Rob Van Dam isn’t sure how far the IMPACT Wrestling and All Elite Wrestling partnership will reach but he’s waiting to see if they can rekindle something missing from today’s wrestling business.
RVD recently spoke with WrestleZone’s Dominic DeAngelo, and he shared some thoughts about IMPACT’s recent rendezvous with AEW, and how it might all work out.
“It’s awesome. I’m skeptically optimistic, we’ll see. I have my own guesses about what they’re doing and how far they’re going to go with it and we’ll see, but it’s definitely interesting and interesting times. I think for the last several years I’ve been saying it’s going back towards like the territorial times because I’ve seen different followings building up,” he said, mentioning wrestling hotspots domestically and across the pond in the United Kingdom.
“All these different, really supportive groups of wrestling fans that would turn out every time, promote it cause hey they’re part of the show and it’s such a winning vibe and it’s still out there. That’s what AEW and what IMPACT are, candidates for potential competition. I think Vince is king. ‘Long live the king,’” RVD added, “but I think that it’s really cool to see the other companies [working together], that’s how it used to be in the territories…”
Being a major Mafia history buff, Rob saw those mafia commission connections to wrestling during the days when NWA ruled the roost.
“But, they would have the local champions and they would have like a national champion that would travel around and then it was like big business. It would pop the company with someone who’s been defending it in these other territories comes over so that’s what they’re doing and it furthers my belief that it’s getting more towards territories and obviously the ratings are proving that. It’s not just a monopoly, at least not the way it used to be anymore, you know?”
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