Swerve Strickland Reveals Surprising Match Which Changed His AEW Career

In 2023, Swerve Strickland’s main event push began as his wave of popularity led to him challenging ‘Hangman’ Adam Page, kickstarting a brand new feud which would continue on into 2024, offering up one of the core threads of AEW programming in that time. This led to Strickland climbing to the world title scene, before defeating Samoa Joe for the AEW World Championship and embarking on a reign which lasted 126 days, eventually ended by Bryan Danielson at All In: London 2024. 

When it comes to his success in AEW, Strickland has attributed this to one match in particular where he believed Tony Khan knew he could trust him with anything, and this came during a match with NJPW’s Hiroshi Tanahashi on Collision. He explained this during an appearance on the No Contest Wrestling podcast.

“Through the office from talks I heard it was me and Tanahashi on a Collision. When Tanahashi was like…it was me and him. It was going right into Forbidden Door. Cause I didn’t do Forbidden Door the main show, on the second Forbidden Door. We were going back and forth and he was about to hit High Fly Flow but he slips off. I run up and I start fighting him up boom boom boom and he knocks me off and he hits me High Fly Flow and wins.

"That was the moment Tony was like ‘I can trust him in anything. I can trust him with anybody’ That might be what saved the New Japan relationship with AEW. It might have been because he became the president like very soon after that. But he gets hurt, all that goes away. All of it. So there’s that. Then shortly after that I started wrestling a lot of the veterans. It was like me and RVD, me and Jeff Hardy, me and Billy Gunn, me and Sting. It was like Swerve can make it work. Swerve can do it. I was like ‘Bring it on.'”

Strickland has reportedly proved to be a selfless member of the locker room, with it recently emerging that he pushed to tap out to Bryan Danielson at All In rather than pass out in order to produce a better moment at his own expense. Given his success in AEW, Strickland has said himself that he doesn't see a return to WWE on the cards.

H/T SEScoops