AEW Coronavirus Updates: No Wrestlers in the Crowd, More Material Taped, Wrestlers Unable to Travel, More

No Wrestlers in the Crowd, Limits on Amount of People

AEW was notably not able to have wrestlers in the crowd this week because of government restrictions on the amount of people near each other in the arena, according to Dave Meltzer.

AEW had to account for the commentary team, referee, ring announcer, time keeper and camera people, so the amount of wrestlers allowed was limited.

The production crew was in a truck outside of the arena and Tony Khan was the only person backstage in the “gorilla position.”

The restrictions also prevented the planned Blood & Guts match and lumberjack match from happening, though it’s likely that the Blood & Guts match would have been postponed anyway.

AEW has been working with the city of Jacksonville in order to continue taping at Daily’s Place each week, but it’s not clear how long that will last with the coronavirus situation quickly escalating each day.

For now, AEW plans to continue with live weekly shows for as long as they can.

“There’s another location that they could move to,” Dave Meltzer said, but didn’t provide further details.

More Material Taped

AEW did “a lot of other taping” on both Tuesday and Wednesday at Daily’s Place, according to the Observer. Some was likely for AEW Dark. It’s not clear if it was taped for future Dynamite episodes.

No Shows with a Crowd Until May at the Earliest

AEW has “given up on the idea of running shows before fans through until May 20 at the earliest,” the Observer says.

Double or Nothing

AEW’s next PPV, Double or Nothing, is scheduled for May 23 in Las Vegas. No decision has been made about the show yet and it will depend on how things develop in the country, but it seems doubtful that they’d be able to run a show with a crowd that early.

Wrestlers Unable to Travel

Several wrestlers are currently unable to travel to the US because of the coronavirus. There are likely others in addition to the list below.

Pac – Lives in the UK
Pentagon Jr – Mexico
Bea Priestley – Lives in Japan, but is in the UK now
Yuka Sakazaki – Japan

Several people who live in California were also unable to travel to the show, according to the Observer, including The Young Bucks, Excalibur, SCU, Rey Fenix, referee Rick Knox and others.