Rob Van Dam: There’s No Truth To The Latest Rumors In AEW
If you ask Rob Van Dam, everything is good in All Elite Wrestling.
For the past few months now, AEW has been going through turmoil, including the backstage brawl that took place between CM Punk and The Elite post-show at the company’s All Out pay-per-view, and, well, another backstage fight between Sammy Guevara and Andrade El Idolo. That’s just to name a couple of issues that AEW has had.
However, according to WWE Hall of Famer Rob Van Dam, there’s not much fire causing the smoke coming from the promotion, with Rob Van Dam saying that the state of AEW isn’t as bad as fans think.
Rob Van Dam recently showed up at a live event hosted by Inside The Ropes, where he would say that the rumors flying in the mill and statements coming from fans about All Elite Wrestling being in trouble “crack him up.”
Rob Van Dam had this to say:
“You know, I think it’s interesting. I think that it’s funny that the word online sometimes is that AEW is going to implode and that they’re done and Tony [Khan] can’t handle the chaos. All that cracks me up because I think there’s probably no truth to that whatsoever.
I don’t even think he cares. I don’t know. But I watched CM Punks interview that he gave when he was stuffing his mouth with Twinkies and shitting on everybody. He always strikes me as the same guy and that guy, just from feeling his energy, there’s a lot of egos in wrestling.
I mean, you have to have a big ego to even think you can do this [wrestling] or to follow your dreams and think ‘f*ck yeah, I’m a winner and I’m gonna beat out my classmates. Really where do you draw the line between believing in yourself and then believing in your own sh*t.
With wrestling, I don’t know if you noticed, but every single promo is just arrogance. Every single promo is the wrestler telling you, [in a comedic voice] ‘I’m the baddest bitch there is’ and you don’t know. Every single wrestler, everyone, has their own spin on that. I’ve been separated from the full time long enough to where I don’t even connect with that competitive ego anymore and it makes so many decisions for you when you’re trapped in that in that way of thinking, you don’t even realise it.
But now looking at it from the outside. Can you imagine another form of entertainment, like musicians, if there was a singer up here saying, you know, this is the last ticket you need to buy, you don’t need to hear anybody else singing once you’ve heard my voice. But with wrestling it’s arrogance against arrogance the whole time and that’s always been an issue, the more I got in touch with my inner Zen, the more of a conflict that became and also if people are going to be inspired by me, in my actions and my beliefs, do I want them to think that I’m like that.”
Rob Van Dam was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2021.