Tony Schiavone Hopes To Keep His AEW Backstage Role After Retiring From Announcing

On a recent episode of "What Happened When," Tony Schiavone was asked if he plans on leaving the wrestling business after retiring from his commentary duties, or if he hopes to stick around with the company in a backstage role. 

"No, I still want to work backstage," Schiavone responded. 

Elaborating on the nature of his desired backstage role, Schiavone joked that he wanted to grab a baseball bat and "whack guys in the ass," specifically those who don't get the job done. He then provided a more serious answer. "I'd kinda like to do what I'm doing now, and that is working talent relations because I think I know how to handle people — and I do. It's a very, very tricky job in wrestling to work in talent relations, and I'm not the only one who works in talent relations — there's like three of us." 

"It's a tricky job because everyone is different," Schiavone continued. "You have to approach people differently, you have to be receptive to their ideas, and you have to be sympathetic to their feelings. Right now, I handle every griping complaint that a wrestler has. [It] kinda goes through me, and I try to settle [issues] as best I can."

Schiavone explained that in the event that two or more wrestlers have a disagreement backstage, he would typically involve other members of AEW's talent relations department to provide a well-rounded solution to the problem. He reiterated that he loves working with talent because a lot of them "watched me while growing up" and had a level of adulation for his illustrious career spanning decades.

The veteran announcer added that his role in AEW talent relations differed from that of Jim Ross in WWE, which also involved scouting talents, signing them to contracts, and so on. 

"I'm just kinda like babysitting," he concluded.