Backstage Report On Tony Schiavone's Absence From AEW Dynamite

The January 8 "AEW Dynamite" in Clarksville, Tennessee saw a lot of high-profile moments, including the return of Kenny Omega, Will Ospreay's first match of 2025, and Powerhouse Hobbs winning the Casino Gauntlet Match. However, one man that missed all of the action was Tony Schiavone, as he was absent from the "Dynamite" commentary desk, but on "Wrestling Observer Radio," Dave Meltzer confirmed that fans shouldn't look too deep into Schiavone's absence, as he missed "Dynamite" due to family-related reasons.

"Yeah so he wasn't on the show tonight, and it's nothing big or anything like that. I mean people — when he wasn't there, I started getting all these people going like 'oh my god did he get suspended for the text?' But it was just a family situation, he's fine, he'll be back. I presume on Saturday, it's not anything to be alarmed over, it was just a family situation and he missed one show, so that's the situation there."

Many people presumed that AEW had punished Schiavone for his comments regarding NJPW English commentator Chris Charlton and his "Anti-AEW" remarks during the Wrestle Dynasty event on January 5. In response to the remarks Schiavone posted on X that Charlton can "GFY" and that he needs to take a shower, but deleted the post almost immediately. Schiavone has been a staple of the vast majority of AEW shows since the company's inception in 2019, and only missed two AEW events in 2024. Those were the January 17 "Dynamite" due to illness, and the March 30 "AEW Collision" due to his dog passing away that morning.

Please credit "Wrestling Observer Radio" when using quotes from this article, and give a H/T to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.