Impact World Champion Josh Alexander Sheds Light on Backstage Frustration During AEW Crossover

AEW began crossing over with Impact Wrestling in late 2020 when Kenny Omega, having just won the AEW World Championship, dubbed himself "The Belt Collector" and began targeting the Impact World Championship. He'd eventually win it from Rich Swann at the Rebellion pay-per-view before dropping it to Christian Cage on the premiere episode of AEW Rampage. The company's top title wouldn't be back in the hands of an Impact Wrestling star until the 2021 Bound for Glory event when Josh Alexander won the gold. 

But while Omega's arrival in Impact was initially met with massive excitement, it wasn't long before fans realized this wasn't going to be a major crossover between the two promotions. Other AEW stars and personalities like Matt Hardy, Private Party, Tony Khan, Tony Schiavone and Jerry Lynn would also appear on Impact and Frankie Kazarian even won the X Division Championship and challenged Alexander for the world title last year, but the "Forbidden Door" between the two promotions didn't seem to swing both ways. The only wrestlers from Impact to appear on AEW programming since Omega's crossover have been The Good Brothers and Motor City Machine Guns, and storylines involving AEW stars on Impact aren't usually mentioned on AEW programming. Alexander recently spoke on The Wrestling Perspective Podcast and talked about how Impact wrestlers felt backstage regarding AEW. 

Josh Alexander on The "Cloud" Over the Impact Locker Room

"During the whole, especially during the Kenny part portion where he was the champion and all this other stuff, there was definitely like a cloud over the locker room, I'd say you'd hear whispers and little conversation in the corner being like, 'Man, like, the doors swing in one direction right now. They're all coming in here.' You know what I mean? That's fine," Alexander said (h/t WrestlingNews.co).

"It elevates our product to have new faces and stuff competing with our guys to put us on the same level, of course, like me defeating Christian Cage," he continued. "That's like, another thing that, you know, we have to be grateful for, obviously, and I'm very grateful for that opportunity. But it would have been real nice if some Impact wrestlers could have got on to the AEW programming and showing what we could do against those guys, because I think, you know, our locker room stacks up right up there with any locker room in this business, be it WWE, AEW, New Japan, anything like that."