Ace Steel was an AEW producer prior to the Brawl Out incident at All Out, where he was involved in the fight alongside CM Punk, Kenny Omega, and The Young Bucks. During the fight, Steel allegedly threw a chair and bit Omega. Steel assumed he would not be let go by the company before learning of the decision.
As PWExclusive.com previously reported, AEW was building AEW Collision around CM Punk, with his return scheduled for the show’s June 17 premiere, but the two sides are at odds over a misunderstanding regarding Steel’s return. Punk believed Steel could work backstage at events, whereas AEW believed Steel would work remotely.
According to Nick Hausman of Haus of Wrestling, AEW re-hired Steel “several months ago” but has not been actively working backstage at shows because they were concerned that his presence backstage would upset people. Hence, they had him working remotely with AEW President Tony Khan on creative in some capacity.
He was expected to return to the road as an agent for the brand once the new AEW show premiered. However, on Tuesday, the decision was made not to bring him back to the road, which Punk quickly learned about, and he was upset with the decision, which resulted in him being removed from the Collision promotional material. Although it has been stated that Punk is still on “sound footing” with no issues between them, and they have maintained open communication.
Dave Meltzer noted in the latest edition of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter that Steel was “apparently one of Punk’s requests or demands to return” because they’ve been friends for years. Meltzer’s AEW sources, however, denied that he was re-hired.
Meltzer wrote, “Steel had been in talk with Impact until several weeks ago, concurrent with the detailed story (and as noted denied to us by AEW) that he had inked a new deal to return. The story is that Tony Khan told Punk that Steel could have his job and work closely with Punk but that he would work remotely and not be brought to the Collision tapings.”
Meltzer compared this to MJF’s situation last year at Double or Nothing, when MJF did the secret Brian Pillman storyline where everyone was kept in the dark about what was planned (MJF beating Punk for the World Title at Full Gear after returning from hiatus at All Out that was nixed due to Punk’s injury).
Meltzer added, “I don’t believe anyone, past Punk and whoever he may have told, knew about Ace Steel (Chris Guy) returning until a few found out about a week ago. It also should be noted that while we had heard talk about a Steel deal to return as a producer for Collision from multiple sources, we had also been told from the top in checking that we were told it was not true.”
Regarding Steel being rehired months ago Meltzer stated, “we had that denied to us when asking several weeks back, but based on what we were told by others weeks ago when the name first started surfacing, the claim had been he was hired a few weeks before that, so about six or seven weeks ago would fit that time table. But at the time those close to him said that it was a closely kept secret and he would actually return at the first Collision show. Even top people in AEW at the time were unaware of this and most still didn’t know until this week. When key talent found out about two weeks ago, they were shocked.”
The difference here is that Punk’s return was supposed to be a big deal because it coincided with the launch of a new show, and Warner Bros. Discovery “pushed very hard for him to be brought back.”
