A candid response from Omega.
In December, Kenny Omega took to his social media pages and shared that he’s sidelined indefinitely and tried to push through the pain for as long as he could. He later revealed that he underwent ’emergency treatment’ and was unsure if he’d need surgery to treat his diverticulitis.
The latest update on Omega came from AEW President Tony Khan, who stated that he does not want to put a timetable on Omega’s return but is optimistic that he’ll be back at AEW.
In his downtime, Omega has been streaming on Twitch and started up a new stream on 3/29. A conversation started about his promos and storytelling and this led to Omega addressing criticisms about him when it comes to those respective departments of his on-screen repertoire.
He said people are trying to talk about him when he’s sold out 45,000-seat venues with his storytelling. He feels he did a good job in that department while champion in AEW. Omega then touched on the television ratings during his AEW run and said there’s been solid numbers for his in-ring and non-wrestling spots. He brought up the opening match of the 2/26/20 Dynamite which was a 30-minute Iron Man match against PAC and that drawing a million viewers.
He went on to speak about his program with Hangman Adam Page and how that was a combination of outside-the-ring and in-ring build. Omega said hopefully if he can come back, he wants to create more memories.
Everyone’s wondering, Kenny, ‘Why is Kenny so bad at promos? He doesn’t have promo game… He needs to cut a promo. That’s all I care about.’ Shut the f*ck up!… Jesus Christ. You’re trying to talk about a guy who sold 45,000-seaters with my storytelling? You’re trying to tell me I don’t know how to tell stories? Because I don’t have a yelling promo voice? Yeah? You tell me and then you’re gonna say, oh well, The Rock sold more. Of course he f*cking did. He’s The Goddamn Rock and you know what? I’m not f*cking bad myself. I try my best… Honestly though, guys, when I wanna tell a story and I have a way to tell it, I’ll tell it in my ways. That’s all there is to it and maybe if something that I’ve done isn’t exciting or my American-style promos just aren’t doing it for you, well, I got news for ya, because I don’t care. I don’t care. It sucks… Hey, I got out there feeling like, man, what am I even doing out here? Why am I even wasting my Goddamn time?
And you can make of it what you will. You can make of it what you will. Say bad things, troll me, whatever, criticize, it doesn’t make a difference to me. It really doesn’t, so… and you know what? You guys actually on me a little bit about the promo thing, hey, it might even inspire me a little bit to care so… No, no, no, promo slander is absolutely allowed. It’s just like, if you guys are gonna say, ‘Hey, I didn’t like a promo’ or, ‘You don’t know how to cut promos’, number one, what’s the purpose of a promo? Of course it’s to sell a match and if you’re wondering and if you look at the records, the records will indicate that I have done my fair share of trying to sell matches in my own way. I have a promo style and cadence and speech and do I use buzzwords in the same way that other people do? Maybe no, maybe it’s just my own thing, I don’t know. But, all I do know is that when the performance of a promo or the performance of speaking hinges on the success of a matchup or wrestling card, I’m gonna do what I can to make sure that I sell (the) card and I feel like, you know, when I was champion in AEW and that’s — jeez, that’s going so far back — I felt like I did a really good job and I’m not one to hang my hat on numbers, things like that. I don’t wrestle for ratings. I want people to feel something when I perform and if the people who are watching that are tuned in, they care and it’s not just popcorn wrestling or it’s like, okay, I’m watching it for a second and then it’s out of my mind, then I feel like I’m doing my duty as a professional wrestler, spreading the message of how powerful and how beautiful wrestling can be and for the numbers during my run and segments to top over a million and to grow, even in moments when it was just wrestling. One of the things I was most proud of, I don’t know when it was exactly, but, I did a cold Iron Man match against PAC where, yeah, we had a story but we just started the episode of Dynamite with a 30-minute Iron Man match and that was kind of unprecedented at that point in time anyway and I think we had like 1.1. mil and I think we were floating around, you know, 859,000 at that time so it was really nice to see that just good wrestling and wrestling was drawing numbers in that day in that moment so, that’s a match actually, in my AEW tenure, it’s a match that I’m very, very proud of because it was just wrestling and people tuned in to watch wrestling and that was very nice, very nice feeling and in the same regard, the story that I was able to tell with Hangman (Adam Page) was a good combination of both, you know, what you do outside of the ring but then when you perform what you perform in the way that you need to perform it when it came time to blow off the thing so… I’m really proud of that stuff so, it’s all good memories. It’s all good memories and hopefully if I can come back, then I’ll be able to create some more… And I hope I do it in a capacity with stuff that’s fun. Fun, challenging — actually, challenging might be the best way to put it. Like being challenged a lot.
Later in the stream, Omega stated that his 2023 matches with Will Ospreay and El Hijo del Vikingo are the bouts when he felt he was in his element and being challenged in a different way than he’s used to.
The match with (Will) Ospreay at Wrestle Kingdom, even the match against (El Hijo del) Vikingo where I just felt challenged in a new way. That’s where I really felt like I was in my element this past year. At least there’s two moments off the top of my head where I really felt like I was in my element, where I was like, okay, I feel like myself. Ospreay II as well (at Forbidden Door). That was another good one.
As of this writing, Omega’s last match aired on the 12/9 Collision where he scored a win over Ethan Page in singles competition.
The Young Bucks (Matthew Jackson & Nicholas Jackson) stated that Omega has been kicked out of The Elite and replaced by AEW Continental Champion Kazuchika Okada.
If the quotes in this article are used, please credit the original source with an H/T to POST Wrestling for the transcriptions.
