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#4 The Young Bucks
The Young Bucks are considered by many to be one of the best tag teams in the entire pro wrestling industry. Having wrestled in most of the major wrestling promotions in the world, including ROH, NJPW, TNA, and others, Matt and Nick Jackson started All Elite Wrestling alongside Cody Rhodes and Kenny Omega and are the Vice Presidents of the promotion.
One thing that many fans don't know is that the Young Bucks have appeared on SmackDown and ECW and have had a couple of matches on the shows in 2008. They also had tryouts with WWE in 2011 but didn't get a developmental offer.
The Young Bucks had an interview with Chris Van Vliet in 2019 and revealed how close they were to sign with WWE before Tony Khan offered the Elite to run AEW and they went ahead to start the new promotion.
"We talked to [WWE] endlessly. At one point, I remember me, Nick, and Kenny were in a room because all of our deals were up at the same time. We got off the phone one day and we looked at each other, and we said, 'I think we're all going to WWE.' It was that close. Tony came to us at the right time and he made the right offer. I'm not talking financially, I'm talking, 'Hey, you guys can run this thing and I want you guys to hire your people.' It's like someone saying, 'I want you to make a movie and you can hire all the cameramen, you can hire all the writers, all your friends to be with you.' He gave us the keys to this thing. You can't say no to this."
They also mentioned a big reason for them not signing the contract with WWE as the hectic schedule that the Superstars have to go throughout the year.
"One thing that took us out of the race for going to WWE was the amount of dates that they wanted us to do. We have young families. Even with the limited schedule, it was like, 'God, I can't imagine being home [just] for 2 days for my kids.'"
