The arrival of AEW onto the wrestling scene earlier this year gave WWE their first real competition since the Monday Night Wars between WWE and WCW in the 1990s.

Going up head to head against NXT on Wednesday nights, the Wednesday Night Wars has given wrestling fans entertaining wrestling for the past eight weeks, and there's plenty more of it to come.

Despite going up against each other on the same night, neither side has referred to the other as competition, even though they have at times fired shots at one another.

Speaking to Sports Illustrated, Stone Cold Steve Austin was asked his thoughts on AEW since he has vast experience of battling against another wrestling company in the Monday Night Wars.

Stone Cold believes, whether or not they acknowledge one another, AEW is competition for WWE, and WWE is competition for AEW.

The Texas Rattlesnake said: “Without competition, who knows what would have happened in my career—who knows what will come out of Wednesday nights, but I believe in competition.

"I know AEW is doing their thing and they say they’re not competition, and WWE might say it’s not competition, but if it’s on across from each other, it’s competition.”

Austin then went on to give his own experience of wrestling competition and how it helped him define his career, referring back to the Monday Night Wars between WWE and WCW.

He said: “I remember when WCW’s Nitro kicked our ass for two years in the ‘Monday Night Wars.’ I couldn’t believe it, I thought our show was better, but they kept winning.

"Finally, we started turning the tide when everybody got so hot. The fact that we had competition, man, that made everybody push the envelope.

"I certainly wasn’t afraid to push the envelope, and I did. I’m thankful for the ‘Monday Night Wars.’ They helped define me. They helped Vince, and it helped us go out on a limb with some of the crazy stuff we did in our feud that became water-cooler talk and transcend the business.”

NXT likely won't be pushing the envelope to the extent in which Raw did during the Monday Night Wars. WWE has moved on from those times.

However, as Austin said, competition from AEW could definitely bring the best out of the superstars, producers, and creative writers in WWE in order to produce the best show possible to stay ahead and keep the fans from going elsewhere for their wrestling fix.