Joey Janela Heard Tony Khan Was Hot About His AEW Contract Comments

With AEW entering its third official year of operation in 2022, we saw the first round of talent leave the company after the expiration of their deals.

One name who departed AEW was Joey Janela, with ‘The Bad Boy’s exit little surprise to some after he went public with his frustrations during an interview with Denise Salcedo, declaring he would not resign with the company.

Now, Janela has given his thoughts on his exit, saying the following to Chris Van Vliet on Insight:

"Chances are, I was going to be renewed, whether it be with Ring of Honor, but I just ran my mouth in an interview saying, ‘I haven't heard from anyone, what is going on? I guess I'm not getting renewed,'" Janela said.

Janela then said the following when asked if anyone from AEW contacted him after the interview went live:

"No, I heard Tony (Khan) was hot about it. It made him look bad, it made their talent relations look bad, but at the same time, it made them improve their communications with talent within that two-week period that I did that, communications were a lot better. I didn't hear from anyone. I heard people were upset, but talent was hitting me up from the company saying, 'You're 100% correct, you spoke up, you're correct and that was cool to take that risk.'"

As for why Janela did that interview with Salcedo, he said he needed to get some things off his chest at the time:

"Denise wanted an interview and I said, 'Let's just do it. I've had it, I'm stressed out, frustrated.' It created a lot of good out of it and there is no… I haven't talked to Tony since. That's something that kind of irked me because we were so cool and after the AEW shows, when AEW first started, I would go out with him because he knew I would stay up until 7 in the morning with him drinking shots of tequila. I assume he's still irked by it, but there is no hard feelings on either side," Janela said. "There are no bridges burned between me and AEW. I'm friends with all the talent there. I'm in contact with all the talent. Tony has a hard job. He wears a lot of hats. He's not booking a traditional wrestling show, he has a huge roster, he's signed some of the greatest free agents in the world. You have three hours of TV a week. When you're not booking a traditional wrestling show and you want to book a TV show like a mini-pay-per-view every week, a lot of talent is not going to get time every week. They either have to sit and wait for something, sit out of the rotation, and go to work and be happy or they can try to pitch something, the creative route, or they can wait for stuff to come. Some of the guys there, they feel like they should be given more, which I believe a lot of guys are, but it's hard to book a wrestling show when you're booking it like a pay-per-view.

"Tony tries to make everyone happy. That work environment is fantastic. It's a fantastic work environment. Of course, all professional wrestling, especially on a mainstream level, there is going to be huge amount of politics. When you have 25-minute matches every week on the show, it's hard to fit everyone in. You're not going to make everyone happy, he tries to make everyone happy."

H/T: Fightful