McGuinness’ return to ROH was a secret as he was hidden away in a production truck.
After seven years away from the company, Nigel McGuinness made his return to Ring of Honor at Supercard of Honor.
McGuinness dove into how his return came to be during his conversation with Stephanie Chase. He shared that he reached out to AEW/ROH when he became a free agent after exiting WWE.
I mean, it’s a long story (how my AEW signing came to be). I won’t bore you with the minutiae. I reached out, obviously when I was a free agent and there was some legalities to sort of square away but once that was all clear and done and dusted, we discussed things for me coming in for Supercard of Honor, as being the Ring of Honor stalwart that I am. Come in and do part of that but then, he (Tony Khan) just called me up actually. It was Tuesday of last week and said, ‘Do you wanna go to New York today?’ And I was like, ‘I’ll check, see if I can’ but sure enough, by 4 o’clock that afternoon, me and Tony and his business partner Bernie (Cahill) were on his private jet heading to New York, New York. So that was where we sort of squared away the majority of the details and from then, I was, as you said, All Elite, graphic included.
Circling back to the Supercard of Honor appearance, McGuinness shared that no one knew he was going to be there because he had been hidden away in a production truck.
It was very exciting (being at ROH Supercard of Honor) in the sense of, I thought about it for a while. Obviously, as soon as Tony (Khan) came on with AEW and got them going, everybody in the business thinks, oh, maybe at some point I could work there, you know? And so, it was exciting in that respect but at the same time, I didn’t get to be backstage before the show. They kept me in one of the production trucks and no one knew I was gonna be there so I was kind of just sat back there with my girlfriend, going over notes, getting ready for the show, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. So it was very nerve-wracking in that regard but once I walked out on stage — people have said to me, ‘You look the most like you that we’ve seen you in like a decade,’ you know? And there’s certainly something to that. It’s a different environment and I think Ring of Honor is viewed very differently in AEW obviously than in WWE for various reasons and so, yeah, I felt like I had that more cachet from being a world champion there than I had in the past.
As far as Nigel’s role(s) in AEW/ROH going forward, he said it’s open to discussion. When he spoke with Tony Khan, Ring of Honor was heavily talked about but doing something in AEW is not ruled out.
It’s open to discussion, certainly (McGuinness said about his future role in AEW & ROH). When I talked to Tony (Khan), he had ideas in terms of which company. Obviously, heavily Ring of Honor but he didn’t rule out me doing some stuff with AEW as well. I talked to Sonjay Dutt before I started working here and he said, ‘The great thing about AEW is that you can really do what you feel like doing. If you wanna help out more behind the scenes in terms of being an agent, then that’s a possibility as well.’ I feel like for whatever (reason), WWE, you have your own little compartment, your own department of where you work in that company and that certainly works for them. In AEW, it seems to be a little bit looser in terms of where you can give your opinion and help out. It’s more of a fluid, synergistic environment I think.
Nigel was present on-screen with Tony Khan on Dynamite when the announcement was made for AEW All In at Wembley Stadium.
If the quotes in this article are used, please credit Stephanie Chase with an H/T to POST Wrestling for the transcriptions.
