AEW DYNAMITE!- 3/1/2023!

[Casey]

@Belgian_Waffle YUTA is leaning more towards the Moxley tweener side (especially after those ROH tapings) and Claudio is probably going heel whether they want him to or not once everyone realizes who he’s feuding with in ROH.

[matt925]

So I got row a seat 9 by clicking best available. Later when looking at the seat map I naturally assumed the prime seat would be 1 and it would end at 12, the furthest from the barricade. But no, not at the cow palace, seat 12 was the best and 1 was the furthest. So I was on the guardrail and 3 away from the other guardrail. Super happy surprise!

This was my third show at cow palace, I went to superbrawl x and g1 special in San Francisco. It should be the last. Wwe hasn’t run a show there in 18 years. The etix website didn’t help them with ticket sales I’m sure either. But the crowd was hot! I just watched on tv and it came across better than I hoped. It may not have been like the Phoenix crowd, but for 3k people a lot were engaged and hot through the show.

Little things I saw during commercial were Matt Hardy fist bumping hook and pulling him in and saying positive stuff. Right before the final segment Justin and Renee were standing right in front of me and she was a tiny bit frantic. I’m thinking something was cut. 
 

OC Big Bill was a ton of fun. I agree that ladder match was terrifying and dangerous but it was still a wild spectacle to witness. That falcon arrow on the ladder scared the crap out of me it looked horrible from where I was sitting. Takeshita and Hobbs throwing bombs is all I want to see in aew they were so awesome. There was a ton of entertaining spots in the match. 
 

I just didn’t like how much heat Riho took and how she ended up looking. I still was thoroughly entertained by the match. I don’t want to be a netico so I’ll just end that there. 
 

Im excited for revolution on Sunday. I agree with things said about the main event but I still think they will think of things to make it entertaining. And the rest of the card is mostly really good. 

[TheVileOne]

Nice to see Hobbs get a big win on TV and all, but this was also his first actual TV appearance on Dynamite since September. He's only wrestled once on cable this year besides this match.

Yeah, they had those book of Hobbs vignettes, but there's a huge lack of consistency here. Guys don't have to wrestle every week every two weeks but I don't like when guys just get vanquished to YouTube for months and suddenly they are back on TV in big matches and big feuds out of nowhere. Look how badly that sabotaged Marina Shafir. She's clearly not ready and comfortable in front of a camera.

Nonetheless, I'm a big Hobbs fan, and I'm glad he got a big win on TV, even if the finish looked goofy with the referees having to come in to hold the ladder down so Hobbs didn't kill himself on that broke-ass ladder.

Another consistency issue, they randomly start up the whole Don Callis scouting Konosuke Takeshita after ignoring it for months, filming angle at BOLA they never used.

As a go-home show before a pay-per-view, it was serviceable and generally did what it needed to do. It was good that Danielson finally shut MJF up for once and didn't allow him the opportunity to speak.

I think the smart play is to have House of Black win the belts this weekend. It finally gives the group some belts and the division now has major heels to chase. It's a good way to have them start the year strong and they can run the division as heels for a while. And then they can eventually lose to a major underdog trio like Dark Order or Best Friends to give them their first major title run. The Elite don't really need the belts and they've already held them twice.

Edited March 2, 2023 by TheVileOne

[The Green Meanie]

GIVE HOBBS AND TAKESHITA ALL THE THINGS.

RD Reynolds called Julia Hart "Evil Stevie Nicks" and now I'm never going to refer to her as anything else again.

Matt Hardy tapping immediately was totally intentional (if you didn't catch it, he smiled subtlety at the end.)

That was the one and only time I rooted for Toni, still can't stand Riho.

The Kingdom are just the worst and I don't understand why they're still employed. You could audibly hear the air being sucked out of that arena during their entrance (and pretty much every entrance of theirs.)

[GuerrillaMonsoon]

The sort of show that if I read the results online ahead of viewing, I feel like I'd have really been looking forward to it.  Instead watching live and seeing so many things poorly executed and guys just spinning their wheels unnecessarily, it was just a frustrating two hours of Could Be Better.

They're not getting my money this month and I will download from Very Legitimate Websites accordingly.

