Shane McMahon Sends Feelers to AEW: Should Tony Khan Entertain Signing Him?

Shane has not been seen in wrestling since tearing his quad at WrestleMania 39.

By Liam Crowley

Shane McMahon's past couple of years in the professional wrestling industry have been checkered. After seven years away, Shane returned to WWE in 2016 to a thunderous ovation. The success of his one-off storyline with The Undertaker led to him becoming a recurring character on programming, eventually taking the reins of WWE SmackDown commissioner. Shane would occasionally step in the ring as well, having high-praised feuds against AJ Styles and Kevin Owens. Shane wrestling became too much of a good thing in 2019, as he was booked to go over in feuds against Roman Reigns and The Miz.

This all preceded his three most controversial moments before his WWE departure. In 2020, Shane introduced "Raw Underground" to WWE Monday Night Raw, a worked-shoot fight club that occupied multiple segments of the weekly show. In 2022, Shane used his backstage power to book himself strongly in the Men's Royal Rumble Match, a move that infuriated then-WWE Chairman Vince McMahon to the point that Vince fired his son and declared he would never get another pop in WWE again. That bad blood fizzled out in April 2023, as Shane returned at WWE WrestleMania 39 but tore his quad seconds into his match. He has not been seen in wrestling since.

Shane McMahon Sends Feelers to AEW

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(Photo: WWE, AEW)

Shane-o-Mac is #AllElite?

As shared by wrestling promoter and podcaster Conrad Thompson on AEW commentator and WWE Hall of Famer Jim Ross's Grilling JR podcast, Shane McMahon has "for sure reached out to wrestlers on the AEW roster" in an effort to "hypothetically discuss the idea" of him joining the company. It was emphasized that this is in no way definitely declaring that Shane will go to AEW, but it is "not that crazy of an idea."

"Absolutely, it could happen, and how he could be utilized as a character on television, that's what I'm talking about, is viable," JR responded to Thompson's revelation about Shane's interest in AEW. "He's got great name identity, people recognize him. He's a good guy. He still loves the business."

Should Tony Khan Entertain Signing Shane McMahon?

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Shane McMahon's availability and interest in AEW is one of the most precarious positions that AEW President Tony Khan has found himself in.

On the one hand, Shane joining AEW for a short-term storyline would pop a rating and would create a debut segment that would go down in history, not unlike when WCW's Eric Bischoff first arrived on WWE Monday Night Raw or when Shane himself appeared on WCW Monday Nitro. There are also a couple of perfect feuds lying in wait for him, namely with "The Patriarch" Christian Cage. Christian is having the run of his career as a character that targets wrestlers with deceased or deadbeat fathers, and the promos against the son of Vince McMahon write themselves.

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All that said, signing Shane is risky. When Vince was running WWE, he asked Daniel Bryan to look into episodes of AEW Dynamite to see if the new competitor was doing anything better than his sports-entertainment company. This was before Bryan left WWE to join AEW. Former NXT star Tino Sabbatelli was once accused of being a "spy" for WWE when he competed for AEW on a one-off basis during his time as a free agent. 

This is all to say that just because Shane is a free agent now and has had falling outs with WWE in the past it does not mean that he would take knowledge of AEW's inner workings with him back to WWE. Vince is gone, but WWE is still run by his brother-in-law Paul "Triple H" Levesque and sister Stephanie McMahon.

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