Maria Kanellis comments on the possibility of an AEW all-women's show.
Maria has had success running women's divisions in the past as she spearheaded the ROH women's division alongside Bobby Cruise during the pandemic and coming out of the pandemic. She and Cruise also run Women's Wrestling Army, an all-women's promotion.
AEW's women's division has grown since its inception with women getting more television time and storylines. Maria is signed to AEW/ROH, and believes an all-women's show is possible, but wants to make sure it makes sense.
"Is there a possibility because of the amount of talent they have in AEW to have an all-women's show? Of course. They are more than capable of doing so. I also think, you have to look at it from the perspective of bandwidth. How much can you put out there right now on the AEW side when you're trying to take care of all of AEW's brand, plus Ring of Honor? A smart person isn't going to necessarily add more things unless they already know what every company and brand situation is going to be a month or six months from now. I know we don't like to look at things from a business perspective as wrestling fans, but there is that side. Is that the best use of time right now or now that we're getting several women's matches on pay-per-view that are highly rated, is it better to build that until you get to a place where, now you know what your profit is going to be?" she wondered while speaking to Steve Fall of WrestlingNews.
She continued, discussing the growth of the women's division in AEW.
"It was building the women's division and the notoriety of all the women in the division," she said. "From Jade (Cargill) to Britt (Baker), even. Britt had been on the Indies, but not to the stardom level of the Young Bucks [Matt & Nick Jackson}. Not many have accomplished that on the Indies anyway. You're building these new talents, and that's what any company wants to do, they want to have homegrown talent that they have built to stars, as well as stars that come from other places, just like territories in a much bigger scale. Maybe you have to look at and say, 'that was building.' For three years, they built homegrown stars while bringing in other talent and now they are to a place where everybody, as a fan, can go, 'I see it now. I get it.' It's like a puzzle was revealed. Maybe Tony (Khan) is more of a genius in that sense in his patience of building it."
Women headlined the January 13 episode of AEW Rampage as Ruby Soho & Willow Nightingale battled Anna JayAS & Tay Melo in a street fight.
Maria is the manager for The Kingdom (Mike Bennett & Matt Taven) in AEW. Bennett recently challenged Darby Allin for the AEW TNT Championship on the January 6 episode of AEW Rampage.
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