[Matt D]

I still have half the show to see but my favorite announcer moments were Taz saying he worked the Cow Palace when I’m pretty sure he never did.

And Tony getting so excited for seeing Takeshita coming in off the corner of the screen that he blew TWO dramatic moments in the ladder match and got called out for it. He’s really become David Crockett.

[Log]

My son when Hook made his entrance: “He didn’t even stop and say hi to his father. That’s so sad.”

[The Green Meanie]

1 hour ago, Matt D said:

I still have half the show to see but my favorite announcer moments were Taz saying he worked the Cow Palace when I’m pretty sure he never did.

That, and Tazz having to backtrack regarding the comment about Pat Patterson.

[YouHaveUntil5]

4 hours ago, The Green Meanie said:

RD Reynolds called Julia Hart "Evil Stevie Nicks" and now I'm never going to refer to her as anything else again.

Evil Stevie Nicks is a good one. I’ve been comparing her to the episode of Daria where Quinn decides to start wearing all black, and also “girl that can’t wait to go to Salem with her friends for Halloween”. 

[Matt D]

10 minutes ago, Log said:

My son when Hook made his entrance: “He didn’t even stop and say hi to his father. That’s so sad.”

Taz was more in "coach" mode than usual on commentary, including getting really worried at the idea of the Side Effect. I think it adds something to the matches, honestly. Hook was sort of a combo of being amazingly smooth at times, uniquely so in a way that no one else in the company is with things like go behinds and the way he shifts his body about, and then, at other times, being pretty awkward like you'd expect a guy with twenty matches to be (like with the headknock out of the corner), but against the right opponent, it can still work and make things feel even more organic in the contrast. He just needs someone who can recover well like Matt. I loved the Firm's reactions all through the match by the way.

[dokdoyle]

 

2 hours ago, Matt D said:

I still have half the show to see but my favorite announcer moments were Taz saying he worked the Cow Palace when I’m pretty sure he never did.

 

WWE did some TV's there so it wouldn't surprise me if he had been on one of those shows

[Pete]

10 hours ago, DEAN said:

This was great.

That was fucking GNARLY. Mox looked like he'd legit lost an eye - that's the kind of visual that should make them call an audible and have Mox sell it with a bandage. Hell, give him an eyepatch and he can do a Pirata Moxley gimmick.

"Chris Jericho squashed Peter Avalon..." sure, if that's what you want to call Avalon taking literally the ENTIRE match before Jericho hits his only offense of the entire thing and wins.  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

The battle royal legit put me to sleep so I missed the closing promo. Again, MJF's instincts are top notch in that he knows when NOT to be strong... I was dreading him cutting another promo while BD made faces, so it was a treat for BD to immediately shut him down and talk asses into seats. BD really should win Sunday, but MJF having to work his tail off and "earn" his victory seems more likely. Either way, in my mind MJF definitely has the wrestling chops to make this something special.

[AxB]

We already had an eyepatch Moxley arc.

[Pete]

39 minutes ago, dokdoyle said:

 

WWE did some TV's there so it wouldn't surprise me if he had been on one of those shows

It doesn't look like he actually wrestled any matches there, but he almost certainly commentated on TV. Depends on your working definition of working.

[Kang]

I liked parts of the show.  Big Billy looked good. Hobbs won the giant sonic ring. I sensed Riho would win with rollup.

I think AEW's real problem is too many wrestlers and the rotation of the wrestler is screwing up things. 
 

[Zakk_Sabbath]

17 hours ago, John from Cincinnati said:

"AEW can't be a little cold right now, fans are fickle and unappreciative -- they're just overwhelmed by all this great shit!" Cult vibes. 

 

16 hours ago, HarryArchieGus said:

And then there's the simplyfing cliche from the otherside. 

If AEW fandom is a cult, I'm David Koresh - don't get me wrong, I've been fully indoctrinated since it was just a t-shirt and vlog mill. And FWIW, I thought last night's show was even better than last week's (and I can't say enough about last week's Uno/Mox main, I really enjoyed that).

