Konnan Discusses Austin Aries' Controversial Impact Departure, Aries Joining MLW

Ever since Bound for Glory last year, fans have wondered where Austin Aries would show up next. That answer is now MLW after he agreed to a deal with the company in early May. Aries will be facing Adam Brooks at Fury Road tonight.

With MLW, Aries should have a chance to work with Konnan who is a producer there. Konnan spoke to Wrestling Inc. on our WINCLY podcast about what Aries will bring to the company.

"He's a great talker and a great performer, so why wouldn't you want him? He's a little bit of a wildcard and walks to the beat of his own drum. But we've got another guy like that in Teddy Hart and people love him. People like people that are real, so he's a welcome addition," said Konnan.

When we last saw Aries at Bound For Glory, he was causing a scene after losing to Johnny Impact. Aries threw a temper tantrum and it appeared that he went off-script in what turned out to be his last Impact appearance. Konnan was asked about what happened between Aries at Impact at Bound for Glory.

"I'm not sure because sometimes they wanna keep things under wraps," revealed Konnan. "I don't know if he went into business for himself ? that's what it kinda sounds like to me. Or, they had agreed on doing something and he went a little bit further cause he thought in his mind maybe it was the right thing to do, but obviously the company didn't.

"I really didn't get into the intricacies of what went down because I didn't care. At the end of the day, I'm sure that's something that he and Court [Bauer] will work out. If there's an attitude problem, or if he's going to go into business for himself, that's something Court is going to curtail."

Konnan praised Court Bauer for being the top boss within MLW and the buck stops with him as opposed to other promotions he's worked in where you aren't sure who is really in charge.

MLW presents a little different product than most other wrestling promotions out there and Konnan talked about what makes it so easy to digest for the fans.

"MLW is an easy hour to watch and of course that helps," Konnan said before talking about going to watch Avengers: Eng Game, a three hour movie, and him losing interest mid-way through it.

"There is a thing called body fatigue. That one hour goes by real quick and there's an ECW feel to it."

Konnan then talked about how Bauer has brought in elements of so many other successful pro wrestling products and that's why MLW works.

"Everybody has something for them. It's hardcore, casual...The only thing I haven't seen them do is intergender matches which I don't think he is a big fan of. But I am a big fan of it in Mexico. And we haven't really seen a lot of female wrestling there, but I'm sure that's soon to come too."

With Konnan now with MLW, that also means his podcast is back on the MLW Radio.

"I started my podcast because of Court Bauer on MLW Radio and I'm back on there on Thursdays," stated Konnan. "So you can check Keeping it 100 where we talk politics, wrestling, sports, pop culture, a little bit of everything. That's every Thursday on MLW Radio and you can check out MLW on BeIN Sports Saturday nights."

Konnan's podcast started out on MLW Radio and then moved to The Jericho Network in 2016 before returning to MLW Radio. He talked about why things different work out on The Jericho Network.

"With podcasting, it's almost like the housing bubble?Anytime someone sees a gimmick or anything that gets over, everybody wants to jump on it. When I started, there were just three podcasts and I think we were the first to ever charge money to listen to us. A year later there were 50 podcasts, now there's like 300," said Konnan.

Konnan then talked about how many podcasts were at Starrcast's "Podcast Row" and he had no idea who any of them were.

"With Westwood One, they came to a point where they were like, 'If your show aren't doing these amounts of listeners on Westwood One, we're no longer interested in it.' And the only show doing those numbers was Jericho. So he stayed on Westwood One and I came back to MLW," said Konnan.

"Like anything else, it will settle back and the strong will survive and the cream will rise to the top."

Konnan can be seen every Saturday night on MLW Fusion. It airs on BeIn Sports at 9 pm EST and is available shortly after on MLW's YouTube channel.

Konnan's full interview with Wrestling Inc aired as part of a recent episode of our WINCLY podcast. It can be heard via the embedded player at the bottom of this post. In it Konnan discusses the future of the Lucha Bros in MLW, how AEW's TNT deal affects MLW, Austin Aries signing with MLW, Austin Aries controversial exit from Impact Wrestling, WWE's booking of Rey Mysterio the passing of Silver King and more.

You can check out past episodes of the WINCLY here. Subscribe to Wrestling Inc. Audio on iTunes or Google Play. Listen to the show via Spotify here or through TuneIn here.