Sami Zayn Says WWE Reaction To His AEW Mention Was "Unfavorable"

Two days after AEW ran its first ever pay-per-view (the 2019 Double or Nothing), Sami Zayn made a few waves by name-dropping AEW during a segment on Monday Night Raw.

The segment was the first (and only) edition of The Electric Chair, in which a personality would be asked unfiltered questions from the audience (while sitting in a literal electric chair). According to Zayn in an interview with Sportskeeda, he anticipated that somebody in this uncensored forum would ask about AEW, and was surprised that nobody had.

"So it was right on everybody's mind. It was super, super fresh and I think they had just announced this TV deal," Zayn recalls. "They had just announced that this wasn't just going to be a pay-per-view. This is going to be a competitor and all this sort of stuff. And they tell me that we're doing this segment where it's legitimately, you know, unplanned questions and anybody could ask anything.

"So at the time this was the number one topic in the wrestling world. So you kind of expected to be asked about it."

But not only did none of the question-askers broach the topic of AEW, Zayn found the "risky" segment to be completely lifeless otherwise.

"As I was out there, I was like, this doesn't have these vibes, these questions are too sterile. So I felt like it was upon me, it was incumbent upon me, to sort of make it controversial. And the fact that we're talking about it now, all this time later, you know I hate to say I was right, but I kind of think I was right to do it."

Thus, Zayn mentioned AEW by name, to palpable shock.

"So it wasn't entirely, entirely off the cuff but it was off the cuff to a certain degree, and the reaction was, uh, let's say unfavorable (laughs) since The Electric Chair met its demise that very same week."