the foundation of this wrestling company that, when we first signed our contracts, we didn’t know really what this was gonna grow into. We’d hoped. We were having the most optimistic thoughts as possible, but nothing was really promised. We really all took a leap of faith because up until then, the only major wrestling company was WWE, and to kind of close the door on that for now and say, hey, no, I really want to go all in on All Elite Wrestling, for a lot of people, you really were. You were like, okay, gonna cross my fingers and hope for the best. Just to see all of this play out in the absolute best way possible, it’s so reassuring. It’s very surreal. I wrestled on the first All In in front of 10,000 people. That was the big show I’ve ever been a part of, which was essentially the precursor to All Elite Wrestling," Baker said.
Baker continued by noting that seeing the growth of AEW, from its early days to its upcoming event All In event at Wembley Stadium, is huge. She noted that this growth, and the drive to keep it going, can be what rallies everyone together. Baker stated that internal competition is good, but everyone needs to be fighting for the same goals.
"Myself, Kenny, the Young Bucks, MJF, Jungle Boy, the whole day group of all of us, just to see the growth to now we’re gonna be wrestling in Wembley Stadium. I think there’s 70,000 tickets sold. That’s huge, it’s massive. It almost seems like that could have never been possible at one point, and it is. You really have to think, the growth, that’s what I think can really rally everyone together, that, ‘Guys, we worked so hard together to get from one point to where we are now. Let’s keep growing, but we can’t do that if we’re all on different pages. Everyone needs to be working together.’ That’s with every company. You need to have people on the same page. Internal competition is good. It creates pressure, and pressure makes diamonds. I think competition within a company is great, but at the same, everybody needs to be fighting for all the same goals," Baker said.
Baker recently commented on the reaction to her black eye t-shirt. Click here to see what she had to say.
Tony Khan recently stated that Thunder Rosa has done a lot of the things the company would ask for as she has been making amends. Check out his comments here.
Check out the card for the May 17 episode of AEW Dynamite here. Fightful will have live coverage of the show as it airs.
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