Tony Khan Believes That Some Hardcore Wrestling Fans Didn’t Understand What Jon Moxley Was Doing At The Start Of 2025

Tony Khan comments on Jon Moxley in 2025.

Following his Continental Classic victory at Worlds End, fans are rallying behind Jon Moxley for the first time in years. Since losing the AEW World Championship to ‘Hangman’ Adam Page at the All In pay-per-view in July, Moxley has slowly established more and more sympathy for his character, nearly completing his arc in the process.

Speaking with Case Lowe of Q101 for a new interview, Tony Khan spoke about Moxley’s year in a very positive light.

“I absolutely agree with that. Jon Moxley is one of my all time favorite wrestlers and one of my all time favorite people. Jon Moxley, he’s so important to the foundation of the company. From the very first show, he’s been here and he has delivered this year. I agree with you, this has been my personal favorite year also. I know he’s really enjoyed this year and that makes me very happy. He’s also somebody who takes wrestling very seriously and works very hard. The only person who has been at every AEW event this year besides myself is Jon Moxley. He works so hard, he’s a leader in and out of the ring. I’m so proud that we’ve been able to build this company over seven years and that we have somebody that has been able to not only be a face of AEW and not only represent throughout the years so many different great things about the company, but he’s a fantastic person and I’m really glad that people see what a tremendous year he is having.”

Khan went on to say that some people in the hardcore wrestling community didn’t understand what Moxley was doing at the beginning of the year.

“At the beginning of 2025, and it’s all opinions, but I felt like from some of our tape trading brethren, some of the hardcore wrestling fans, I didn’t feel like enough people in the hardcore wrestling community understood what Jon Moxley was doing at the start of 2025 and nobody could’ve known how banged up he was.”

Khan proceeded to elaborate on that statement.

“I think that people misunderstood the mission of the Death Riders and I think that people misunderstood the physical toll that all these years of wrestling had taken on Mox. Mox, throughout this year, has gotten healthier and better. I think that’s been part of why this arc throughout the year has been so fantastic. I felt like physically as the year went on, even as he continued to wrestle, actually got more and more healthy. I also think it worked so perfectly that as we approached Double Or Nothing and the Owen Hart tournament, that the stakes around the chase of Jon Moxley continued to rise and rise and it helped AEW so much.”

After celebrating the ratings and business success that Moxley brought to AEW, Khan stated that Moxley made everybody better in 2025.

“The chase of Jon Moxley, I felt, made everybody better. I think that now in hindsight, so many fans can see that and look back at how captivating it was to have two fan favorites like Hangman Page and Will Ospreay fighting for the love of the sport but also the opportunity to fight Mox and fighting with that honor and the promise that I’ll have your back after this is over if you have my back after this is over. Then, to see them all come together, it was a really incredible moment. Then, I think as Mox became more and more of a sympathetic figure after that and the fans saw what he did, it helped make this year’s Continental Classic even more captivating. To think that somebody as dominant as Jon Moxley, where you have an entire promotion clamoring to chase him, and then he was able to create the vulnerability where people actually thought he could lose every match in the Continental Classic. To have Jon fight from behind and have the entire arena — and it’s the same arena just over a year ago, where Mox suffocated Bryan Danielson with a plastic bag and betrayed his best friend. After everything Mox did and seeing how unpopular as a villain he was, to have an entire arena coming and cheering for him, it was amazing.”

Elsewhere in the interview, Khan spoke about AEW All In 2023, calling it the most stressful pay-per-view in AEW history. Check out his full comments by clicking here.

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