Joey Janela still isn’t sure what AEW was thinking about the payoff to one of his past storylines.
Janela took to Twitter/X and asked fans to give him a wrestling-related topic to react to. One fan mentioned Kip Sabian, who Janela feuded with in AEW. The storyline was largely based on Sabian “stealing” Penelope Ford away from Janela.
Janela and Penelope Ford were in a relationship prior to joining AEW, and Sabian and Ford began dating some time after that. The storyline featured Janela, Sabian, and Ford all taking shots at each other. They not only referenced their personal history with each other, but this also included some social media posts about their sexual activities.
Janela said he never should have feuded with the pair, calling the storyline uninspired and “low-hanging fruit.” He says he agreed to it mainly to stay on AEW television. Despite expressing regret over the feud, Janela said the infamous “kiss spot” was great. He also praised Sabian as a great guy who has helped his current partner, Megan Bayne, out in AEW.
“Should’ve NEVER feuded with him and Penelope at that time, was unimaginative, uninspired, and unoriginal low hanging fruit and I just said yes because I’d do whatever to be on tv,” Janela wrote. “Still don’t know what they were thinking, the kiss spot in crowd was great though haha. But he’s a super nice guy, like him a lot has been very helpful to Megan in AEW.”
Kip Sabian said Ford and Janela continued to work together long after they’d split up
Ford and Janela continued to work together after they’d broken up, but didn’t publicly announce they’d split. This led to the perception that Sabian “stole” Ford from Janela. He told Sean Smith on the Sappenin’ Podcast that they only started talking near the time AEW launched and decided to pursue a relationship after that.
“There’s a lot of people that thought because her (Penelope Ford) and Joey (Janela) were doing the gimmick together, they were actually a couple but they’d been broken up for a long time in between which is why I got a lot of heat when we started dating,” Sabian said (via POST Wrestling). “Because they’re like, ‘Oh, he stole Joey’s girl.’ Don’t be that type of mark. It’s a gimmick, you know what I mean?
“But yeah, we started talking. Then it was the initial AEW announcement in January when I already knew I was signing, but I couldn’t say anything. When she walked out and I was like, ‘No!’ Because we had not told each other. So we both kept it under. We were talking everyday and we both kept it under wraps. And then literally, I text her saying, ‘I guess we’re gonna be colleagues as well now’ so I was like wow, this works out great. So then, that was when we were like, ‘Okay, we probably can pursue this further now because we’re gonna be working together.’”
Sabian and Ford are still together and got married in 2021. They both still work for AEW, where Ford is aligned with Bayne as a tag team. Ford recently announced she was injured, and Marina Shafir replaced Ford as Megan Bayne’s partner in the Women’s Tag Team title tournament.
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