On a recent edition of the “Hold the Mayo” podcast, AEW’s Ricky Starks explained why he chose to leave the NWA in 2020. He said,

“I didn’t re-sign [with NWA] because I felt like I had hit my ceiling already. I quit, basically, right when COVID happened. So I had no paycheck. So I was making all my money online from my t-shirts on my website. I had did this video. I make these different vignettes, these videos…a promotional package for myself. I direct all of them, I pay for all of them, I produce all of them.

“I had posted it online. I posted it online, and Cody [Rhodes] had replied to it like ‘Oh, this is cool.’ That was…that may have been in May or something like that. The end of May comes around, I get an email from him saying ‘Hey, we want you to come in and do this Open Challenge for the TNT Title.’ I said ‘Okay. I’m just cooped up in my house right now. I’ll do it.’”

Joining AEW certainly paid off for Starks, who has been a featured performer and won the Owen Hart Foundation Tournament in 2023.

Starks is also a former AEW World Tag Team Champion. He and Big Bill lost the gold to Sting and Darby Allin earlier this month.