Jon Moxley's 'hard reset' for AEW is exactly what the company needed

Jon Moxley is leading a revolution within AEW. His Death Riders faction is laying waste to all that stands before them. Orange Cassidy, Daniel Garcia and Darby Allin are leading the small regime trying to stop his attack from within. 

Since returning from his hiatus, during which he was rehabbing a hip injury and also made a brief stop in Japan, Moxley has been on a mission. He has consistently spoken of his desire to rid AEW of its malaise and eradicate those who want to keep it the same. 

During a recent interview with Joseph Staszewski of the New York Post, Moxley shared his thoughts on the current revolution happening within AEW. He labeled his return as a "hard reset and complete restart" for the company. 

However, Moxley's vision goes far beyond the Death Riders and their current storyline. For him, this is about returning AEW to its former heights and surpassing them.

"Everything that has happened up until this point doesn’t matter,” Moxley said. “This is Day 0. We begin from here, and it might not look much different right now, but it will, and things are accomplished by small incremental steps, doing little things consistently. And that is how big changes are made over periods of time.”

Moxley is one of wrestling biggest stars. He is among the biggest draws on the AEW roster and helped provide early legitimacy to the young company when he chose to leave WWE while being a top talent within the promotion. Now, he's aiming to be a cornerstone of AEW's new phase, where they embrace setting their own rules and redefining what wrestling can be.

“It can be whatever the f--- we want it to be; there’s no rules,” Moxley said. “Any rules we have … ‘Oh, we got to have, you know, interviews on the set that look like this so we got to have this in time, we got to put this up.’ Any of the rules we have are just things we put on ourselves. It’s pro wrestling, man, and it’s always evolving. And even you gotta stay evolving with it, or you get left behind.”

 AEW needed this. Its numbers have been in sharp decline for the past 12 to 18 months. Even a steady influx of new talent, including Will Ospreay, Mercedes Mone and Adam Copeland, has failed to halt the slide. Those struggles also translated to ticket sales. Earlier this year, it became commonplace to see an almost empty arena during episodes of Dynamite or Collision.

Moxley is bringing a new energy and a new feel. His current storyline showcases homegrown AEW talent, and he's dragging them upward by putting them in one of the hottest storylines in professional wrestling. 

Only time will tell if Moxley can achieve his goal. But right now, AEW programming feels different. It has an edge to it. There are twists and turns, and there are reasons to tune in every week. There's still a lot of work to be done, but Moxley is clearly putting the foundations in place.