Three New AEW Signings Had Talks With WWE

Maxwell Jacob Friedman has long professed about the "bidding war of 2024," but recent developments indicate that there is already financial fighting for top wrestling free agents between AEW and WWE. This was made apparent earlier this fall, when Bandido impressed in his AEW Dynamite match against Ring of Honor World Champion Chris Jericho. Following the praised bout, Bandido himself confirmed that he received an offer from WWE, but ultimately ended up signing with AEW and will next wrestle for the company later this week on AEW Rampage. Even though they lost out on Bandido's services, WWE has not stopped trying to land free agents that have ties to AEW.

As reported by Fightful Select, there was "some contact" between WWE and The Kingdom (Matt Taven, Mike Bennett, Maria Kanellis) before the trio inked deals with AEW. This comes after reports surfaced in early October that said WWE was interested in bringing in Taven specifically. Even though the two sides had conversations, Fightful reports that WWE never made an official offer to the trio, as the talks were more of a "feeling-out process." While it's not specified who spoke to The Kingdom, sources believe that WWE Chief Content Officer Paul "Triple H" Levesque and WWE Creative Consultant Gabe Sapolsky were the points of contact during the conversations.

Regardless, The Kingdom is now All Elite and appears to be on a collision course with Ring of Honor Tag Team Champions FTR. Taven, Bennett, and Kanellis made their AEW debuts on the October 14th edition of AEW Rampage, confronting Dax Harwood and Cash Wheeler. Later in a digital exclusive, Taven pointed to the fact that himself and Bennett never got their ROH Tag Title rematch. It remains to be seen as to when that match will go down, but December's ROH Final Battle is a likely site.

While Taven has never had a WWE run, Bennett and Kanellis are no strangers to Stamford, Connecticut. Kanellis spent a collective decade in WWE before having runs in ROH, NJPW, and Impact Wrestling. Her second stint in WWE came alongside Bennett, her real-life husband. The two have long-professed their frustrations with that run, with Bennett specifically revealing that he almost lost his passion for the business while in WWE.

"It was one of those things where I felt like WWE kind of beat the love out of wrestling for me," Bennett said in 2021. "I'd always loved wrestling, I loved what it was, I loved performing but then when I got there, I got to the point where I was like, 'I don't like this.'"