Report: MJF's Friends Questioning If They've Been Worked The Whole Time

The saga of MJF vs. Tony Khan is sure to be one that will define the rest of 2022 and possibly beyond, and with MJF’s penchant for sticking to kayfabe at all times, the reality of the situation may not come to light for years.

Such is MJF’s commitment to storylines that even some of his friends have reportedly been questioning if they’re being worked by ‘The Salt of the Earth’, with PWTorch’s Wade Keller reporting the following after MJF’s headline grabbing promo against Tony Khan last week:

“I know of wrestlers who MJF was saying all the things that he said in that promo to, but in real life private conversations that didn’t in any way seem to play into a strategy to work the dirt sheets or work Tony Khan or whatever you think that the con and the game was – who are now [asking], ‘who is Max?, how much of what he was saying was just part of his elaborate web of trying to create this believable, long arc work that would elevate him to… some higher status that’ll give him an even bigger deal and a bigger legendary Andy Kaufman meets Brian Pillman meets CM Punk meets whatever, for a WWE deal.”

Keller continued, “There’s also wrestlers whose eyebrows were raised [on Wednesday] that I’ve heard from and about who are like, ‘oh, we don’t make people feel? Is that what Tony’s authorising wrestlers to say on the air that all the stuff that we’re doing to our bodies doesn’t make people feel but a guy who in three years has worked 22 matches, on average about seven per year for this company is getting to go on TV and disparage what we do in a promo that led to fans cheering him because he got to sort of heel on ex-WWE guys.’ Like there’s a bunch of money being spent on external TV guys who are just thrown under the bus on a promo to generate a buzz. So even if Tony Khan hasn’t lied to anybody’s face about this, within hours of that promo, there’s people in AEW talking to each other going ‘what? what’s going on here? Were we worked? Who’s side is Tony on? Is he the captain of the ship? Did MJF work him? Can we please know what’s going on here? And by the way, can you stop throwing us under the bus and making us look bad?’”

Keller continued, stating he has heard from colleagues of MJF that Friedman is always in work mode:

“Multiple AEW wrestlers told me or people that I directly talked to who even showed me like screen captures of texts, like, what the attitude was towards this before [Wednesday’s] Dynamite, which is, ‘it’s a work he’s working the dirt sheets, he’s working his friends… he’s always in work mode, he’s always in character, you guys are suckers. You know, be smart about how you report on this.’

“It’s fascinating because the people who are tight with MJF and have heard him say these things are like, there’s just no way [this is a work] but there’s doubt in their voice. But [they are like] there’s no way this could have actually been a work all along. I had these conversations with them and I know how they felt… But what I’m privy to, it’s hard to reconcile what I know with MJF sitting down with Tony a few months ago going ‘I got a great plan, and it’s going to culminate in Los Angeles and you don’t even have to do anything, Tony, just say no comment, and we’re gonna make this work.’”

H/T: WrestlingNews.co