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AEW Dynamite - 5/12/2021


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8 hours ago, Sammo~! said:

As a biracial person, if my white father tried to use my existence for a babyface pop about racial equality in America, I'd punch the old man in his god damn mouth. (And I like my dad) Cody can fuck off forever.

I'm a white guy so I don't know the best way to say this, and I've been thinking about it since Wednesday.  Cody was on TNT's Hispanic Heritage Month adverts as he is biracial.  But he self-identified as "white" in that promo.  Biracial friends, is that cool or kind of off-putting?

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11 minutes ago, Curt McGirt said:

EDIT: With all the talk of "Wild Thing" I keep forgetting that the first thing I thought when it played was "man why didn't they bring over his cool New Japan music instead".

I don't think AEW didn't want people to focus on that "Death Rider" Mox is so fucking cool.

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13 hours ago, John from Cincinnati said:

8-0 #1 ranked Page falling to 8-1 #5 ranked below Cage and Moxley is absurd. Anyone who takes the rankings too seriously is opening themselves up to abuse, full stop. If they're not going to sweat the details too much, nobody else should. Let them book whatever they want and don't think too much about TK's mental masturbation. 

The rankings are an excellent story-telling tool IMO. Like any story-telling tool, they should be used in a way that serves the needs of the larger story, of course. And it's nice if there's some in-universe explanation they can point to that explains why person A is ranked higher than person B. But complete consistency is not needed. If they could come up with a rigorous formula for the rankings and keep to it while still getting results that drive the story they want to tell, that would be both neat and impressive. But that's above-and-beyond stuff.

Regarding your specific example - Page dropped below Cage in the rankings because he lost to Cage. I can't imagine anything more simple and logical than that. And Moxley's raw numbers are almost as good as Page's, but his lone loss is to the champ while Page lost to the #3 contender. So Moxley being ranked higher than Page doesn't strike me as a problem either.

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4 hours ago, Technico Support said:

I'm a white guy so I don't know the best way to say this, and I've been thinking about it since Wednesday.  Cody was on TNT's Hispanic Heritage Month adverts as he is biracial.  But he self-identified as "white" in that promo.  Biracial friends, is that cool or kind of off-putting?

I guess from my standpoint it doesn't matter how he identifies because "I listen to Snoop and me and my black wife are having a baby isn't America wonderful" is such an out of touch white dude thing to say. I can guarantee you that kid is going to experience all kinds of ugly racism in their life by people who don't give two shits that they are the great grandchild of a plumber. 

At best it comes off as egotistical and weird, at worst it sounds like he's objectifying and fetishizing his wife and child.

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I dug the whole presentation of Moxley vs Nagata. The pre match split screen, the camera following Nagata and to the ring from the backstage area all felt like the lead up to a big MMA fight. I hope they keep doing that going forward. I really hope Moxley keeps Wild Thing as his theme in AEW it was a cool ascetic. The match was really good, a ten minute stiff fest, the beat the heel outta each other and Moxley got busted open hardway, can't beat that. 

I didn't want to Like Cody's Promo but I liked Cody's promo. Him vs Ogogo is gonna be good I think. The set up with Ogogo punching Cody in the ribs and draping the Union Jack over him was awesome. I also like that Cody vs Marshal was a stepping stone for Cody vs Ogogo, Ogogo's first major wrestling angle. Cody wrestling as "The American Dream" at the PPV has me worried that he's going over as I think Ogogo should go over Cody. Look who long it's taken Shawn Spears to recover from the booking post Cody lost, you could argue Spears hasn't fully recovered and I fear the same for Ogogo.

