Former WWE star Darren Young (Fred Rosser) revealed on Twitter that he was turned down by AEW on two occasions but his main goal was always to work for NJPW:
I get asked a lot why not @AEW? Well, I tried and I was told NOPE…NOT ☝? but ✌?…besides AEW wasn’t my end goal it’s always been NJPW @njpw1972 ?? No matter what, don’t ever get overwhelmed and decide to throw in the towel. I’ve still got a lot of work to do! #blockthehate pic.twitter.com/IiT6IDK7K5
— nodaysoff FRED ROSSER III (@realfredrosser) December 12, 2020
In an interview with Fightful.com from last year, Rossler talked about reaching out to AEW:
“Any interview I take, I let the people know I’m interested. ROH, New Japan, AEW — I’m 35 and I feel alive. I’ve reached out to Brandi Rhodes in AEW. I’ve reached out to Sonny Kiss to see if he wants to team up with me and he seemed excited. I sent ideas to Brandi from AEW. I sent out feelers to ROH. In wrestling, we’re professional waiters. We wait on the rental car, at the air port. I didn’t just get off the football field and go to the Performance Center. I grinded on the independents from 2002 to 2009. There were 75 guys and girls I beat out at my tryouts. I know what it’s like to cut my teeth and all that.”