On the June 18 episode of AEW Dynamite, Jake Hager and Wardlow engaged in a MMA Fight. Hager remained undefeated in MMA, submitting Wardlow in the second round after being rocked in the first round.
The match took place in an MMA cage and was complete with an MMA-style presentation.
According to Chris Jericho, even though Hager is the pro MMA fighter, the concept was Wardlow's idea.
"That was a suggestion by Wardlow months ago. We had it scheduled two separate times and things just changed. One time, somebody was hurt or couldn't make it. The other time, it didn't fit the angle where we had it slotted. The funny thing is, we had to do that match before we went back on the road because obviously you have to build that cage and we wanted an actual MMA cage and wanted it as close to an MMA fight as possible because Jake is an MMA fighter. We had the cornermen, Aubrey had the black ref jersey, the way Justin Roberts announced it. We really put a lot of time into making it different from anything else you had seen, but it had to be taped because of [the cage]. It was the last taped show we had available and we could create and change the story to put it in there," said Jericho on Wrestling Observer Radio.
Jericho also noted that the feud between The Inner Circle and The Pinnacle has "a long way to go."
The feud between the two groups continued on Wednesday's AEW Dynamite with MJF battling Sammy Guevara. If you missed anything from AEW Dynamite, check out Fightful's full report on the show by clicking here.
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