WWE has staff at its headquarters in Stamford, Connecticut, whose job is to watch AEW programming and report back to analytics and other departments, according to WrestleVotes. TC of WrestleVotes revealed the information during a WrestleVotes Live Q&A.
“I know that there’s people in Stamford with AEW action figures on their desks,” TC said. “There’s people’s jobs is to watch AEW programming and report into analytics and different departments on what’s going on in AEW. So it’s not like a hush-hush thing.”
The comments came in response to a question about whether WWE talent discusses AEW internally. TC noted that wrestlers from both companies talk openly, given the number of friendships and prior working relationships that exist across the two promotions.
The war between the two promotions have been going on since 2019. AEW quickly established itself as the number two wrestling promotion in the world and engaged WWE directly during the Wednesday Night Wars, a period from October 2019 to April 2021 when AEW Dynamite and WWE NXT aired head-to-head on Wednesday nights. The conflict ended when NXT moved to Tuesday nights, widely regarded as a concession by WWE following a period in which AEW consistently outperformed NXT in the ratings.
The competition between the two companies intensified again throughout 2025, with WWE counter-programming multiple AEW pay-per-views. On September 20, WWE Wrestlepalooza and AEW All Out aired on the same day. In August 2025, it was reported that WWE’s counter-programming tactics were part of a broader campaign to drive AEW out of business.
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