Jay Lethal signs with AEW, set to challenge for TNT title

One of the top stars from Ring of Honor has arrived in AEW.

Former ROH World Champion Jay Lethal made his AEW debut at Full Gear on Saturday night. It was announced that Lethal will challenge for Sammy Guevara’s TNT Championship on Dynamite this Wednesday.

Lethal appeared on stage at Full Gear after being introduced by Tony Schiavone. Lethal declared that he’s now All Elite, and he challenged Guevara to defend the TNT title against him on Wednesday’s Dynamite in Norfolk, Virginia. Guevara then came out to the stage and accepted Lethal’s challenge.

Following his debut, AEW posted a graphic on social media announcing that Lethal has signed with the company. AEW also released its first T-shirt for Lethal.

Lethal is a former ROH World Champion, Pure Champion, Television Champion, and Tag Team Champion. He also previously wrestled for TNA and held their X-Division and Tag Team titles.

Lethal was part of the card at All In in 2018. He retained the ROH World Championship against Flip Gordon at the show.

It was announced last month that ROH is going on hiatus after their Final Battle pay-per-view this December. ROH wrote that it “will be taking the first quarter of 2022 to work internally to reimagine” the promotion. ROH talent won’t have their contracts renewed and are able to work wherever they want immediately.

In July 2020, Lethal issued a statement amid the #SpeakingOut movement saying that he’s never sexually harassed or abused anyone. The statement was in response to Kelly Klein alleging that multiple women had brought complaints and evidence of sexual assault/harassment by Lethal to ROH. Klein said that ROH ignored it or covered it up.