That video package with SCU before the Tag Match really brought the point of how much this match really means to SCU not only that if they lose they are done as a tag team but that the want to smack some sense into the Young Bucks for their recent actions. I have been vocal about how much the Bucks heel turn has fallen flat and this was a nice step in trying to get some heat on the Bucks. SCU took it personal and the Bucks aren't the same Bucks they've known for all these years on the road together. This is the first match since the turn I actually bought The Young Bucks as heels. Maybe they are becoming more comfortable in their new roles but this felt like The New Mean Streak Bucks they've been alluding too. The are cocky, mean and will cheat to win. I may be turning a corner on the Heel Bucks. If MAtt's new gimmick is mocking Shawn Michaels I could get behimnd that. Really good match. SCU wrestled like their lives depended on it and they kinda did. Daniels bled buckets Kazarian had the match won twice on his own. It took a can of cold spray to finally put SCU down. What A final match from that team.

Kingston and Moxley destroying The Elites locker room, to a nicer group it couldn't have happened.

We are getting Christian Cage vs Matt Sydal next week. That should be good.

Where Is My Mind fits Orange Cassidy like a glove. I don't want to gratuitously knock WWE well I haven't done it yet but This is the first matlch up between Cassidy and Pac since Revolution 2020 14 1/2 Months ago granted Covid happened and Pac was stuck in England for most the year, but had this been WWE they'd have had 20 return matches in that time. AEW has kept them away from each other until now and it's for a World Title Shot. That first match was the first time in AEW that Orange Cassidy "took a match seriously" it was his coming out party for how good he really is, when he wants to be. There's more weight to this match I feel, Cassidy has came into his own over the last year while Pac who was ascending the ladder in AEW his momentum was cut out from under him due to no fault of his own. The match was really good, Nagata and Moxley set a tone and it's been followed so far. No exceptions here. Pac was his usual surly self putting a beating on Cassidy and Cassidy put up a fight. That rolling it the corner pose and then duck under leg sweep into the ring post into the second commercial was a cool spot. The finish, i'm not too hip on no finishes but this did't feel like a no finish cuz either man wanted to do the job, this was done to further an angle. Kenny is the egotistical Champion that doesn't want to lose the belt so he'll do everything in his power not to, even if that means causing a no contest in the number one contenders match. Of course it backfires cuz it should and Kenny is facing both men at DON. That match should be really good so i'm not mad about that. There was a triple threat Tag Team Championship Match at Full Gear 2019. I don't think theres been a Championship triple threat since. Id have rather the time spent to do the Cassidy hurt spot, the Callis distraction, Kenny from behind, the count out and Tony's announcement and reaction they could have continued the match and had Cassidy continue the match hit the Orange Punch and get the win. It was only 3 minute sit didn't take up that match time but after that interaction last week between Kenny and Cassidy I think the real money is on a one on one between Kenny and Orange. The best Cassidy angles are win his opponent feels they are above him and underestimate him only for Cassidy to show fully what he is capable of once the bell rings. 

The Young Bucks feel into Moxley and Kingstons trap. I really hope Moxley and. Kingston take the straps from the Bucks at DON. 

The Pinnacle-Inner Circle segment was cool. MJF and Tully are awesome on the mic, they were pissing the crowd off. The Champagne was a cool spot. The Heels in AEW are really good at getting coaxed into giving the Babyfaces what they want. I'm interested in how the Stadium Stampede turns out between the two groups, they just had a violent blood bath are they gonna go for the cutesy like last years Stampede. 

Britt Baker has really came into her own as a personality and a competitor in the last year, I'm looking forward to the Shida match.

The Thunder Rosa match was quick and to the point. Rosa is a force to be reckoned with right now. I'm hoping we get a Britt-Rosa feud over the Strap sooner rather than later.

I don't know where they are going with this Jade Cardgill angle but if it means Cardgill's on my TV every week I'm cool with it.

