Kevin Kelly continued by voicing his displeasure of AEW commentator Ian Riccaboni, who he felt ruined his reputation within the company by slandering him on social media, adding to the mental health issues he was struggling with. He also shared that he felt the environment in AEW was “very stressful” and that he was much happier working in NJPW. 

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“You cannot do something like that, it happened to a much greater extent. I’m not comparing myself to it at all, but to Hana Kimura, okay, because when you bring down the force of social media onto a person wrongly accusing someone, there are consequences. You can’t do that, you shouldn’t do that, and I mean what happened to Hana, of course, was much worse than what happened with me. I was not a fit for AEW, I just felt like it was a very different kind of place and very stressful, so many people, so many just like … there was so much chaos and it just really stressed me out a lot, I was much happier in New Japan.”

The last episode of “AEW Collision” that Kelly participated in was the March 2 edition where he shared the desk with Tony Schiavone and Nigel McGuinness.

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If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit “K & S WrestleFest” with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.