Various: AEW Backstage Reaction to Brodie Lee Illness, Nick Aldis on NWA Contract Status, Indies

AEW Backstage Reaction to Brodie Lee’s Illness

As noted before, Jon Huber, known as Brodie Lee in AEW, passed away this past Saturday at the age of 41 due to a lung-related illness.

Fightful’s Sean Ross Sapp reported that AEW’s staff and locker room were informed of the severity of Lee’s illness as far back as early November. Sapp reported that AEW officials informed everyone in the company to not share any details of Lee’s illness out of respect for his family’s wishes and privacy until his passing. One AEW wrestler spoken to stated that any rumors of Lee’s illness being anyway scandalous in nature are not true.

Following Lee’s passing, Pro Wrestling Tees announced on Twitter that all proceeds of Lee’s merchandise sales on their online store will go directly to his family. Mick Foley and CM Punk also announced that all proceeds of their merchandise sales on Pro Wrestling Tees for the month of January will go directly to Lee’s family in honor of his memory.

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Nick Aldis Reveals NWA Contract Status & NWA’s Plans to Resume Events

A recent episode of the Keepin It 100 with Konnan podcast had Nick Aldis as the guest and some of the topics discussed included his current contract status with the NWA and NWA’s current plans to resume their NWA Powerrr series.

On the status of his contract with the NWA, Aldis stated:

“Billy picked up my option with the NWA. I had an option on my contract and Billy picked it up. I would not have opened up discussions with anyone….Since this is Keepin It 100, I just care about that paper. Billy has been very loyal to me and I to him. I truly believe in what we’re doing and I wouldn’t have walked away from it at this point because we haven’t even scratched the surface of what we can accomplish.”

On the topic of NWA’s current plans to resume their NWA Powerrr series, Aldis stated:

“UWN Primetime Live is not an NWA product. NWA Power is our flagship. That’s coming back in 2021, 100%. We’ve got some really good news on the NWA front and I’m hoping within the next few weeks we’ll be able to share with everyone. Everyone who has been asking over and over ‘what’s been going on with the NWA? When are you guys coming back and making new content?’ Stay with us because we’ve got something really cool coming up on the horizon that will satisfy everyone on that front.”

Transcript h/t: Fightful.com

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Misc. Wrestling News & Notes

New Japan Pro Wrestling recently announced that they will be halting ticket sales for their upcoming two-night Wrestle Kingdom 15 event after today. The official reason is due to the recent limit on attendance allowed for public events in the city of Tokyo by the Japanese government.

El Rey Network, cable network home of former Lucha Underground, reportedly will be ceasing all operations on December 31st, according to Cablefax.com. It was reported that Univision had pulled out as the minority owner of the network last month and the network had been suffering from a significant loss of distribution over the past year.

Riho reportedly finished up all of her commitments for Stardom this past weekend, according to the Wrestling Observer. Dave Meltzer reported that Stardom currently wants all of their talent to be exclusive to the company which is not possible with Riho due to her current contract with AEW.

Major League Wrestling announced that Séptimo Dragón was involved in a serious motorcycle accident in Mexico on December 27th and underwent surgery for his currently undisclosed injuries.

Highspots.com announced that they have cancelled all plans to hold next year’s WrestleCon event in Los Angeles, California due to coronavirus pandemic issues in the state.