AEW is a new professional wrestling league headlined by Cody, Chris Jericho, The Young Bucks (Matt and Nick Jackson), Kenny Omega, Hangman Page, Jon Moxley, Mr. Brodie Lee, Matt Hardy, MJF, Nyla Rose, Hikaru Shida and Brandi Rhodes. For the first time in many years, AEW is offering an alternative to mainstream wrestling, with a growing roster of world-class male and female wrestlers that is injecting new spirit, freshness and energy to the industry. The inaugural event under the AEW banner was the sold-out “Double Or Nothing” PPV in Las Vegas’s MGM Grand Garden Arena in May 2019.
One of the AEW stars who has had people talking as of late is Maxwell Jacob Friedman, aka “MJF.” The current holder of AEW’s highly-priced Dynamite Diamond Ring, MJF is set to wrestle in the main event of this weekend’s “All Out” pay-per-view against World Champion Jon Moxley. Especially significant about this match is if MJF defeats Moxley for the AEW World Championship, he will become the youngest Jewish professional wrestler to have been a world champion; the initial title reigns of Bill Goldberg, “Macho Man” Randy Savage and other Jewish wrestling greats definitely did not take place when those athletes were under the age of 25.
Beyond being undefeated in AEW singles competition, MJF holds admiration from multiple generations of wrestling performers. He is the rare sort of modern-day talent who is simultaneously appreciated by veterans (e.g. Jim Ross, Taz, Jim Cornette, Konnan), active performers (e.g. Chris Jericho, Cody Rhodes, Brian Myers) and top-tier industry journalists (e.g. Bill Apter, Chris Van Vliet, Alicia Atout, Gary Cassidy) alike. All while being a smirking, condescending, elitist, mean-spirited individual on both his social media accounts and international weekly television.
On Aug. 31, 2020, I had the pleasure of speaking with MJF via Zoom, as embedded below. Among the topics we discussed:
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- Why AEW fans “deserve better” than Jon Moxley.
- His feelings about potentially becoming the youngest Jewish world champion in wrestling history at “All Out” on September 5, 2020.
- How proud he is of his Jewish roots.
- Whether he had a theme at his bar mitzvah.
- Why he should have placed higher than #22 in this year’s “PWI Top 500”
- Working with “Smart” Mark Sterling, Nina and the rest of his cabinet.
- The success of his father’s “pagels” via Bedrock Bakers.
- Being one of the most talked-about performers on this year’s Chris Jericho’s Rock ‘N’ Wrestling Rager At Sea.
