Stokely Hathaway is figuring things out in a AEW landscape without CM Punk.
During his appearance on The Sessions with Renee Paquette, Stokely Hathaway spoke about his current spot in All Elite Wrestling and how CM Punk’s absence changed plans for The Firm. Stokely says CM Punk personally asked to work with him, but the now-infamous post-show fight with Punk and The Elite caused a massive rewrite for his plans.
“I mean I think it’s one [a lull now] to be honest. Everything that was supposed to happen with The Firm did not happen. I think if people look back at All Out and what happened immediately after the pay-per-view, that’s a huge part of it. Who we were supposed to directly feud with, is no longer with the company, and that was one thing I was looking forward to because I was hand-chosen for that role. I’m just going to say it — I don’t know specifics, people are choosing sides, whatever. I just know for me, the fact that CM Punk said, “hey I want to work with this guy’, like that holds a lot of weight. It means a lot regardless of what has happened, what will happen. So when that didn’t happen, it was literally re-writing everything on the fly. Everyone in the group is trying to do their best but we are trying to figure out how to make this work because the original purpose isn’t the purpose anymore. It’s like what do you do?
“Ethan Page right now, he’s doing great. The Gunns, great. Lee [Moriarty], he’s going to go into this feud with HOOK, so things are slowly, no pun intended, gearing up, it’s just going to take a few weeks and I think the way wrestling is nowadays, I get it. First impressions are everything but it’s a little bit difficult to change people’s minds,” Stokely explained. “Most people don’t want to see Picasso paint, they just want to see the shit done. So I think that’s the phase we are in. We’re working on it, but they don’t want to see anyone working on it. They want to see the finished product. I completely understand, but at the same time, we’re all human.”
Stokely was asked what the next year could look like if he controlled his destiny, but he said he had no clue and he would just put his best foot forward and try to make it work.
If you use this transcription, credit The Sessions, h/t WrestleZone and link back to this post.