The truth of my feelings probably lays somewhere between the two extremes you guys are mentioning - I would still take AEW over any other promotion on Earth, and I still think it's among the best American wrestling I've seen in my life, maybe second only to '96-'97 WCW, with an honorable mention to 2014 WWE. Like I said, i think it's more of a me thing, just kind of dealing with the overall vibe shifting a bit since All Out. 

And apologies for being repetitive, but I'm totally going to be, because I feel an overwhelming need to reemphasize this: my feelings are born from a completely, totally positive place - if the last three years weren't mind-blowingly, life-alteringly good, I might feel a little less pedestrian about the more recent goings-on. 

All of that said: I did quite enjoy the show last night, with the highlights for me being Mox' promo (possibly an all-timer - you guys all know I mark out for the art of the bloody promo - Jeeezzus!!) the ladies match, BIG F'N BILL, and the Wardlow/Joe/Hobbs post-ladder match angle (I was SO relieved Hobbs didn't eat it). I've been waiting for Hobbs to get back into the TNT title scene since he returned to fight Wardlow and Joe at the Live Rampage I went to... (checks calendar)... FOUR months ago!! (Full disclosure: we bumped into him right after the show, still in the same clothes he hit the ring in, and he was possibly the kindest, most gracious person I've met in wrestling besides Big Bossman, so my house is rooting for this dude on a personal level). 

[DEAN]

Here you go.

 

[DEAN]

WRECKED EM!

 

[Craig H]

Man, really weird timing and booking issues tonight, but also a lot that was great.

That opener between OC and Big Bill rocked. I said OC could be a top face in AEW and Dolfan pretty much dismissed that. Everything OC is doing right now shows he can be a top face in AEW. Big Bill was looking really good too and bumping well. If there was any downside to this match, it was because it lead to some repetitive booking later on.

Have House of Black win the titles on Sunday, dammit! Not because I don't like the Elite, but the House of Black need those titles more than the Elite do right now. The only way I would approve of the Elite winning is if it lead to CMFTR coming out to confront the Elite.

Killer promo by Christian Cage that lead to...a weird Darby-esque vignette from Jungle Boy. Not super thrilled with the booking of that segment.

Hook vs Matt Hardy was fine. It was a match. Hook won, which he needed to do. But you already had Stokely looking like a geek at the start of the show and now he looks like a geek again in this match, which wound up feeling like it had more to do with Matt Hardy and Stokely with Matt's quick tap out and smile afterwards than it did Hook and Stokely.

Riho vs Storm ruled, but I'm so, so, so over this mean girls act that Saraya and Storm are doing. The AEW women's division now rivals WWE's and maybe has surpassed it in terms of quality and then you have Saraya who is so out of her element. Saraya would have fit in fine during the early Moneyball era of the women's division, but she doesn't now. And if Hayter loses that title on Sunday I'm going to fucking riot. HAYTER FOR LIFE.

That ladder match. What in the fucking fuck. 19 to 24 motherfuckers out there just killing themselves on ladders instead of trying to win. The only dudes who looked like they were trying to win were Takeshita and Hobbs. Speaking of which, holy shit, I had no idea how much I needed a series of matches between Takeshita and Hobbs. But there was so much nonsense here. You have Eddie continuing to go after Ortiz, with them brawling to the back, which was all a way to have Eddie quit AEW so he could be on ROH, which is a total fucking mistake to take Eddie off of AEW TV to try to boost ROH. Commander is out of his mind insane. Sammy's tried to kill himself about three different times. You had sloppy shit, stiff shit, and finally Hobbs wins to end the suffering for everyone else. Not the type of ladder match I like where dudes are just throwing themselves around to pop the crowd. Try to win the match you fucking dorks.

Dude, that battle royal was one of the sloppiest Royal Rumbles/Battle Royals I've seen. What in the fuck. Sometimes dudes were coming out every 10 seconds and other times it felt like it was nearly two minutes. I also loved Ex trying to put over the Butcher and the Blade as THE MOST DANGEROUS MEN IN THE HISTORY OF AEW BATTLE ROYALS. I miss Butcher's hair and awesome shades like he was the third Bash Brother on the Oakland As. Anyway, man, fuck this battle royal. I guess I'm fine with OC and Danhausen winning, but if Chuck and Trent aren't legit injured, why not just have them in the match? I say this as someone who is probably too much of a mark for Dustin and Greg, but come on TK, do something with Chuck and Trent again. Who fucking cares what JR thinks.

