Report: AEW titleholder leaving despite ‘substantial offer’, starting in WWE ASAP

The rumor mill recently included one about WWE officials being “very high” on AEW’s Powerhouse Hobbs. That feeling appears to be mutual, because Fightful Select is reporting tonight (Jan. 14) that Hobbs’ contract expires at midnight, he’s decided not to re-sign, and it’s expected he’ll sign with WWE as soon as he legally can. It sounds like that should be immediately.

Fightful’s sources say AEW president Tony Khan made Hobbs a “substantial offer” as they negotiated the past couple months, but Powerhouse informed the man he’s worked for since 2020 that he wants to test the free agent waters. The two sides are said to be parting on good terms.

But the 34-year-old from California did come into this evening’s double-taping in Phoenix as one-third of the AEW Trios champions, along with his teammates in The Opps, Samoa Joe and Katsuyori Shibata. A defense was set-up on Dynamite for the Trios champs, and early SPOILER reports from the taping that followed say Hangman Page and JetSpeed did beat The Opps to take the belts at the Collision taping.

Which would seem to both solve a problem for AEW, while confirming that they’ve at least lost the former TNT champion — and probably to a company that likes pushing former AEW titleholders.

Thoughts?