Throughout their time as free brokers, Santana and Ortiz have been some of the wanted tag groups in wrestling earlier than the 2 settled with AEW. They have been then paired with the corporate’s first world champion, Chris Jericho, which helped them to get off to a sizzling begin in 2019. Nevertheless, the choice to affix AEW wasn’t a simple one, because the duo had a number of suitors. On the “Shining Wizards Wrestling Podcast”, Ortiz revealed there have been varied choices on the desk at first. Because of AEW’s scheduling, although, the pair determined to affix Tony Khan’s promotion, which was within the early levels of its life.
“Impression positively wished to maintain us,” Ortiz stated. “WWE was an choice at the moment. It actually went forwards and backwards with us and it made our determination actually laborious. They made it very interesting and we’d’ve gone over for ‘NXT.’ They have been making it actually interesting and laborious for us to really select AEW. In the end, we went with AEW simply because the schedule was an enormous issue being that we might be at house extra with our households. We would be able to increase our youngsters and have extra of a hand in that. We have been pondering greatest case state of affairs. Let’s imagine we might bust our a** and take off and make it to the principle roster in WWE. We would most likely by no means be house.”
Santana and Ortiz’s time on AEW TV programming has decreased lately, and Santana suffered an ACL harm in 2022 that additionally altered their trajectory. Whereas Santana returned in August 2023, the 2 have been not working as a tag staff. In accordance with Ortiz, Santana is adamant about not desirous to staff up once more, which has left their futures unsure.
