Former WWE star "Maven" Huffman recently went backstage at an AEW event for a video that he posted on his YouTube channel which he framed as him sneaking into the event (in actuality, he was obviously given backstage access by the promotion).
In an interview with Ariel Helwani this week, Maven spoke about his experience offering up plenty of praise for the promotion and for President Tony Khan in the way he is running his business:
“When I was backstage at AEW, that environment seemed like a good place to work. Great vibes. And Tony Khan seemed like the best boss to work for. I know he gets a lot of, you know, a lot of critics talking about him online."
“I sat and watched. They were about 30 minutes away from ending the show and my contact told me, ‘Tony wants to meet with you, he just has to wait until, obviously, the show’s over.’ So, yeah, no problem, we’re here, we don’t have any place to be. So iI sat and I watched Tony for 30 minutes and every wrestler that came out of that ring, he got up from his producing chair, took his headphones off, made sure every one of them was healthy, happy with the match that they had just had."
"And you can tell when someone cares as opposed to when someone’s going through the motions. He cares. I left and I told him to his face, ‘You have changed my perception on what I thought you were.’ And everybody that I talked to there seemed happy to be there. And seemed happy with the product that they were putting out in front of the fans."
"AEW seemed like a good place to work, great vibes, and Tony Kahn seemed like the best boss to work for. He gets a lot of critics talking about him online...
I sat and I watched Tony for 30 minutes and every wrestler that came out of that ring, he got up from his producing… pic.twitter.com/IwP6pq5dMT— Ariel Helwani (@arielhelwani) September 8, 2025
