Brody King Names Who Campaigned For Him To Join AEW

Brody King recently spoke with AEW's Unrestricted podcast about joining the company.

Brody reveals that things all came together quite fast following the Ring Of Honor hiatus announcement. The House Of Black star also stated that talent in AEW were campaigning for him to join the company.

"It was just kind of weird," he said. "Like you said, a lot of people that were probably excited for me to be there were also maybe campaigning for me to come there. Guys like MJF and Darby, there's a whole list of people that I used to work with on the indies, we all kind of came up together.

"So, they would check in every couple of months and be like, 'hey, when is your contract up, when are you coming here?' Then obviously with the fallout of Ring Of Honor, the gears started turning a little bit more. I got in contact with Tony, I think maybe the day after the news of Ring Of Honor broke. It happened quite rapidly."

Brody King believes that things truly got going following Malakai Black's release from WWE. That is when they started putting ideas together, with Black wanting them to test their in-ring chemistry out first.

"I would say the wheels really started turning when Malakai got released from WWE. We kind of started putting this House Of Black, Kings Of The Black Throne thing together. It was cool," he said. "Tommy was like, 'well, let's just see if we mesh well together in the ring, just kind of get some reps in and see where this goes. Hopefully, it will take off from there,' and I think it has."

Brody King then recalled when he would appear backstage before signing a contract. Talent was always asking if he was set to debut, but things officially were agreed upon around Full Gear.

"So, it was around Thanksgiving, Full Gear that we made a handshake on it," he said. "Then everything started proceeding around December. It was funny because I would show up backstage, and everyone would be like, 'are you doing something tonight?' And I would be like, 'no.' 'Are you signed yet?' And I am like, 'no.' It was the inevitable wait of putting pen to paper."

Brody King also spoke about how he created his name in wrestling. That is something that took inspiration from Brodie Lee, as he watched him putting together great work. At the time, he was in WWE as Luke Harper, so he felt the name would work.

"I had been watching Brodie Lee's independent stuff," he said. "As far as big men wrestling, Luke Harper was huge in me seeing somebody on TV doing these things that most other big men weren't doing. He was doing hurricanranas, he was doing dives, and all sorts of crazy stuff. I started watching his Chikara stuff, and it was even more there, he was able to be an incredible base, but also do all these incredible things as a big man. So, he was in WWE, I was like, 'well, it seems like Brody works on multiple levels. So, I became Brody King.'"

If you use any quotes from this article, please credit AEW's Unrestricted podcast with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.