In an interview with Bill Apter, Dutch Mantell, and Dr. Chris Featherstone, Jake Hager spoke about his experiences working in AEW before his departure in May 2024.
Hager expressed his belief that things changed for the company after the departure of Cody Rhodes, who served as an executive vice president and competed in AEW until early 2022.
I think everything changed after (Cody Rhodes) left because he was involved with it and after that, it just kind of became a free for all. Young Bucks and Kenny still had a big say in what they were doing. Chris obviously still had a big say in what he was doing, but even Chris, he would tell me that Tony would not respond to his messages for like two weeks.
Hager went on to address Tony Khan’s handling of the company, stating he was unsure if AEW was a high priority to the president given the other businesses he’s involved in:
It became a point to where either AEW is important or it’s not. It just seems like it was not to him because they stopped doing production meetings, they stopped doing anything to make the show timely. We would be waiting around till like 5:00 PM to find out what we’re doing that day.
Hager debuted for the company on the inaugural episode of AEW Dynamite to work alongside Chris Jericho, who the former WWE World Heavyweight Champion credits for being the reason he was offered a job in 2019:
The only reason why I got signed with AEW is because of Chris Jericho, so I’m very thankful for that. Tony wanted nothing to do with me because I was from the fed and he’s an indie darling guy, and I dare you to argue with me about that. He wants flips and hamburgers and hot dogs and not storylines.
Source: F4WOnline