Doc Gallows and Karl Anderson On 2019 Talks With AEW, Plans to Appear on Dynamite, Heat On Them For Staying With WWE

Doc Gallows and Karl Anderson discussed how close they were to signing with AEW last year, the original plans for them in AEW and having heat over sticking with WWE on their Talk’n Shop podcast. Gallows and Anderson spoke with Ryan Satin and discussed how they were unhappy in 2019 when their contracts were coming up later that year and began talking with the Young Bucks. They said that they fielded offers from several companies at the time and that they were close enough to signing with AEW that plans were made for them to appear on the debut episode of Dynamite.

Ultimately, they acknowledged that they were wooed by the amount of money being offered them to stay with WWE and decided to sign back up, which left some bad blood in AEW because of how close discussions came. You can see highlights below as well as the full podcast:

Anderson on when they first started talking with the Young Bucks: “I remember, it was January of 2019. We were going out to California for a house show, and we messaged the Young Bucks because we heard rumblings of stuff they were doing. And we hadn’t really — we stayed close with them the entire time, but we hadn’t really heard exactly what they were going to do. And they were just landing back from Japan on the day that we were in Ontario, California for this house show. And as they landed, they said, ‘Dude, let’s meet at the Ontario mall.’ And we said, ‘All right,’ so we drove to the Ontario Mall before the house show. And we sat there with them for an hour and a half…we had a pretty, you know, you could call it rough 2018 where they traded us to Smackdown and we weren’t on television much. We had some good times, but there were some miserable moments in our professional wrestling career that really f**ked with us. And we were like, ‘It’s time to get out of here.’

“And when we sat with the Bucks, and we talked to them about what they were going to start. We left that day and went to the house show. And I mean, how f**king excited were we? This is early, this is 10 months before Dynamite debut. So they hadn’t even announced [Dynamite]…So they were telling us what we were gonna do. And it’s not that we didn’t believe them, we were just thinking, like, ‘Fuck, is this really gonna happen? Is it not going to happen?” Then as the year went on, as 2019 went on, we realized we really wanted to leave. And then we started hearing more, AEW started coming more into fruition. We met with Kenny Omega in Winnipeg, we talked with him.”

Gallows on their talks with WWE: “We were just dancing for a year, because [Anderson] might remember the day, but we walked into Carrano’s office like a year before we were up. And he was like, ‘We gotta talk contracts, boys.’ And we went, ‘Oh f**k.’ We thought they were gonna forget we were f**king signed, because at the time it was during our rollercoaster ride. We were like, ‘We’re gonna ride this shit out and get away with it.’ Well, they were on our asses, they knew we were friends with Kenny, we were friends with the Young Bucks. They knew we were gonna be on board, and weren’t happy with how we were being used.”

Gallows on not being sure about AEW at the time: “Not that we don’t trust our friends, we had all the faith in the world in them. But you’re dealing with big corporations and business and millions if not a billion dollars and all this stuff. So [the question is], is this really going to happen? Is this really a viable option? If this doesn’t happen, yes, we’re television, American TV famous now. How much is New Japan going to pay? Is it comparable to these awesome paydays we’ve been getting? And now, you’re stacking up this downside guarantee … And when Triple H is telling you, ‘I want this to set you up for the rest of your life,’ and you’re going, ‘F**k man, we’re gonna make a few million dollars over a few years here.’ It’s a hard thing to dance around.”

Anderson on AEW planning for them to come in: “As it got to closer to, let’s say June or something like that. I remember the text clearly from Matt Jackson, Matt and Nick. And they had planned out the entire first debut of Dynamite’s main event. It was gonna be, Machine Gun music’s gonna hits, I gonna come out, f**king Gallows comes from behind. We ‘Too Sweet’ the Young Bucks and Kenny, turn around, everyone’s happy. And then we beat the f**k out of them, we leave everyone laying to end the very first night of [AEW Dynamite].”

Anderson on ultimately signing with WWE: “It’s one of the biggest regrets of my life that that didn’t f**king happen. It kills me, badly. I said it a couple times to Gallows, I was like, ‘We don’t know if it is actually going to take off on TNT, or go on TNT.’ The only thing that we know is with the guys involved, Young Bucks, Kenny, Chris Jericho, those are motherf**kers that are successful and are not going to fail. They’re just not gonna fail. And we knew AEW would be successful, we knew that they would pop off. We just succumbed to the amount of money and promises — kept or unkept, whatever, that doesn’t matter — by WWE. It does [matter], but we signed because of the thought that it was going to be our last contract and we were gonna ride it out and wave the WWE flag as high as we could.”

Anderson on there being heat on them in AEW over it: “You know, I would say for a good six months, we told the Bucks and Kenny, ‘We’re coming. We’re f**king coming, like no matter what,’ Because we were that ready to go. This is where it bothers me a lot that we didn’t bet on ourselves and allow ourselves to leave when we knew that we f**king should have. And that’s why I’m so glad with FTR being able to get out on their own terms and being able to do what they did. But yeah. there were some hard feelings I think. Because I think people trusted the Bucks and they told other parties that we were coming. And then we didn’t come and it made them look like they couldn’t close the deal.”

Gallows on people in AEW being upset over it: “There was probably a little heat internally there. And you know, we have other friends there, we don’t have to drop a bunch of names. But like, a friend who is in a high power position there and wrestler who was like, ‘What the f**k, guys?’ And I think he’s still a little offended by it. My answer to him, if he ever hears this or reads the transcript was; none of this was ever personal. And we appreciated the offer and everything was trying to do. It was clearly a business decision. We were looking at a five-year deal as opposed to a two-year deal with maybe a one-year option. So when you start calculating that money and where you’re going to be in five years, especially with the ‘You’re going to be here for the full five years and there’s plans for you after’ and all that. It’s like, you’re stacking millions and millions against, ultimately, the smaller figure.

“Should we have taken the smaller figure and bet on ourselves and been something really cool again like we were in New Japan? F**k yes. Is the egg on our face? It’s running down my f**king face right now. But I think a lot of people in that situation would go back and look at your kids and wife, and go, ‘All right honey, how do I say no to them backing up a bank truck to the front of the house and dropping the load in front of the door.’ That’s a hard answer…a mistake was made, but there was logic behind it. It wasn’t to be harmful or spiteful or to backdoor anybody. It was a business decision to do what we thought was best for our family.”

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit Talk’n Shop with a h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.