Swerve Strickland Wants Young Bucks Off Trios Title Belts

Swerve Strickland has a suggestion for AEW: get the Young Bucks off the AEW World Trios Championship belts.

Strickland, who is currently in his first reign as Trios Champion alongside Kofi Kingston and Austin Creed, was asked in a brief interview with Don Chenz what he would change about the championship. His answer centered on the physical title design itself, calling for the Young Bucks to be removed from the belts.

The Trios Titles have gone through several design tweaks since AEW introduced the championship, and previous champions — including the Young Bucks themselves, who have held the gold multiple times as part of various trios — have had their imagery incorporated into the plates at different points. Strickland’s comments suggest he’d rather see the current champions, or perhaps a more neutral design, take precedence over lingering ties to Matt and Nick Jackson’s past reigns.

It’s a small comment, but it fits Strickland’s larger persona in AEW. Since arriving in the company, he has consistently positioned himself as a disruptor unafraid to call out AEW’s power players, and the Young Bucks — both as in-ring competitors and as EVPs with real backstage influence — have long been an easy target for talent looking to make a statement. Whether this was a genuine gripe or just a bit of playful shade during a rapid-fire interview, it’s the kind of soundbite that tends to get people talking, especially given the real-world stroke the Bucks hold in the company.

Strickland’s Trios reign with Kingston and Creed has given him a rare taste of tag-team success after years of building his AEW career around singles competition and championship runs, most notably his time as AEW World Champion. Pairing him with two established names in Kingston and Creed added star power to the trios division and gave Strickland a new dynamic to work with heading into the fall.

Whether AEW takes the suggestion seriously and reworks the title plates remains to be seen — companies don’t always act on offhand comments from champions, even pointed ones. But it does raise a natural question about how AEW wants to represent title lineage going forward, especially with a faction as prominent as the Young Bucks tied to the belts’ history.

For now, Strickland, Kingston, and Creed remain the reigning champions, and it will be worth watching whether Strickland brings this idea up again — whether on commentary, in an in-ring promo, or in a future confrontation with the Bucks themselves. In AEW, comments like this rarely stay contained to a 60-second interview for long.