Tony Khan: “I think people misunderstood the mission of the Death Riders”

He’s somebody who takes wrestling very seriously and works very hard. The only person who’s been at every AEW event this year besides myself is Jon Moxley.

He works so hard. He’s a leader in the ring and out of the ring. And I’m so proud that we’ve been able to build this company over seven years and that we have somebody who has been able to not only be a face of AEW, and not only represent throughout the years so many different great things about the company, but also so many of the greatest events and moments involve Jon Moxley.

He’s a fantastic person, and I’m really glad that people see what a tremendous year he’s having.

At the beginning of 2025—and it’s all opinions—but I felt like from some of our tape-trading brethren, some of the hardcore wrestling fans, I didn’t feel like enough people in the hardcore wrestling community understood what Jon Moxley was doing at the start of 2025. And nobody could have known how banged up he was.

I think people misunderstood the mission of the Death Riders. And I think people misunderstood the physical toll that all these years of wrestling had taken on Mox.

Throughout this year, Mox has gotten healthier and better. And I think that’s been part of why this arc throughout the year has been so fantastic. I felt like Mox, physically, as the year went on—even as he continued to wrestle—actually got more and more healthy.

And I also think it worked so perfectly that as we approached Double or Nothing and the Owen Hart tournament, the stakes around the chase of Jon Moxley continued to rise and rise and rise. It helped AEW so much as challenger after challenger came after Jon Moxley.

The promotion got a huge boost from this, and it helped make AEW in 2025 very successful commercially.”