Tony Khan Compares AEW Roster To WCW In 1997

Since its inception, AEW has at times been compared to WCW, both fairly and unfairly. And it seems the comparisons are not lost on AEW President Tony Khan.

Speaking with Busted Open Radio, Khan talked about AEW’s impressive and vastly growing roster, and how it’s like WCW 1997 roster, but with several key differences:

"I don't want to compare our roster to anything, ever, but I like to compare our roster sometimes to what I think was the hallmark great roster, which was 1997 WCW where you had all these stars and all this young talent,” said Khan “I really do my best to try to utilise the roster even better than they were when they were a successful company and printing money in 97 and 98. They had a lot of young talent that they didn't realise and they could have built for the future to help make it a profitable company that they never want to shut down. They could have made it a money-printing machine if they developed the young talent in-house that they had like Chris Jericho, Dean Malenko, Eddie Guerrero, and Rey Mysterio. I do try to build stars for the future and that's why you have so many great homegrown stars that are being featured at All Out. There are great opportunities here and I don't think Jericho, Mysterio, and Guerrero got those same opportunities when they were on a roster with the all-time names like Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, Randy Savage, and Roddy Piper. What a great TV business they built with that roster that unfortunately didn't last, but I think would have lasted longer if they had built the young stars the way I try to do.” 

H/T: Fightful