Sadly, no, it is not that simple.
Being close to the speaker does not stop reverb to reach you. It will stop weak frequencies to reach you, yes (mids and trebles), but bass will require you to listen in a very large room if you wish low bass bouncing to stay away from you. Trebles and mids are also very directive so they'll end up splitting very quickly away in the room. Bass is not directive, every bounce will get to you.
In a regular room, any bass below ~50hz will certainly bounce on walls for a while and imply a "drag". In a very small room it's nearly impossible to hear a good bass and EQing won't solve the drag issue. Low bass require big rooms... or bass traps. But bass traps for fq below 50hz are huge, so it is often impossible to set them up in a small room.
N.B. not sure about the drag term but I'm sure you'll get the idea (not English native speaker).
edit : oops, very old thread, sorry.
While I'm at it I also found this nice review about the AVAAs:
https://www.jochenschulz.me/en/blog/active-vs-passive-absorbers-psi-avaa-c20-review