Darby's black and White vignette was tight. Darby's is a very intriguing character there's a mystic to it a motif too. I hope they keep him primarily cutting promo's in black and white he doesn't need to be backstage with Dasha the video packages are his wheel house. Where has this Miro been for the last 8 Months? Darby took a beating, holy shit was that a beating. Darby can sell his ass off, you couldn't help but feel for him I was almost pleading for Miro to stop through my computer screen. If i could have thrown in the towel for Darby I would have. Miro looked like an unstoppable monster, he wasn't playing video games he wasn't a best man he was just a mean son of a bitch that brutalized the Champion and took his Belt away from him. This is exactly what Miro should be doing. I like that AEW always has something (most of the time) for someone to do after the get done with a program. Ethan Page and Scorpio Sky tossed Darby down a flight of stairs last week then interfered and chop blocked Sting so there's Darby's next program. Luckily for Ethan Page people will see his and Darby's matches this time. That was such a great jab at Gabe. And Miro looks to have found Lance Archer as his first challenger. That should be a great match. Gotta give it up to Darby Allin the first half of his reign during the Team Taz feud he didn't defend it that match but after the feud was over he became a fighting Champion and brought the belt back to the prominence it was at during Cody's first run. 

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4 minutes ago, Web Conn said:

Look who long it's taken Shawn Spears to recover from the booking post Cody lost, you could argue Spears hasn't fully recovered and I fear the same for Ogogo.

Arguably that has less to do with the booking and losing to Cody and more to do with being Shawn Spears.

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47 minutes ago, tbarrie said:

The rankings are an excellent story-telling tool IMO. Like any story-telling tool, they should be used in a way that serves the needs of the larger story, of course. And it's nice if there's some in-universe explanation they can point to that explains why person A is ranked higher than person B. But complete consistency is not needed. If they could come up with a rigorous formula for the rankings and keep to it while still getting results that drive the story they want to tell, that would be both neat and impressive. But that's above-and-beyond stuff.

Did they ever give any criteria? It'd have been so long ago that I can't recall. But if we're taking quality of competition into account, as you are with explaining Moxley holding ground relative to Hangman, then I've got serious questions about how that's been applied to other people jumping in and out of the rankings 

I see the rankings functioning more as a target for scrutiny than useful for story-telling. Anything that's acknowledged #3 ranked Max Caster for one week because they noticed his record was surprisingly good and wanted to prop someone up for Hangman to eat exists for eye-rolling more than anything. My advice not to take the rankings too seriously stands, because from time to time there's going to be an absolute joke in there or something you'd need to stretch to justify.

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45 minutes ago, Phantom Lord said:

Another good show for the most part. Cody needs to just go back to being that heel that he was with The Elite. Babyface I love America Cody is so damn annoying.

This is the funny part. He’d make such a good heel, as the Bucks do. They’ll yield to my recommendation eventually, most other points have been captured ?

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24 minutes ago, John from Cincinnati said:

Did they ever give any criteria? It'd have been so long ago that I can't recall. But if we're taking quality of competition into account, as you are with explaining Moxley holding ground relative to Hangman, then I've got serious questions about how that's been applied to other people jumping in and out of the rankings 

I see the rankings functioning more as a target for scrutiny than useful for story-telling. Anything that's acknowledged #3 ranked Max Caster for one week because they noticed his record was surprisingly good and wanted to prop someone up for Hangman to eat exists for eye-rolling more than anything. My advice not to take the rankings too seriously stands, because from time to time there's going to be an absolute joke in there or something you'd need to stretch to justify.

AEW should hook up with all the wrestling journalists to create college football type writers poll. Get PWI/Apter, Meltzy, Wade, et al and just have them send in a weekly top 10 and just have them weigh the win/loss record. It would be pretty fun and would lend validity to all the dirt sheet name dropping they do. 

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10 minutes ago, John from Cincinnati said:

Did they ever give any criteria? It'd have been so long ago that I can't recall. But if we're taking quality of competition into account, as you are with explaining Moxley holding ground relative to Hangman, then I've got serious questions about how that's been applied to other people jumping in and out of the rankings

I don't think they've ever set any criteria, no. There was a tweet from Cody way early on - before they had rankings - saying quality of opposition mattered (in response to questions why Darby Allin and, I don't remember, somebody else got to wrestle for a shot at Jericho) if you want to accept that.

But IMO, they shouldn't establish formal criteria, and they should take quality of opposition into account if doing so gives the result they want. And they should go strictly by numerical records if that gives the results they want. Establishing strict rules, sticking to them, and booking in such a way that the rankings still serve the stories they want to tell would be impressive, but I don't think it's a realistic expectation.

