Why Swerve Strickland Wishes AEW Vs. WWE Would Happen More Often

Last night "AEW Dynamite" lost a close battle in the ratings with "WWE NXT" and former "NXT" star and current AEW wrestler, Swerve Strickland, thinks that kind of competition is good for the pro-wrestling business.

"I want them to make [more commotion about] it. It's two rival teams going at it," Strickland said in an interview with DAZN, mentioning how passionate fans get when big rivalry showdowns take place in regular sports. Swerve believes that the battle between the two companies keeps them sharp and especially thinks the running trend of older wrestlers versus younger wrestlers that's been occurring on AEW programming helps bring eyes to it as well.

"There's a lot of intrigue on Adam Copeland ... There's a lot of intrigue about me," Swerve said. Swerve believes the competition forced him to wrestle Bryan Danielson for the first time ever, as intriguing matches like the one between the two Washington state natives are needed to keep fans interested. On the other side, Swerve says that his former home promotion of "NXT" has a lot of stars at the moment that benefit from being in high pressure situations like Tuesday's ratings war. 

"It's beautiful. I welcome it ... It's appointment TV, which we're losing a lot," Strickland explains, noting that people tend to watch things on their own schedules in the streaming era, and Tuesday's head-to-head showdown forced fans to watch live. Ultimately, AEW lost to "NXT," 609,000 viewers to 921,000 viewers, but in the grand scheme of things, over 1.5 million wrestling fans tuned in to watch the stars of both brands.