There have been a number of confusing situations surrounding AEW contracts during the second half of 2022. Mixed reports on the future of Malakai Black, a still uncertain situation surrounding CM Punk, and even a brief moment during which some thought that The Young Bucks could have been looking at WWE. Someone who seemed tied to AEW for the foreseeable future was William Regal, but now all that has changed.
William Regal’s potential out
The situation started at Full Gear when Regal took on Jon Moxley to help MJF win the AEW title. Four days later, a furious Moxley told Regal to leave AEW and never come back. Fast forward another week, and Regal has been written off WWE TV after MJF punched him in the back of the head. That has led many to believe that Regal is done with AEW, and that he may well be back in WWE.
Speculation about the future of Regal has been everywhere in recent days. There have been mixed reports about the length of his contract with AEW. It could be a year or it could be three. Turns out, that might not matter at all. While he hasn’t been able to confirm if this is the case, Wrestling Observer’s Bryan Alvarez (via Cultaholic) believes that Regal had a clause in his deal with AEW that allowed him to leave if Triple H returned to a position of power in WWE.
Triple H Back To Power
“The belief among people within WWE is that when he signed with AEW, he essentially had an agreement that if Triple H comes back to power, he can come back to WWE,” Alvarez said. A wild clause to have in a contract if accurate, and perhaps evidence that AEW had no idea that Vince McMahon would retire and the entire WWE regime would change hands in 2022.
Regal was released by WWE earlier this year and since Triple H has been re-hiring others who were let go, you have to imagine the former European Champion would have been among them if he hadn’t signed a deal elsewhere. If he has been asked to return, and Triple H’s clause in his contract is real, it seems likely that he would have told The Game that he wanted to end things and leave properly, though the clause presumably means he could have simply left. out of AEW and straight back into WWE if he wanted to.
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