WWE Accused of Inflating Wrestler Prices to Make Tony Khan Pay More

AEW has been part of the world of professional wrestling for well over five years now and with its increased roster, comes an increase in salaries for their talent. With that said, Jim Cornette believes WWE is inflating the price for wrestlers to make AEW pay more for them.

While speaking on his YouTube channel, Jim Cornette talked about AEW signing talent to lucrative deals. Jim Cornette suggests that WWE might be intentionally inflating the price for wrestlers to make AEW pay more for them.

Cornette believes WWE could be using this tactic as a way to force Tony Khan to spend more money, even if WWE doesn’t necessarily want the talent. Cornette mentioned examples like Will Ospreay and Okada, indicating that WWE might be inflating their value to test AEW’s willingness to pay more.

“How many people that WWE and Tony Khan—I’m not saying it’s a bidding war where they’re doing the f****** storage war auction, 1 million 5, 1 million 7—but how many people were talking to both companies, and Tony won out? We heard about Will Ospreay, famous for ‘the grind,’ right? Did he want the grind or did he not want the grind? We don’t know about the grind. And Okada—people said, ‘Oh, they’re talking to Okada.’ Well, maybe they wanted to get into Japan, and Mercedes Moné.

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Cornette pointed out that WWE has a history of giving better deals to wrestlers who are leaving or negotiating, like Edge and Mark Henry. Even if WWE didn’t initially want these wrestlers, they could use their offers to push AEW into spending more. Cornette speculated that WWE might be setting high offers intentionally, knowing that AEW’s Tony Khan will have to counter with even more attractive deals.

”Remember when they were talking to the Buckaroos? And remember when Edge was coming? Edge left, and Tony gave him a better deal. You could say the same about Mark Henry. When he left, he wanted to be more involved in either training or whatever he wanted, and they apparently didn’t want him. But he got a lot of money to do very little for the past three or four years, and then that deal is up, and suddenly his son signs with NXT, and he’s back on TV. The point I’m making is Tony’s winning a lot of these, right? What if they’re fake finishes?

Because it wasn’t something Vince wouldn’t do—to say, ‘Hey, you might not want to come now, but you might want to come later.’ But right now, he always wanted to babyface himself to the boys, you know, use me to get more money. Well, what if they’re talking to these people? Let’s say I’m WWE, and I make a lot of money, and you, Brian Last, are Tony Khan, and you have a lot of money. And I know you want to sign the newest indie darling or somebody from another country, or Jack Double Barrel Cannon—everybody’s making a big deal on the internet about Jack Double Barrel Cannon.

So what if I call old Jack Cannon in and say, ‘I’ll give you a million dollars, but of course, I’m going to own your name, and I’ll change it, and I’m going to own your likeness and intellectual property, and you’re going to work X hundred days a year,’ and give him a sales pitch that you don’t necessarily want him to take, but you’ve set an offer and a price? And then old Jack Cannon goes over to f***** Tony—‘Tony, I’ll give you a million and a half, and you can own your stuff], or you can be an actor, or you can only work one day a week, or you don’t have to come in if you don’t want to,’ or all the ancillary things that everybody that signs with AEW says they love about the company and the job. And then WWE—they particularly may not have wanted the f***** guy to begin with, but since they’ve got billions of dollars, if they f***** up and get one every once in a while, who gives a s****? Meanwhile, they’re setting Tony’s price that he’s got to beat and treating them like Bosom Buddies too. And Tony’s winning more of these than he’s losing, and I’m starting to think that.”

Cornette also suggested that WWE executives, such as Nick Khan and Triple H, might be deliberately offering high salaries to see if Tony Khan will match or exceed them. This strategy could be a way for WWE to create leverage and influence AEW’s spending decisions.

”The point is, what if Nick Khan and Triple H and a bunch of the gang are sitting up there going, ‘I wonder how much he’ll pay for this f****** guy? Let’s offer him a million and a half a year for three years and see if Tony will beat it?’

I’m saying, if I was still in a Stamford office, I could see a bunch of people having fun with this. Even if they want somebody, if they know Tony’s going to, God damn, break the bank, as they say, why not? Well, let’s see how far he’ll go. Maybe they’ve got an office pool going. I’m just telling you.”

We have also reported that AEW currently allocates just over 55% of its revenue to talent salaries. This distribution is partly based on the anticipation of a significant increase in revenue from TV rights deals expected in 2025. Regardless, it is not known whether WWE manipulates Tony Khan into overpaying for wrestlers, but some fans feel it might be plausible.

What do you think of what Jim Cornette had to say about WWE possibly manipulating Tony Khan into overpaying for wrestlers? Do you feel there is truth to this? Let us know in the comments section below!

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