AEW's Tony Schiavone Discusses Tony Khan's Love For ECW

As Paul Heyman said in his WWE Hall of Fame induction speech, the spirit of ECW has never died due to how influential the company was in its prime. Its influence still exists, to the point where many of the top promoters and company owners worldwide still borrow from the land of the extreme. 

One of those people is AEW President Tony Khan, who has made it known in the past that he is a big fan of ECW. On a recent edition of the "What Happened When?" podcast, Tony Schiavone talked about what he and Khan loved about ECW. 

"Tony Khan absolutely loved it," Schiavone said. "Talks about it all the time and I've said this before about ECW, of course, I didn't see any of it, but these characters are absolutely incredible. What ECW brought to the wrestling world still exists today." 

Schiavone also praised the work of ECW commentator Joey Styles, especially how the company chose to shoot the commentator in backstage segments where the camera would never be fixed and would constantly move in and out to give a sense of chaos about things. The AEW commentator also credited ECW for being the reason why one particular weapon of choice always gets a big reaction from crowds. 

"The ECW style is so much a part of what we do today, because fans still go bananas — it doesn't matter what match it is, that we have fans go bananas when someone pulls a table out underneath the ring." Khan got to witness ECW firsthand growing up and can even be spotted in the crowd at the 1996 "The Doctor Is In" event at the legendary ECW Arena.

Please credit "What Happened When?" when using quotes from this article, and give a H/T to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.