The new AEW World Champion is with AEW for the long haul.
It was in the main event of AEW’s Dynasty pay-per-view that Swerve Strickland defeated Samoa Joe to become the new AEW World Champion. Thus far, he’s had one successful defense against Claudio Castagnoli.
As Strickland was the focus of a Highspots Sign It Live session, he was asked if he ever envisioned he’d be where he is present day when he was released from WWE in 2021. In his response, he mentioned that when he joined AEW in 2022, he got a ‘lengthy contract’. His mindset was that he’d make his way into the World Title picture in three years time and he was able to do it in two.
Not quickly but it was something I always wanted to strive to do (Strickland responded when asked if he envisioned he’d be where he is now when he exited WWE) and I got a lengthy contract so it’s like, okay, cool, I’m gonna try to get to that and I have a manager and an attorney who was just like, ‘If you work on these things, improve on this and we get to this point right here, you get this right, we can probably get into this world championship, title contention thing in about three years’ and I was able to do it in two and actually achieve it. So it was just like, I had to work overtime to get to this success. I had to do a lot more than I — even what was asked of me and that’s the hard part but it’s also the simple scope of things if that makes sense. It’s a simple concept but it’s just difficult work. You gotta keep going.
Coming up is AEW’s Double or Nothing pay-per-view on 5/26 and it is official that Strickland is going to be defending his title against Christian Cage.
If the quote in this article is used, please credit Highspots with an H/T to POST Wrestling for the transcription.
