Update on AEW offer to Powerhouse Hobbs before WWE Royal Rumble debut
The offer AEW gave to Powerhouse Hobbs before he signed with WWE was discussed on Wrestling Observer Radio by Dave Meltzer and Bryan Alvarez.
Hobbs debuted for WWE as Royce Keys in the Royal Rumble on Saturday in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. He entered at number 11 and was eliminated after just under 10 minutes by Bronson Reed.
“I just want to clear some things up on the Hobbs thing. I don’t know the WWE offer. I know he got a five year offer from AEW,” Meltzer said on last night’s show.
In Friday’s edition of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Meltzer wrote that the offer AEW gave to Hobbs would have been higher than what anyone but Chris Jericho made in the company in 2019. However, Meltzer noted that salaries in wrestling have jumped significantly in recent years, and the offer Hobbs was given now wouldn’t put him in the range of the top paid AEW stars.
“The standard of what guys are making in wrestling has just gone way, way, up, because of competition.”
“He got a very good offer. It was not like a top 10 offer in the company (AEW) or anything like but it was a good offer. Again, I don’t really know much more, I don’t know what the WWE offer was.“
Meltzer reiterated that WWE has been confident for some time that Hobbs would sign with them when his contract came due.
“I don’t think he was that interested in the AEW offer. I think he had already made up his mind. And I said this all along, in WWE, for a long time their belief was as soon as his contract is up he’s gone.”
The full episode of Wrestling Observer Radio is available here for subscribers.
Ian Carey is a writer from Toronto, Ontario, Canada, whose work has been featured in NOW Magazine, The Huffington Post, and more. A lifelong wrestling aficionado born in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, he has covered the industry for a decade and a half. He joined the f4wonline.com team in 2019.