In a rare move, WWE's Chairman and CEO Vince McMahon has acknowledged rival promotion All Elite Wrestling and claimed that he doesn't view Tony Khan's company as a legitimate threat to his business.

McMahon made the comments during the second-quarter earnings call with WWE shareholders on Thursday, July 29.

"I don't consider [AEW] competition in the way I considered WCW back in the day," McMahon said, referring to the now-defunct World Championship Wrestling. "Not even anywhere near close to that."

vince mcmahon tony schiavone and tony khan

WCW famously gave Vince McMahon's WWF a run for its money in the mid-late-nineties, and its flagship TV Nitro even beat Raw in the ratings for 83 weeks in a row thanks to the wallet of billionaire Ted Turner and the guidance of the savvy Eric Bischof. WCW's fortunes soon changed as the company was unable to compete with WWF's historically successful Attitude Era. In 2001, Vince McMahon purchased WCW and declared victory in the war.

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Later in the earnings call, Vince questioned AEW's talent investment methods and took a shot at the fact that many members of its roster are former WWE Superstars.

"I’m not sure where their investments are. When it comes to their talent, perhaps we could give them some more," he said.

Vince McMahon has alluded to AEW's existence on previous earnings calls, but he is usually quite coy and refrains from saying too much about Tony Khan's fledgling wrestling promotion.

"There will be something we do in terms of a direction of content — more controversy, better storylines, etcetera," Vince said during a 2019 earnings call. "But at the same time, we’re not gonna go back to the quote ‘Attitude Era,’ and we’re not gonna do blood and guts and things of that nature, such as being done on perhaps a new potential competitor."

The above quote caused a stir in the wrestling world, but AEW embraced the jibe and wore it as a badge of honor when they named one of their match types "Blood And Guts."

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