AEW’s legendary announcer Tony Schiavone made the company’s veteran star Samoa Joe the focus of his What Happened When podcast this week . He praised the former TNA and WWE star as “one of the most professional
guys I’ve ever worked with backstage, ever”. Schiavone, who also holds management positions with AEW, also said Joe holds the respect of “not only everybody in AEW backstage, but probably anybody that ever worked with him.”
It’s not the first time we’ve heard that kind of praise for Joe, who will challenge Hangman Adam Page for the AEW Men’s World title this Saturday at the WrestleDream PPV in St. Louis. And it’s why if he follows through on the rough plan to end of his career he keeps bringing up in interviews, it’ll be felt throughout the entire industry.
Joe did an interview with SHAK Wrestling recently where he was asked about the retirement plan he laid out for Chris Van Vliet earlier this year. Shakiel Mahjouri wanted to know if Joe’s plan was still to retire at the end of his current AEW. Joe replied:
“I’d say most likely, and honestly I think it’s for a lot of reasons — and I think most of them are responsible.
Obviously you never want to outstay your welcome in this industry… that I have been fortunate that I have been able to be involved with for over 25 years now. And the other thing too is, I think many of us want to preserve what we can of our health for our latter years, so [retiring when his contract expires] is something that is probably the most likely scenario — but hey. It is an unusual world, and unusual opportunities come up.”
Mahjouri asked if he’d like to share the date when his contract expires, and Joe said he would not. Then he explained:
“It might be a surprise, it might just be one day I’m gone. I’m not as ceremonial as everybody else. I like disappearing into the sunset.”
Asked why he wants to go out that way, Joe explained:
“In a lot of ways I feel it’s important, maybe to me more than anyone else. I wouldn’t want to hold up a young burgeoning industry… on behalf of myself — not that anybody else isn’t deserving of that honor, I’m not saying that.
”But what I am saying is, I’ve always been someone who’s been firmly planted with their eyes towards the future and never tried to dwell too much on the past, and it’s kind of been my theory with the industry too.
“I would hope we always look to the future, and… obviously appreciate the past but not miss it too much.”
And that’s probably a good example why people all over the industry respect Samoa Joe*.
* I’d like to think another is because he sounds so dang cool. I mean, we’ve heard a lot of wrestling types say “never say never”… how much more badass does “it is an unusual world, and unusual opportunities come up” sound?