10 minutes ago, John from Cincinnati said:

I see the rankings functioning more as a target for scrutiny than useful for story-telling. Anything that's acknowledged #3 ranked Max Caster for one week because they noticed his record was surprisingly good and wanted to prop someone up for Hangman to eat exists for eye-rolling more than anything. My advice not to take the rankings too seriously stands, because from time to time there's going to be an absolute joke in there or something you'd need to stretch to justify.

Huh, I thought Caster was #2 going into his match with Page, but looking through the records it seems you're right, he was only #3. But regardless, I've defended that before as a good use of the rankings and stand by that. No, Caster was clearly not the third most pushed non-champion in the men's singles division at that point. But so what? The #1 contender holding off a guy who's hot on his heels in the rankings is more dramatic than merely beating a midcarder on a hot streak, so why not lean on Caster's numerical record as a justification for ranking him? It served the story, which is the only reason to have rankings in a fake sport.

As for whether you should avoid taking the rankings too seriously - well, duh. You shouldn't take anything associated with pro wrestling too seriously. Pro wrestling is inherently ridiculous. But I think the rankings, at least for the men's division, have generally been solid. And I don't follow real sports, but I suspect their ranking systems are often fucked up anyway, in which case you can't even criticize an inconsistent ranking system as unrealistic. (Which I would imagine was Craig's point in bringing up college football.)

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Rankings are a v good idea. Nice way of adding mild seriousness & legitimacy to the product without having to be so severe. A passive-elevation, as it were. They should find some more serious / presentable / article journalists to underpin it however. All feels very hammy at the moment, which is a waste. They have enough cool, young, athletic guys to really pull it off. 

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@tbarrieIf you're going in with the conceit that this is outcome based but you don't think they should attempt to apply any sort of logical consistency to get to those outcomes, then I come right back to the feeling I've had pretty much from the start which is why bother? I guess you think it's adding something. But I'm not seeing it at all. 

Quote

The #1 contender holding off a guy who's hot on his heels in the rankings is more dramatic than merely beating a midcarder on a hot streak

Is it really? Especially when Caster clearly wasn't on anybody's heels and wasn't particularly hot? It's not like ranking Caster made me feel any different about that match compared to any of Hangman's other "here's a guy for him to beat decisively and get a win" matches. 

I guess I'm glad someone's getting something out of it though.

I'm somewhat charmed by @Wyld Samurai's idea though, if only for the potential Meltz twitter drama. 

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1 minute ago, John from Cincinnati said:

@tbarrieIf you're going in with the conceit that this is outcome based but you don't think they should attempt to apply any sort of logical consistency to get to those outcomes, then I come right back to the feeling I've had pretty much from the start which is why bother? I guess you think it's adding something. But I'm not seeing it at all. 

Is it really? Especially when Caster clearly wasn't on anybody's heels and wasn't particularly hot? It's not like ranking Caster made me feel any different about that match compared to any of Hangman's other "here's a guy for him to beat decisively and get a win" matches. 

I guess I'm glad someone's getting something out of it though.

I'm somewhat charmed by @Wyld Samurai's idea though, if only for the potential Meltz twitter drama. 

It's really not all that different from what Apter did back in the day with the NWA/WCW.

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9 minutes ago, John from Cincinnati said:

@tbarrieIf you're going in with the conceit that this is outcome based but you don't think they should attempt to apply any sort of logical consistency to get to those outcomes, then I come right back to the feeling I've had pretty much from the start which is why bother?

That's not what I'm doing, though. I'm simply setting the bar for "How much logical consistency is enough logical consistency?" at a different point than you seem to be. Which is fine; that's clearly something people can reasonably disagree on. But from my perspective, if Caster had been 2-6 in singles matches and they put him in the rankings anyway to try to make the Page match more interesting, that would be eye-rolling. (Unless those two wins were against big names, I guess.) As it is, he had accumulated a big enough winning streak on Dark that they could reasonably defend his ranking if called on it. So again - why not?

