Tony Khan On What Tony Schaivone Told Him About WCW's Move To TNT

AEW President Tony Khan recently caught up with PWInsider to discuss all things AEW. As the company moves to TBS on Wednesday nights with their premier show, Dynamite, Khan hopes to see the audience grow as a result.

"It's great to have shows on both networks. I think it's ideal," Khan explained. "And something Tony Schiavone said to me a long time ago about when he was an executive in WCW, Tony told me, 'We had a great business and we had strong recognizable shows and stars when we were on TBS, and the company grew, but it felt like we didn't really take off.' This is Tony talking about his time at WCW. He said, 'It felt like we didn't take off really until we got our show on TNT and then we were on both networks.'

"For us, I hope that's that effect," he continued. "It would be awesome for us. We've had great shows on TNT, but now to have our presence on TBS, and not just any presence but our flagship show Dynamite and then to keep Rampage on TNT where we built consistently one of the top shows in our time slot and have delivered really strong results, especially in recent weeks. We just had an awesome rating for Rampage that we got last week, where we were up 29%. It's been really, really, really great working with WarnerMedia, and now to have two channels with AEW programming, I think it's awesome."

Among the positive changes, Tony Khan thinks that AEW airing at 8 PM pacific time on TBS instead of live on TNT will bring back some viewers to the product.

"As far as TBS, I think it'll also be really good for us that we are no longer out of time, time on the West Coast, going back to 8:00 PM Pacific will be really nice and should make it more convenient for the fans who aren't getting home from work in time to start a show. So, absolutely, I think there'll be some benefits to that. It's great doing the show live, don't get me wrong, and we will be live on the East Coast and Central Time. But I think one of the good things about the TBS move is with the sports schedule, it makes it more conducive, keeping the show in primetime on the West Coast."

As noted, the first AEW Dynamite episode on TBS is scheduled for next Wednesday, January 5th.