Update On Why Jay White Chose AEW Over WWE

On April 5^th, Jay White surprised many people when he appeared on AEW Dynamite and joined forces with Juice Robinson. In doing so, White becomes the latest wrestler to join AEW’s ever-growing roster.

Jay White’s status as a free agent lasted a few months after he lost a loser leaves Japan match to Hikuleo on February 11^th followed by a Loser Leaves New Japan match against Eddie Kingston a week later.

With his NJPW contract no longer in effect, rumors began circulating that White would end up in either WWE or AEW.

Now that he’s in AEW, some are wondering why White chose that company. According to Fightful Select, White was interested in going with WWE but something appears to have gone wrong somewhere along the way during negotiations.

Per Fightful, both WWE and AEW were interested in signing White as far back as Wrestle Kingdom 17. The WWE officials that spoke with Fightful noted that they were confident White would sign with them, especially after both Triple H and William Regal made overtures to White in order to persuade him to sign.

However, WWE’s higher-ups are said to have “failed to communicate properly” during the hiring/contract negotiations process. It was even alleged that WWE was already working on creative ideas for Jay White under the presumption that he had already signed.

And yet, some sort of interruption between the company’s top brass and those directly involved with contract negotiations ultimately caused White to rethink that decision and go with AEW instead.