Two awesome promos in one night. First, Moxley channels his inner Cocaine Bear and cuts one of the best promos I've ever heard. The only thing missing to put it over the top was some sort of a catchphrase, otherwise it would be right there with Austin's King of the Ring promo. Then Danielson cuts a badass promo. I still find it weird that they quietly distanced Danielson from the BCC, but BCC have turned into a bunch of dicks. 

If anything, the final promo made me increase my chances Danielson would win from .1% to maybe 5%. All told, I don't think there would be a ton of harm done by having Danielson win the title here, have MJF claim he still hung with Danielson but Danielson can't defend the title in an Iron Man match every time out, do one more match between MJF and Danielson, and MJF wins the title back. Yeah, you hot potato the title a little bit, but I don't see the harm done when it's passed back and forth between the top two guys. 

[JLowe]

26 minutes ago, Craig H said:

That ladder match. What in the fucking fuck. 19 to 24 motherfuckers out there just killing themselves on ladders instead of trying to win. The only dudes who looked like they were trying to win were Takeshita and Hobbs. Speaking of which, holy shit, I had no idea how much I needed a series of matches between Takeshita and Hobbs. But there was so much nonsense here. You have Eddie continuing to go after Ortiz, with them brawling to the back, which was all a way to have Eddie quit AEW so he could be on ROH, which is a total fucking mistake to take Eddie off of AEW TV to try to boost ROH. Commander is out of his mind insane. Sammy's tried to kill himself about three different times. You had sloppy shit, stiff shit, and finally Hobbs wins to end the suffering for everyone else. Not the type of ladder match I like where dudes are just throwing themselves around to pop the crowd. Try to win the match you fucking dorks.

I definitely agree with this part, several times where guys chose to do a sick move instead of just trying to win (although I did enjoy some of the sick moves). There were also at least 2 instances (one with Komander) where someone was near the top and could easily have grabbed the ring and won but instead had to just kind of hang out there looking like an idiot waiting for someone to show up for the next spot.

[Zimbra]

49 minutes ago, JLowe said:

I definitely agree with this part, several times where guys chose to do a sick move instead of just trying to win (although I did enjoy some of the sick moves). There were also at least 2 instances (one with Komander) where someone was near the top and could easily have grabbed the ring and won but instead had to just kind of hang out there looking like an idiot waiting for someone to show up for the next spot.

The Komander one was particularly funny because I'm pretty sure lil guy couldn't have reached the ring without the taller ladder anyway.

The whole ending was a mess with Hobbs trying to climb the wrecked ladder instead of grabbing a new one, the refs having to hold it up so he wouldn't die, and then getting stuck at the top.  About which: how do you not cut to the crowd while that is going on?

[MoeCristyV.1.6]

Was it as bad as Jack Swagger fumbling with the MITB case back then?  It never ended... 

[Craig H]

39 minutes ago, MoeCristyV.1.6 said:

Was it as bad as Jack Swagger fumbling with the MITB case back then?  It never ended... 

Not quite. I don't think Hobbs knew how to get the ring off of the carabiner and for a second, I thought someone made the mistake of take the little screw on the carabiner and screwing it down to prevent it from being unclipped.

[Zimbra]

It was hard to tell from the camera angle but it also looked like they lowered the ring just a tad so he could reach the carabiner.

You know what was good during the ladder match?  AR Fox's "I don't need this shit" facial expressions when he was getting crushed on the ladder outside.

[Log]

Big Bill was the standout performer this week for me. We all know by now what Orange can do, but I thought BB more than held his own in that match. His offense all looked really great. He needs to use that full nelson regularly. Cool visual with him rag-dolling OC around. Of course, it's the perfect hold to be broken out of by putting your hands in your pockets, so that works, too.

The ladder match had a ton of cool spots, but it wasn't fun to watch. Probably three or four times where I legit worried that someone had been seriously injured. I'm not necessarily against big, dangerous spots, but at least make them important. Build to them. They just sort of happened in this match.