Everything You Need To Know About Tony Khan Raging At WWE

Tony Khan was using his phone again on Tuesday night and the AEW CEO decided to take time out of his busy schedule to rage at WWE creative, in particular the booking of Jinder Mahal in a World Heavyweight Title match against Seth Rollins on next week's edition of Monday Night Raw and the criticism he has received for booking HOOK in an AEW World Title programme with Samoa Joe.

"A double standard: @730hook 28-1 career record, on winning streak calls out the Champ, a logical challenge sparks online outrage Jinder has literally lost every single match he's in for the past year, immediately gets title shot, where is the rage #AEWDynamite TOMORROW on TBS," Khan wrote.

Jinder Mahal has won two matches since the start of 2022 but has seldom been used on WWE TV. His match with Rollins came about following a brawl on this past Monday's episode of Raw.

The AEW President also didn't take kindly to a shot from the USA Network X (FKA Twitter) account, which poked fun at Khan's affinity for Cagematch.

"A moral victory for USA is one win more than their World Title challenger Jinder Mahal has in the past 364 days...because it's been literally a full year since he won a match. You really put AEW in our place getting Jinder Mahal in a big match on your tv show. Do it more often," Khan wrote.

The situation only devolved from there as former WCW President and longtime Tony Khan critic Eric Bischoff replied with a clown emoji, to which Khan responded with a still image of Alexis Carrington from Dynasty saying, "Get out of my sight you miserable has-been." 

Bischoff then tried to criticise AEW's booking of Abadon in a TBS Title match at Worlds End, only for Tony Khan to point out she earned the title shot by winning a Four-Way.

"No @EBischoff, not true at all. Abadon returned to AEW + then they won a 4 way match on TNT against other great wrestlers to earn a title shot, which is completely different than someone going a full year losing every match they're in + getting a title shot without a single win. Reading would be your friend, Eric." Khan wrote.

Jinder Mahal himself replied to Khan's comment in a since-deleted tweet, asking, "Who tf is Hook?" 

Wrestlers from AEW, including Anthony Bowens and Dax Harwood both expressed their support for HOOK while Edris Enofe from WWE NXT responded to Tony Khan with "stfu".

Corey Graves, meanwhile, defended Jinder Mahal, simply tweeting: "Jinder rules."

Tuesday night wasn't the first time Tony Khan has taken shots at WWE since the founding of All Elite Wrestling in 2019. In fact, it is part of a strategy for Khan due to AEW's status as the challenger brand in an industry where WWE are the number one company.

He told Ariel Helwani in 2022: "I've said it before, I consider all wrestling as competition. Some people ask me why I'll talk about other wrestling companies, especially WWE, and I'll tell you. It was literally a book handed to me over three years ago before the launch of [AEW] Dynamite by WarnerMedia at the time before it was Warner Bros. Discovery. It was telling me what our place [was] already because Dynamite hadn't launched, but we had carved out a space in the pay-per-view business.

"They handed me a book. It was [about] how to be a challenger brand. This is what you are. A challenger brand I learned then, three years ago, is not the industry leader, but it is also not a niche brand. It is not that. It is a big company. It is Pepsi [to Coca-Cola.] It is Burger King [to McDonald’s.] What will get Burger King marketing? What is Burger King marketing? Basically a lot of it is 'hey McDonald's sucks guys.' So for AEW, it's just part of what we are. We're a challenger brand. There's no reason to pretend we're not. That's what you are. Embrace it. So it is literally a corporate philosophy handed down on high to me by my boss."

Past outbursts from Khan include him taking shots at WWE over last-minute rewrites and holding pay-per-views in Saudi Arabia. He also referred to Vince McMahon's "alleged misdeeds" in tweets from October 2023, shortly after he insinuated Triple H was a "bald asshole" in the run-up to AEW Dynamite going head-to-head with WWE NXT.

The two promotions have had issues outside of Tony Khan's tweeting and the AEW President noted All Elite Wrestling and WWE hate each other in early 2023. This came only months after WWE allegedly approached a number of talents about returning to the company despite them being under contract with AEW.