MJF Makes Surprise Return, Cashes in Casino Gauntlet Contract for AEW World Title Opportunity
- All Elite Wrestling
- 3 hours ago
- 2 min read
He’s better than you. He knows it. And he’s back in AEW.
MJF – Maxwell Jacob Friedman himself – made a surprise return on Wednesday night’s special AEW Dynamite and AEW Collision Holiday Bash from Manchester, UK, interrupting the contract signing for the 3-Way AEW World Championship Match between “Hangman” Adam Page, Swerve Strickland and champion Samoa Joe to cash in his Casino Gauntlet contract, making the championship match at Worlds End on December 27 in Chicago, Illinois, into a 4-Way Match!
And as soon as he grabbed a microphone, MJF addressed the question many AEW fans were probably asking:
"Now, I'm sure a lot of you are wondering why a guy like me would willingly execute my contract, knowing I would have to face three men instead of one.”
He then walked toward Hangman and addressed the former AEW World Champion: “Hi, Seabiscuit! Since the inception of this company, you’ve called me a coward. And while I had time off, getting my stuff together and filming a movie – because unlike you, I’m actually a star – I was festering over this, and eventually I realized it, Hangy. Maybe you were right. You know, the old me, I would have came back here, I would have took every shortcut in the book just to get what I want. But that wouldn’t cut you deep, now, would it? See, I need to hurt you, Cowboy. And I can’t think of a better way to do it than not just by taking that title far away from you, but by doing it by beating you and two of your biggest rivals all in one fell swoop. That way, you and your fans have absolutely zero excuses.”
Fair enough.
We last saw MJF after his defeat at the hands of Mark Briscoe at September’s All Out pay-per-view in Toronto. Following that defeat, Friedman reflected on everything he’d been through in the years and months leading up to that, saying at the time that something was missing – that he wasn’t MJF; he was just playing MJF. He said then that he couldn’t come back until he looked in the mirror and no longer saw a fraud but a man who was at the top of his profession. And at that moment, he would be the most dangerous he had ever been.
It would seem that time has come. Welcome back, MJF.
