Jeff Jarrett recently appeared on AEW Unrestricted for an interview covering all things pro wrestling. During the discussion, Jarrett talked about his involvement with AEW and being in charge of live events:
“When I came on board, I had the dual role. You just kind of look at the survey and the landscape. I live here in Nashville, so it is in a lot of ways the hub of the touring business. All the tour buses are here. Lots of the audio and video equipment. Nashville is located geographically close to both coasts, so there is a massive amount of touring, so I know all facets of the touring business externally knowing that side of things, and then internally, Rafael (Morffi), me and Raf have worked together for years and years and years and he knows things.
“That’s one of the things I noticed right off that a lot of people see Dynamite, see Rampage, see the pay-per-views and say, ‘Man, this is this big booming wrestling organization.’ In a lot of ways, we are still very much in, I hate to call it startup mode, but it is still a very, very lean and mean staff. So really, me utilizing internal and external sources, just kind of put the teams together and let the horses run.”
“At the end of the day, TBS and TNT, and I’ll go ahead and say our social media partners, because you got to look at YouTube as a true partner, our distribution is super strong. The brand is incredibly strong. Wednesday night by nature, that’s when our shows are on as you guys know, but it’s not the best night for touring. It’s still, as we know, everybody works Monday through Friday for the most part, and so Fridays and Saturdays are really the touring nights.”
“So Saturday night, Troy, OH, booming success. Just a few tickets shy of a legit sell out. But in a D market, that’s something that I’ve gone on record and others have gone on record, that the real reality of our situation is that Dynamite and pay-per-views and Rampage take precedent in the, we’ll call them A markets, the Top 20, Top 30 markets. So we’re gonna take this to, and it’s no disrespect, but it’s just kind of the size of the market, the C and D markets. I’m really looking forward to the crawl, walk, run process of live events. There’s a bunch of other things that I’m working on that I won’t share because we are a privately held company. I think there’s a lot of good stuff coming in the pike.”
“There’s one thing that I have said since I arrived here. The amount of opportunity that everyone has, from talent, to production to staff, you know, there’s departments right now that aren’t even formed and people maybe working in one department saying, ‘Hey, I’ve got an idea.’ Before you know it, they’re going to have their own department. People are going to be working under them.”
“The Spanish commentating is just a sliver of opening up that Hispanic market. The Spanish speaking discretionary income is massive, so it’s incumbent upon us as a brand to tap into it with, I believe, and I’m partial in a lot of ways to Penta and Phoenix, but I think they’re the best Lucha talent in a generation. They’re unbelievable. Look, I’ve gone to Triple A for years and years and years and know that market very, very well and thrown out a few tortillas in my time down there. Those guys are unbelievably talented.”
If he intends to continue pursuing the tag team championship or pursue a singles run:
“I’ll get real here. I’m a two time Hall of Famer, 12 time former World Heavyweight Champion, multiple other belts and tags and championships and all that. I want some gold. It’s really that simple, whether it’s tag or singles.”
“But with that being said, at the very top of the list is, I’ve known Jay Lethal literally since he broke in. I want to see him succeed. I’ve gotten to know Satnam very well as a human, as a person. The potential upside of Satnam Singh goes without saying, and I’ve said this multiple times, I believe he has the most upside of any individual on our roster. The reason I say that is the country of India. The name of his documentary on Netflix, ‘One in a Billion.’ I mean, it is very appropriately titled. He is truly one in a billion. I say that, yes, he is one of a billion people in India, but you don’t find seven foot four, super athletic, former basketball players, collectively as a group, are the best group of athletes in the world. I put wrestlers as two. I’ve always said that. As a group, you ask us and look at us across the board whether it’s Omega, Penta, or Phoenix, or Brody King, look at all of us as a group what we do. I mean, there’s people that come in from Hollywood, stuntmen that have been doing it, and they’re like, ‘There ain’t no way I’m going to do that, and y’all did this with no rehearsal, and you’re gonna go do this again tomorrow night?’”
“Anyway, Satnam Singh with his basketball background and his footwork, being from India, he’s very charismatic, he is bilingual, there is so much upside. I’ll just say this. This is what we all are as talent, the opportunity to generate revenue, he is a one-in-a-billion opportunity that I see a lot of great things in his future. So at the top of my goal is not just gold, it’s really Jay and Satnam.”
You can listen to the complete podcast below:
(h/t to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription)
