Swerve Strickland Addresses AEW 'Playing Defense' About Locker Room, Backstage

If there's one thing besides wrestling that AEW has become known for over the past few years, it's backstage drama. Whether it's Andrade El Idolo and Eddie Kingston both having issues with Sammy Guevara, MJF and Dr. Britt Baker D.M.D arguing, or everything that happened with CM Punk, what goes on behind the scenes has often overshadowed the work the rest of the AEW roster does in the ring. However, AEW World Champion Swerve Strickland recently stated in an interview with "Rasslin'" that the AEW locker room is united heading into their biggest weekend of the year, and that a lot of what people read on social media is not only exaggerated, but potentially planned ahead of time. 

"I think that everything's been exploited, definitely been blown out of proportion with a lot of things. They say it's every other week, but it's like, go back the last week, what did you hear? Go back the week before, go back the last month, go back to almost six months now, you've heard nothing. So therefore to me, it's almost calculated to a T, before every pay-per-view, right before every big moment we have, there's always something that comes out," Strickland said.

Strickland believes a lot of this comes with the territory of being the alternative to what is established, and while he's more than happy for fans to argue over rumors on the internet, he's happy to continue being the face of a company that is continually growing. "We have to play defense a lot in those scenarios, but that doesn't stop us from continuing to put on great product and great shows. That doesn't stop us from people wanting to still come over and be in All Elite Wrestling. That doesn't stop any of that."

Please credit "Rasslin'" when using quotes from this article, and give a H/T to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.