When All Elite Wrestling first launched the company made it a point to put tag team wrestling in the spotlight and The Young Bucks have been one of the top teams in the company from day one. Many fans were excited to see FTR join the company in 2020, but their run hasn’t played out as some expected it to.
Former AEW Tag Team Champion Dax Harwood opened up about FTR’s time in AEW on his FTR with Dax Harwood podcast and he noted that his relationship with Tony Khan and The Young Bucks because he felt that promises were not delivered.
“I felt like we were a backdrop. I felt that everything we had been promised, when we came in, we were promised that the tag division was going to be built around these two teams, and I felt it wasn’t being built around us. I felt we were lied to and at the time we were being lied to. I think my relationship with Tony got even more strained, I felt the relationship with the Bucks completely deteriorated. I take the blame for that. I take the blame for it because I shouldn’t have taken wrestling so seriously. If Tony decided that he didn’t think we were in that league or we should’ve been presented in a certain way, it’s his company. Same thing with Vince (McMahon). I hold no ill will towards Vince or Tony (Khan). Tony is one of my closest buds now and I love him for what he’s done for me and my family.”
Dax went on to say that he had a lot of conversations with Tony Khan about how he wanted FTR to be presented when he added, “We had a lot of meetings with Tony during this time period. From the time 2021 started to right after I had my anxiety attack and I started to get on the good side of that. We had a lot of talks with Tony. I remember telling him, ‘Tony, I want you to present us as 1A and 1B with the Young Bucks.’ He said, ‘You guys are 1A and 1B.’ I think he did think that. I think he thought that in the world of wrestling, the best tag teams in the world, we were 1A and 1B. I didn’t feel that we were being presented that way, but I think he did feel that way. I think he felt we were the two greatest tag teams in the world and he thought that was good enough. It probably was good enough and should’ve been good enough, but to me, it wasn’t.”
When asked how he could have handled everything differently Dax admitted that he was being too abrasive and he should have used a different approach while trying to get FTR a better spot on the card.
“Going into Tony’s office and instead of trying to find a middle ground to get a better position on the card, I would go in there and say, ‘Tony, you’re s***ting on us. You’re making us look bad. You’re not presenting us the way we feel we should be presented. You’re putting the Young Bucks here and us here.’ It was just me being too abrasive.”
Previously Dax had confirmed that FTR’s contracts with AEW are set to expire in April, and they asked to be taken off TV in the meantime while they figure out their next move. Stay tuned for updates.
H/T Fightful
