Tony Khan Reveals He Spoke To NWA's Billy Corgan Following National Championship Announcement

In the lead up to Full Gear 2025, it was announced that AEW would be introducing a brand new title for the men’s division; the AEW National Championship. It was revealed that a Casino Gauntlet match would be held to determine the inaugural champion. During the announcement, references were made to the lineage of the NWA National Title, which still exists today, prompting a response from the current NWA National Champion. 

Tony Khan took to X to discuss the potential controversy regarding AEW’s National Title, revealing he’d spoken with NWA’s Billy Corgan over the week. 

“When I recently announced it, I saw a lot of talk online and there was chatter from people from other promotions and people all over. Wrestlers are going to talk and say stuff, that’s totally cool. I ended up having a nice conversation about it with the President of the NWA, Billy Corgan. The NWA National Championship has a great history of its own. When we created a National Championship, I saw NWA wrestlers saying, ‘We have a National Title.’ AEW is a separate company and we have our own lineage. Blly, I have a lot of respect for him and what he’s doing. I love the traditions of pro wrestling and I had a nice talk with Billy. We haven’t talked in a long time and it was good for him to do this. I respect him and the NWA. We’re trying to do something different here. We brought pro wrestling back to TBS, but there are a lot of promotions that had history on TBS before, one of them being the NWA. I think it’s great that Billy is trying to keep that tradition alive and revive it. We had a really nice talk about this. To any wrestlers anywhere in the world, particularly you in the NWA, you might be happy to hear Billy and I had a nice talk about this. I’m sure he would say the same.”

Thus far, Bobby Lashley, Ricochet, Kevin Knight, Shelton Benjamin, and ‘Speedball’ Mike Bailey have been announced for the Casino Gauntlet match.

H/T Fightful