{"id":144103,"date":"2025-10-17T04:13:22","date_gmt":"2025-10-17T08:13:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/?p=144103"},"modified":"2025-10-17T04:13:22","modified_gmt":"2025-10-17T08:13:22","slug":"darby-allin-ariel-helwani-interview-takeaways-fan-reaction-opinion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2025\/10\/17\/darby-allin-ariel-helwani-interview-takeaways-fan-reaction-opinion\/","title":{"rendered":"Darby Allin & Ariel Helwani Interview: Takeaways, Fan Reaction, Opinion"},"content":{"rendered":"

On The Ariel Helwani Show, Darby Allin opens up about AEW, his personal life, and even baffles Helwani after pouring water on himself. His interview features many insightful and controversial moments, which have sparked conversation online. Fans on forums and in comments have added further commentary, and speculation has risen around topics Allin stayed vague about. Today, we’ll go over some key takeaways from this interview. Also, we’ll briefly look at fans’ responses to it.<\/p>\n

Darby Allin on Cutting Out The Cancer<\/h2>\n

Allin is an AEW original. He’s seen people come and go and has been through the good and bad of the company. He’s more than happy to see those who bring negativity leave. Allin talked about this on the show and believes AEW is in a much better place now.<\/p>\n

He described this negativity as a ‘cancer’, saying that, “A few years ago, you definitely felt this tension, but now everybody\u2019s on the same page. Let\u2019s make this place as good as possible\u2026 The cancer was cut out. Just egotistical wrestlers who don\u2019t want to lose.”<\/p>\n

Allin Names The Backstage Leader<\/h2>\n

Helwani then asked about leadership backstage at AEW. Allin was quick to name Jon Moxley as someone who leads by example. He said the former World Champion’s leadership stands out due to his work ethic and selflessness. He also explained that Moxley’s reliability and contribution to the company make his leadership more valuable than others.<\/p>\n

Allin said, “I think Moxley is that guy. When everybody was like ‘Can someone else become World Champion?’ This guy is at every show. He’s there when it starts, he’s there when it ends.”<\/p>\n

Allin went on to explain that this selflessness is something he relates to, as well.<\/p>\n

He explained, “He’s got no ego, and that’s why I see myself in him a lot still. You’ve got to lead by example, and he will literally do anything. He’s there all the time, it’s great.”<\/p>\n

Wrestling Is Fake, So Why Be Egotistical?<\/h2>\n

Darby Allin went on to slam egotistical wrestlers. He explains that it’s weird to have a big ego in wrestling, as it’s all staged. People win or lose because they’re told to. Despite being a huge name, Allin keeps himself grounded and humble. He explains that climbing Mt. Everest earlier this year helped him with this mentality. He also gave narcissistic wrestlers some golden advice.<\/p>\n

“This is all staged. It’s the greatest thing in the world, but it’s staged. So if you’re going to have an ego about that…Get out of the f*cking sport. Go be in the UFC. Go try–don’t be bringing that sh*t here. This is about having fun.”<\/p>\n

\"A
Photo Credit: By Super Festivals<\/a> – Flickr, CC BY 4.0,<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Fan Reaction<\/h2>\n

Fan reaction varied, but people have started to speculate who Allin was referring to when talking about the ‘cancer being cut out.’ Many people point to CM Punk, who was called a cancer by both Chris Jericho and Seth Rollins, not too long before Punk joined WWE. Other fans have speculated Aleister Black and Andrade, as Allin and Punk are good friends.<\/p>\n

Ariel Helwani also pushed further on this, but Allin stayed vague and only said he was speaking about “groups of people.”<\/p>\n

Fans also took this interview as confirmation of the much-talked-about locker room morale. This discussion also reignited conversations about Darby being a future world champion or the face of the company. With Allin’s passion for the company, there’s no doubt he’ll be a world champion sooner rather than later.<\/p>\n

Opinion<\/h2>\n

Allin is absolutely right about the backstage vibe. While there were people who negatively impacted the locker room, that aura seeped onto TV. Additionally, people being egotistical in the business is stupid. Wrestling is<\/em> fake, or scripted, however you like to put it. Egotism kills wrestling, and it’s past time it stops being so normalized in the industry.<\/p>\n

For example, Hulk Hogan’s egotism killed WCW and almost killed TNA. Without Hulk Hogan, WCW may have lasted longer, and TNA wouldn’t have faced such financial issues. Even AJ Styles called out Hulk Hogan during his interview with Chris Van Vliet.<\/p>\n

Jon Moxley is also an excellent choice for a backstage leader. With his experience and love for AEW, there’s no one better suited to lead. Who was the cancer in AEW? It’s a group of people, but it changed as others came and went out of the company.<\/p>\n

Though dumping water on himself was a bit too ‘edgelordy,’ and made things awkward, time and place.<\/p>\n

What did you think of Darby’s interview with Ariel Helwani? Do you agree with him on certain things or disagree on others? Let us know!<\/em><\/h3>\n

More From LWOS Pro Wrestling<\/strong><\/p>\n

Header photo \u2013 WikiMedia Creative Commons<\/a> \u2013 Stay tun<\/em>ed to the\u00a0Last Word on Pro Wrestling<\/a> for more on Darby Allin and other stories from around the world of wrestling, as they develop. <\/em>You can always count on LWOPW to be on top of the major news in the wrestling world. As well as to provide you with analysis, previews, videos, interviews, and editorials on the wrestling world.\u00a0 You can catch AEW Dynamite on Wednesday nights at 8 PM ET on TBS. AEW Collision airs Saturday at 8 pm Eastern on TNT. More AEW content available on their\u00a0YouTube<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On The Ariel Helwani Show, Darby Allin opens up about AEW, his personal life, and even baffles Helwani after pouring water on himself. His interview features many insightful and controversial moments, which have sparked conversation online. Fans on forums and in comments have added further commentary, and speculation has risen around topics Allin stayed vague […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5605,"featured_media":144221,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4677,6,2192],"tags":[491],"class_list":["post-144103","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aew","category-north-america","category-wrestling","tag-darby-allin"],"modified_by":"Michael Joseph Sugue, Manager","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144103","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5605"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=144103"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144103\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":144222,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144103\/revisions\/144222"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/144221"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=144103"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=144103"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=144103"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}