WWE legend Edge would have joined AEW if he had not been cleared to compete in ring again, claims Matt Hardy
WRESTLING Hall of Famer Edge was going to join AEW if WWE never medically cleared him to return to the ring.
That is according to All Elite Wrestling star Matt Hardy, who suggested that Vince McMahon's promotion didn't have much choice in their decision to give The Rated-R Superstar one more run.
Hardy told : “That was one of those things, too.
"I think if [WWE] hadn’t have cleared Edge and let him wrestle, he was going to end up at AEW.
“So they kind of had to go, ‘Oh. If we don’t want him to go, we got to let him have his way.’"
Edge was forced to retire in 2011 due to a serious neck injury and had to relinquish the World Heavyweight Championship.
The 11-time world champion dedicated all of his energy to return to the ring and hinted he was close to coming out of retirement following an appearance at SummerSlam 2019 where he took out Elias.
The 47-year-old then admitted he held talks with other promotions and hinted one of them was AEW.
BETTING SPECIAL - GET JOSHUA TO WIN IN ROUNDS 1-6 AT 60/1 OR ANYTIME AT 25/1
Most read in WWE
Edge previously said: "SummerSlam happened and another company within the industry contacted me and said they were interested and wanted to know if I could wrestle.
"At this point, I didn’t know if I could. Before I did anything, I decided I needed to find out.
"Some discussions were had. The one thing I told them through all of this was, ‘When you give me your offer, I need to go talk to Vince.’
"He’s done right by me my entire career. He gave me my chance. He trusted me to be able to pull off a lot of things, be a pillar for his shows, be a general. That goes a long way for me.
"I reached out to Vince and said, ‘I need to talk to you this weekend. It needs to be face to face, not through texts or phone calls.’
"I went, sat down with him, and told him everything. I wasn’t trying to get a bidding war going or anything like that.
"WWE didn’t even know if this was possible. I didn’t know if this was possible. He said, ‘Well, this needs to happen here.'”
Edge shocked the world of wrestling after making a stunning return to the ring last year at the Royal Rumble.
The Canadian superstar then won the Men's Royal Rumble Match a year later and headlined WrestleMania 37 where he challenged for the Universal Championship.
However, the ex-WWE Champion lost to title-holder Roman Reigns in a Triple Threat Match, which also included Bryan Danielson.