AEW: Kota Ibushi Provides Update on His Broken Femur Injury & Surgery Recovery, Jerry Perry on His Backstage Altercation Incident with CM Punk in 2023 & “I Felt Like I’ve Grown A Lot From It”, More News

Kota Ibushi Provides Update on His Broken Femur Injury & Surgery Recovery

As noted before, Kota Ibushi has been out of action for AEW since this past October due to a broken femur injury and surgery.

Ibushi provided an update on Tuesday on Instagram about the current progress of his recovery from his broken feamur injury.

“I suffered a serious injury. The doctor told me that it would take about two years for me to return to competition. It’s been about two months since I was injured. However, it seems that I don’t need that. But that doesn’t mean I’ll take any easy steps. This time, I really want to step into the wrestling ring. So please give me a little more time.

My English may be strange, but please forgive me.😊”

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Jerry Perry Comments on His Backstage Altercation Incident with CM Punk in 2023 & “I Felt Like I’ve Grown A Lot From It”

As noted before, Jack Perry and former AEW talent CM Punk were involved in a backstage physical altercation incident at AEW’s All In event in August of 2023 resulting in their suspensions from the company and Punk’s firing from the company in September of 2023.

A recent episode of the AEW Up Close with Renee Paquette show featured Perry as the guest. One of the topics discussed included Perry’s thoughts about his past incident with Punk without mentioning it by name and how he feels that he has grown a lot from it.

“I think, I feel like I’ve grown a lot from it, but I feel like the growth came from a lot of it sounds dramatic to say pain, but it wasn’t the nicest of times, for most of that time. I think it really freed me in a lot of ways. It’s kind of like before all that feels like another lifetime at this point, and I think back to how I felt before that, and I think a big thing I had was like, I just really, it sounds silly, I just wanted everyone to like me.

I was new to being on TV. This was my dream job since I was a little kid, and I wanted to do it perfectly, and I wanted everyone to like me, and it’s not something I worry about so much in my real life, but this was different. I kind of wanted to micromanage it and make it perfect. So then when I would come up short of that, it was very disappointing, and I think coming up short of anything sucks, but doing it in such a public way, and then there are a million people telling you you’re a piece of shit or whatever, it’s hard.

I think, through all that, I finally realized there are some people that are never gonna like me no matter what I do, and in a way that was really freeing because then I was like I don’t have to worry about that anymore, what do I wanna do?”

Transcript h/t: F4WOnline.com

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AEW News & Notes

Adam Cole and Samoa Joe recently released their Top 10 games list for GiantBomb.com’s annual Top 10 games lists for 2025.

AEW recently released a new commercial featuring Max Caster and the Costco Guy’s The Rizzler hyping up tonight’s AEW Dynamite On 34th Street 2025 and this Thursday’s AEW Christmas Collision shows.

AEW also recently released a new “Where Wrestlers Work” ad video featuring “Timeless” Toni Storm and Darby Allin.

AEW also recently released a new AEW Top 10 video titled “MEMORABLE MOMENTS from AEW Holiday Bash!” on their official YouTube channel.

In a recent issue of the Mone Mag fan newsletter, AEW TBS Champion Mercedes Mone gave her thoughts about the online critisms from others about her belt collecting gimmick and why she does not care what her critics say about it. Mone stated “Why would I acknowledge the critics? The goal is shown. It’s been shown. For the people that can’t see it, it’s on them.” Mone also gave her thoughts about her year in wrestling for 2025. Mone stated “One of my favorite discoveries was Aliss Link from Denmark. Her style is unlike anything I’ve experienced—creative, sharp, and unpredictable. One of my favorite independent matches of the year came against her, and trust me when I say: Aliss Link is someone you need to keep your eyes on. Kanji from the UK, wrestling for RevPro, twisted me into shapes I didn’t even know my body could bend into. She proudly calls herself the female Zack Sabre Jr., and for good reason. Wrestling her felt like a high-level chess match—one I can’t wait to play again. Then there’s Emersyn Jayne from Scotland. Don’t let appearances fool you. Her intensity, agility, and ferocity were unreal. She represented her country with pride, holding the Discovery Pro Championship for over 1,000 days. But as the CEO of women’s wrestling, I study my opponents like no other— and I always find a way to win.”

In a recent interview with Fightful, MJF gave his thoughts about his storyline and feud with Adam Cole in 2023 that ended abruptly due to Cole suffering an ankle injury. MJF stated “Here’s what happened. At the time, and this is just a fact, we were the highest minute-for-minute drawing angle, not just in AEW, but in all of professional wrestling at that point. We were moving the most merch in the company. At that point, and was to no fault, Bloodline’s going to go down as one of the greatest long-term thing, but at that point there was a bit of lull in their story at that point in 2023, and we had taken lead and Better Than You Baybay is what everybody was talking about and then that pussy Adam Cole broke his ankle like the complete dork that he is and then he decided to turn on me because he’s a horrible human being. But I learned a lot in that in that year I learned a lot about myself you know when I when I was out—full disclosure I was in a very dark place. I was my hip, my left shoulder; my last two pay-per-view matches—pretty much the left side of my body was useless. But I wasn’t going to tell the doctors that because that’s not how I was brought up. In not just in real life, but in this business. When I had that time off, I had a lot of time to reflect and it made me angry. Now I look back on it and I shouldn’t have been angry at the fans. Who I should have been angry was that myself. Because I went from being, ‘MJF is the best thing since sliced bread,’ and within a flip of a switch, ‘It’s MJF sucks. He’s killing this company that we love.’ It took, if we’re being honest, it took all the way into like the first month of this year of 2025 for everybody to be like, ‘Maybe we were harsh. Maybe he’s actually still one of the best in the world.’ They can’t help it. But I know why. It’s because nobody likes a braggart. But the unfortunate thing is I can’t help myself. I’m just really good at my job and I can’t help but talk about it.” (Transcript h/t: Fightful.com)