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5 WWE STARS WHO COULD JUMP TO AEW

There’s a war going on in the world of professional wrestling. It might not be commanding as large an audience as the fabled Monday Night Wars of the 1990s did, but the competition between AEW Dynamite and WWE’s NXT on Wednesday nights is a fierce one, and one that so far AEW has been winning comfortably. For AEW to truly supplant WWE at the top of the wrestling tree, though, that isn’t the battle it needs to win. It needs to continue building on its audience until it reaches the point where it can go toe to toe with WWE’s flagship shows, RAW and SmackDown. 

Right now, that battle seems a long way off. AEW would need to add at least another million viewers to its audience to even come close to competing with either show. That might be a stretch, but it's not impossible. It just means they need consistent and compelling television and more stars that might draw eyeballs. There's a ready-made set of stars in WWE at the moment who, for various reasons, are either unhappy with their situation or aren't being used at all. Like Jon Moxley, Brodie Lee, Matt Hardy, and Shawn Spears before them, they would likely be happy to hear from AEW when their existing WWE contracts fall due for renewal. 

We're not suggesting that AEW will or even should automatically pick up anybody that WWE lets go. That would make them too similar to WCW and would make them appear secondary to WWE. Despite that, a wrestling card is only as strong as its lineup. For TNT, it's like playing casino games. You'll get a small win from an online slots game if you can build a winning line of moderately valuable symbols, but if you want a big win, you have to pull off the same trick using higher-value symbols. Right now, most of those higher-value symbols from AEW's point of view are locked up by WWE (who are actually releasing a range of real online slots later this year). If AEW wants to land a jackpot, it needs to pick up a few of the aces WWE drops. Here are a few performers who might be tempted to make the jump. We're not counting The Revival, as they're already free of their contracts and are likely headed that way soon anyway!

Ricochet

We have no idea what went wrong for Ricochet. He was universally adored in NXT, and was rewarded with the North American Championship during a short run there before he was called up to the main roster. From there, he was put in an 'odd couple' tag team with Aleister Black and then got a run as US Champion. Several websites and internet-based reporters claimed that Ricochet was a favorite of Paul Heyman and was being groomed for big things - and then everything went wrong out of nowhere. He was fed to Brock Lesnar in Saudi Arabia without landing a single offensive move in the process. The following week on RAW, he was pinned cleanly by Riddick Moss, who hadn't been given any build whatsoever. Now the same sources who said Heyman was high on Ricochet are saying Vince McMahon has given up on him, and so a move to AEW would probably be extremely tempting. 

EC3

Nobody seems to know what Vince McMahon's problem with EC3 is, other than the fact that he clearly appears to have one. On paper, EC3 should tick all of McMahon's boxes. He's a big guy, he's in incredible physical shape, and he can cut a great promo. His in-ring work may not be on the same level as the best wrestlers in the world, but if anything, that should have held him back in NXT more than on the main roster. Instead, the reverse happened. EC3 was booked solidly in NXT, called up to the main roster very quickly, and then almost never used at all. As is the case with Ricochet, there have been several reports that McMahon just doesn’t want to push him. He was pictured on Instagram with AEW’s Chris Jericho several months ago, with Jericho mentioning in the caption that EC3 had ‘exciting opportunities’ in his future. It isn’t hard to work out what those opportunities might be. 

Rusev

Rusev likes to work fans on Twitter. He's dropped several hints in the past that he's been on the verge of leaving WWE, including deleting all references to the company's name from his social media accounts, only to turn up again on television several weeks later. Something seems different this time around, though. He's been rumored to be in 'contractual dispute' with the company since January, and vanished in the middle of a feud with Bobby Lashley, seemingly bringing plans for a feud between him, Liv Morgan, Lashley and Lana to a crashing halt in the process. Rusev has a large fanbase and, when last seen he was in the shape of his life. He'd be a great asset for any company, and AEW would be foolish not to pick him up if he became available. 

Jeff Hardy

This one seems inevitable. The only reason Jeff Hardy is still under contract with WWE at all is that his contract was frozen while he was dealing with injuries. If that hadn't happened, his deal would have expired at the same time as his brother Matt's, and he'd probably already be in AEW. Historically, wherever one of the Hardy brothers goes, the other isn't far behind. Given Jeff's injury history and his out-of-ring issues, it's unlikely that they'll want to push Jeff too hard when he starts working full-time again. If Jeff wants one final big run before he calls it a career, he'll probably have to leave to make it happen. Heading to AEW looks like his best chance of making that happen. 

Asuka

WWE may never have dropped the ball with a female performer more than they did with Asuka. She was undefeated as a champion for almost two years in NXT before being called up to the main roster, and a fast run to one of the two women's championships seemed inevitable. Instead of doing that, WWE pointlessly sacrificed her to the already-made Charlotte Flair at WrestleMania 35 and killed her momentum stone dead. She's had a brief run as champion since then - only to lose to Charlotte for a second time - and more recently, she's been busy putting Alexa Bliss over clean and tagging with Kairi Sane in a team that's mostly played for laughs. Asuka deserves better, and if that means rediscovering her identity as Kana and joining AEW, more power to her. 

Part of the thrill of competition is that sometimes the unexpected happens. We think that the names mentioned above are among the most likely to jump - but you never know who might think the grass is greener elsewhere when the opportunity presents itself. We could be in for a very interesting twelve months of talent jumping ship!

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