WWE is headed to Jacksonville, Florida next month with SmackDown set to emanate from VyStar Veteran’s Memorial Arena on May 17.
One half of the new WWE Tag champs was in Jacksonville doing promotion for the show last week, and Grayson Waller paid a visit to News4JAX’s Going Ringside podcast while he was in town. It was there that Waller made a comment that every wrestling fan and observer knew was aimed at AEW, which has always called the northeastern Florida city home because of its owner Tony Khan’s ties to the area via his father’s NFL team, and ran exclusively in Jacksonville’s Daily’s Place during the pandemic.
The always outspoken Aussie told Going Ringside host Scott Johnson:
“Finally, some good wrestling in Jacksonville. I feel like it’s been years since we’ve seen some really good wrestling in Jacksonville.”
This week, it was new AEW World champ Swerve Strickland sitting on the Going Ringside set with Johnson to promote his company’s shows this week at Daily’s Place. Strickland offered a little laugh when the host read Waller’s quote, and when asked for comment about what was “obviously a subtle dig at AEW” said:
“Obviously [Waller was taking a shot at AEW] and I love the subtleties. And this person that said that, congratulations on their championship gold — amazing. You were awesome when you were watching me in the seats when I was being a champion over where you were as well. So, happy to see where you’ve progressed to. But let’s be real, we are the best wrestling not just in Jacksonville but anywhere on the globe… In the world, and I stand on business on that.”
Strickland (as Isaiah “Swerve” Scott) and Waller were both on NXT in 2021, when Swerve held the WWE developmental/third brand’s North American championship.
So we’ll take this banter as a bit of fun between old colleagues, and as a bad sign for anyone hoping the two sides of this promotional rivalry will stop making subtle and not-so-subtle digs about each other any time soon.
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