AEW wrestler Sammy Guevara recently spoke with TV Insider to promote this week’s AEW Grand Slam TV tapings at Arthur Ashe Stadium in New York City.
During the interview, Guevara was asked about AEW President Tony Khan addressing the rowdy crowd in Chicago, IL, just hours after firing CM Punk from his company. He said,
“Tony, I feel, doesn’t get enough credit he deserves. He, The Young Bucks, Kenny Omega, Cody Rhodes. They all changed everyone’s life and wrestling. Without them, especially Tony, there would be no AEW. There would be a bunch of people doing something completely different. I don’t know anything regarding the behind-the-scenes decisions he makes, but he is such a caring guy. What I will say is that he has a lot of balls. I have a lot of respect for him. He went out in front of the Chicago crowd to address them personally after he made the decision to let Punk go. He didn’t have to go in front of everyone. He could have just played the video. But he went out in front of thousands of people. He is getting booed. He understood how they felt. He is an upfront guy.”
Guevara continued, “I watched him make the announcement thinking, ‘Wow, he doesn’t have to do this. I get it from a wrestling fan’s perspective. You went to the show expecting to see someone, and now this guy is telling you he isn’t going to be there. It’s almost like killing the messenger. But when you think about it, this man did not need to go out there. He could have easily also had someone else do it. Mad respect. I told him that too. I told him he had a lot of balls for him to do that. He said, ‘It had to be done, and I had to be the one to do it.’ He wasn’t going to get the heat on any of the boys or anyone that night. He wanted to take the heat, which I thought was commendable.”