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6 minutes ago, tbarrie said:

That's not what I'm doing, though. I'm simply setting the bar for "How much logical consistency is enough logical consistency?" at a different point than you seem to be. Which is fine; that's clearly something people can reasonably disagree on. But from my perspective, if Caster had been 2-6 in singles matches and they put him in the rankings anyway to try to make the Page match more interesting, that would be eye-rolling. (Unless those two wins were against big names, I guess.) As it is, he had accumulated a big enough winning streak on Dark that they could reasonably defend his ranking if called on it. So again - why not?

Because as you said, "Caster was clearly not the third most pushed non-champion in the men's singles division at that point."  There's no real argument to be made that anyone should see him as occupying that space, so why even bother? All they're doing is chipping away at the miniscule credibility of the ranking system. Caster being there tells me being ranked doesn't mean all that much. 

Also, looking at the rankings for March 31 and April 7, I love that PAC got squeezed out because they were pretending he was a tag guy that week and now he's in the world title match at the PPV. Even if that win over Colt Cabana were enough for unranked Caster to catapult over three dudes, it's Cody who should have been cut. This stuff is silly. 

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56 minutes ago, zendragon said:

I didn't really have to much of a problem with Cody's promo other than it felt weird for him to be channelling1980's Hulk Hogan instead of his dad for a change 

Regarding Cody, that promo is a promo Dusty would've definitely cut. He would've cut it in 1987, mind you, so it wouldn't have the same baggage it does today. But it sounded like a Dusty promo to me.

I don't understand why people are comparing it to a Hogan or Hacksaw promo. It wasn't like he was waving a flag or a 2x4 around, ranting like a coked up moron.

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34 minutes ago, John from Cincinnati said:

Because as you said, "Caster was clearly not the third most pushed non-champion in the men's singles division at that point."  There's no real argument to be made that anyone should see him as occupying that space, so why even bother?

That implies the rankings should be commensurate with how highly pushed a wrestler is. That's certainly a reasonable starting place, but IMO it's too restrictive to be a hard and fast rule. It also would sometimes violate the logical consistency you're pushing for - I mean, MJF is clearly still one of the most pushed and protected wrestlers on the roster, but as far as I can tell from a Google search he hasn't wrestled a singles match in 2021. Ranking him commensurate to his actual status would mean putting him in the top five with a 0-0 record, which would look ridiculous.

So why bother? Because putting Caster a ranking makes him look like more of a threat to Hangman. Maybe not to you or me (though if pushed, I would have given Caster a better chance of beating Page than Cage a few weeks later), but as long as somebody bought it, it worked.

34 minutes ago, John from Cincinnati said:

Also, looking at the rankings for March 31 and April 7, I love that PAC got squeezed out because they were pretending he was a tag guy that week and now he's in the world title match at the PPV. Even if that win over Colt Cabana were enough for unranked Caster to catapult over three dudes, it's Cody who should have been cut.

I'll give you that one. Like I think I said before, there should always be something they can point at to explain the rankings, and I can't think of any reason Pac would have dropped below Cody without losing a match or Cody winning a match.

34 minutes ago, John from Cincinnati said:

This stuff is silly. 

Well, not to be a broken record, but of course it's silly. It's pro wrestling.

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I vividly recall a comment from Cody during the media scrum for I believe the first double or nothing. Somehow race came up and Cody told the anecdote that early in his relationship with Brandi they talked about it and Cody said that he’s colorblind, and Brandi said that means you don’t see me or my experiences, and that really opened his mind up. This really resonated with me, as a white dude with a black wife and two biracial kids. I’ve always considered myself to be extremely liberal, but my relationship with my now wife opened my eyes to so many things I had never fully considered. It wasn’t anything malicious, just ignorance. I hope to be a bit wiser every day. 
 

