AEW Star Reveals His Contract Is Expiring
It has now been confirmed that another member of The Dark Order will be a free agent on July 1, 2022.
After his cryptic tweet earlier this week that had fans speculating, Alan '5' Angels has now confirmed to "Fightful" that his contract is due to expire this Thursday, June 30.
"I was told about a month and a half ago that they are not going to re-sign me. They did offer me a per-appearance, which I decided not to take, just solely based off what I thought was best for me. I feel there is more room to grow outside of AEW, right now, at this point in my career. It's nothing against AEW or Tony Khan or any of the higher-ups in the business. It's a personal thing."
Angels hopes that his stock will increase by taking to the indie circuit and establishing himself as a top talent there. He recognizes that this is still possible if he stays with AEW, but right now, he thinks he's being presented as a "bottom guy in Dark Order" and that's far from where he wants to be
"On top of that, I never got to have a great Indie career. I was on the Indies for three years, got lucky, and got scooped up. As a wrestling fan, being an Indie wrestler and doing cool ass Indie shows, that's a thing I want to do. There are plenty of places to make money in pro wrestling right now."
Things are ending on good terms between the two parties, and Angels notes that it's not necessarily the last they see of him in AEW. He may return at some point, but for now, he wants to take a chance on himself and see where it goes.
Regarding the tweet that caused speculation amongst AEW fans, Angels says that he didn't think much about it at first. However, once people started getting stirred up by it, he added some fuel to the fire for his own amusement.
"It was literally just a normal tweet, at first. Then I saw some people speculating some stuff and I was like, 'You know what, my contract is up in a few days, I'm just going to run with it.' Then I turned my profile picture black, took the AEW out of my bio, and really just stirred the pot because I love watching people freak out on social media. People were hitting me up, asking if I was okay. Yeah, I'm fine, I just like watching people freak out on the internet."
Angels became a member of the AEW roster following a match with Kenny Omega at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in Spring 2020. Despite losing the match, Angels was put over by Omega and given several fits of offense in the bout. He would go on to become a mainstay of The Dark Order stable alongside fellow members Evil Uno, Pres"10" Vance, and a fellow member of the roster that has departed the company, Stu Grayson.