Scott D'Amore discusses the partnership between TNA and AEW.
Throughout 2020 and 2021, AEW and TNA were involved in a working relationship. The main anchor of the partnership was Kenny Omega, who held the TNA World Championship for over 100 days throughout 2021. Furthermore, stars like Thunder Rosa, Karl Anderson, Christopher Daniels, and Luke Gallows all participated in the relationship at the time.
While speaking to Fightful for a new interview, D'Amore talked at length about the partnership and explained that some of the restraints are the reason that it all eventually came to an end.
"You look at that partnership. At the time, IMPACT was really struggling to ain’t traction. We were doing our damndest and putting out everything we could, but really struggling to find ourselves. Getting Kenny Omega as IMPACT World Champion and getting the Good Brothers featured on their show. From a business point of view, the two Kenny pay-per-views, were two of the three highest pay-per-views the company had at that point. Even the one with Christian when he came in was pretty high when it came to buys. There was a lift in business and viewership. A massive lift on social views and monetization. Anything that was Kenny Omega monetized well. I think Kenny got a bad rap in the sense that the plan from day one was not for Kenny to lose the belt directly. Kenny would have. He wanted to. He wanted to work with Eddie Edwards and Josh Alexander. There were some restraints there. The other thing was, and he’s never talked about it, but I’ll talk about it. He was in such immense pain half the time. There was times when he could barely walk. The amount of work that it took just to get him to the ring to perform. I cite one example. Kenny was supposed to come to Nashville when we were filming at Skyway. He was in so much pain and so banged up. He just couldn’t travel. We talked about giving him a week because of the tape delay to heal up, and then we filmed it at Daily’s Place. That was his title defense against Moose. I thought it was cool we got to shoot at a different location and we got to have Tony Schiavone, a legend, call the match. Personally, the AEW relationship was cool because I got to call a match on TNT with JR and I got to call match on our show with Tony Schiavone. Overall, the relationship had its positives, including that. Kenny was so banged up, I think they worked on him for 90 minutes to get him to the ring to wrestle. I’ll never forget, after, Kenny being frustrated and apologizing because it wasn’t the match he wanted to have with Moose. He really wanted to give Moose a special match. I think they had a very good World Title match, an excellent match, but Kenny doesn’t like excellent, he wants legendary. Hats off to Kenny on everything he did for us and the AEW relationship. Did it have its hindrance, as far as what some of the restraints were? Sure. That’s why it ultimately had to end. While we were doing it, there is no question from a financial point of view, it had its benefits. There is no question when it came to eyeballs, buzz and legitimacy, it certainly helped. Somebody is going to watch this and say, ‘D’Amore is kissing up because he’s doing business with AEW.’ I said the same thing when we weren’t doing business with AEW. It’s hard for a company at their level to work with other companies. There are always going to be restraints. Overall, what were we supposed to do? Not do the relationship with AEW? Wrestling is evolving and growing. The AEW relationship was good for IMPACT, it helped Kenny with his storyline there, and it helped AEW. The current TNA relationship with WWE is a great one and mutually beneficial. It’s one of the reasons I reached out about initiating that relationship. What they’ve built since I’ve left has shown to have benefits for both side."
Elsewhere in the interview, D'Amore explained how Christian Cage and Jeff Jarrett are able to use their TNA theme songs in AEW. Check out his full comments on the subject by clicking here.
Fans can check out Fightful's full interview with Scott D'Amore in the video linked at the top of this article.