I think the problem with the promo is that he didn’t have anything relevant to say about a very touchy subject (which means he shouldn’t have said anything) and he tried to dumb it all down and both-sides everything. That’s really easy for white people to do (I know he’s half Cuban) when they don’t have to actually deal with anything. It was all just poorly thought out, even though I’m sure he meant well. Never should have gone down that road in the first place. 
 

I appreciate your comments, @Sammo~!

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2 hours ago, matt925 said:

I vividly recall a comment from Cody during the media scrum for I believe the first double or nothing. Somehow race came up and Cody told the anecdote that early in his relationship with Brandi they talked about it and Cody said that he’s colorblind, and Brandi said that means you don’t see me or my experiences, and that really opened his mind up. This really resonated with me, as a white dude with a black wife and two biracial kids. I’ve always considered myself to be extremely liberal, but my relationship with my now wife opened my eyes to so many things I had never fully considered. It wasn’t anything malicious, just ignorance. I hope to be a bit wiser every day. 
 

I think the problem with the promo is that he didn’t have anything relevant to say about a very touchy subject (which means he shouldn’t have said anything) and he tried to dumb it all down and both-sides everything. That’s really easy for white people to do (I know he’s half Cuban) when they don’t have to actually deal with anything. It was all just poorly thought out, even though I’m sure he meant well. Never should have gone down that road in the first place. 
 

I appreciate your comments, @Sammo~!

I remember that scrum and I was there live that weekend. And those words were definitely sticking in my mind when he was trying to push that garbage promo onto viewers on Wednesday night. It was embarrassing.

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6 minutes ago, TheVileOne said:

I remember that scrum and I was there live that weekend. And those words were definitely sticking in my mind when he was trying to push that garbage promo onto viewers on Wednesday night. It was embarrassing.

Straight up what was in my head was “Penta says he’s gonna break your arm so you can’t hold your baby girl!” 
 

My wife and I were there as well. And she didn’t like it! She hates wrestling. But I knew exactly how hot the crowd would be and figured it would be fun for anyone. I was wrong but she’s a good sport. 

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10 wins is 10 wins is 10 wins.  What is the problem?  IF fans/non-fan viewing audience don’t watch at least some matches from Dark/Diet Dark how do you know they haven’t earned their rank/wins?

There are usually pretty good matches on days besides Wednesday/4 Sundays a year.   AEW could fudge things a little by making a Top 5 ranking for the TNT Title.  We could get into problems with someone being “first among equals” with separate rankings if they added another contender list.

AEW theoretically wants to be different from the last twenty years.  Endless rematches are on the other channel.  Super pushes like Jinder or JBL don’t come out of obscurity to win the top titles.

In boxing the champ fights someone besides the most obvious challenger in a majority of their defenses.  AEW has only had shows for two years.  They don’t have a history to draw from in feuds or rivalries.  There are only so many upper Midcard or higher.  If you aren’t Moxley, MIRO, Archer, Cody, MJF, Jericho, Hangman, Kingston, Christian,  Darby, Omega or Rey Fenix you have less than zero chance at the AEW World Title.  Split that list in half if you want that match in doubt at all.  
 

The rankings are what they are.  The Top 5 is just giving guys that aren’t considered stars by the masses who need some storyline credibility.

AEW could fix a lot of things.  The Top 5s are fine like they are.  Hopefully, if the Blondes can win this week the tag division will open up a bit more.  They will definitely lose star caliber title matches.  If the Bucks lose they can have a lot more parity after you get past YBs and FTR.  Of the thirtyish regular working tag teams there is the top two and then maybe at least ten more teams that would be good challengers.  FTR and the YBs need to put some teams over or they will always be the only full time teams worth the gold.

Edited by Ryan Faulconer
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3 hours ago, matt925 said:

Straight up what was in my head was “Penta says he’s gonna break your arm so you can’t hold your baby girl!” 
 

My wife and I were there as well. And she didn’t like it! She hates wrestling. But I knew exactly how hot the crowd would be and figured it would be fun for anyone. I was wrong but she’s a good sport. 

You should make it up to her by taking her to see KA or The Beatles LOVE the next time you're in Vegas. 

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