Go2Sleep

I mean Matt owns all the Broken Universe stuff so why not. A clean-shaven Wheeler Yuta cosplaying young Steamboat would be amazing. It's one of those things that walks the fine line between pure wrestlecrap and innovative storytelling on a big stage, but I think all parties could unironically pull it off.

Yeah, but Sting has been in the "part time, special attraction, smoke and mirrors match only" role for years now. As good as he is in that role, I wouldn't expect everyone his age (or especially older) to be able to pull off the same thing. Age and injuries hit everyone different. All in all, I think this card looks pretty good. I think TK is crazy for running Backlash a week after Mania, but the card in a vacuum looks fine. Mox/OC and Kenny/Takeshita are obviously gonna be good. Joe/Taylor will be a fun slugfest and hopefully Hobbs/Miro will match that intensity. Darby is gonna bump like a madman and make Luchasarurus' offense look great. Stat/Ruby is a nice match-up where they each get to work with someone on the same level. MJF and Cole get to do their routine. Even if they can't deliver Punk/Starks in a strap match, that's still a fun card. It's just stuck in the shadow of their biggest show ever.

Decent show considering how promo heavy it was. All Out looks like a good card to me. Real solid undercard with the top acts doing tag work and other guys getting a chance to shine. Two big hoss fights with Hobbs/Miro and Joe/Taylor. Mox/OC could go either way. I could see Mox being too much for wounded OC, or OC sneaking out another win (getting 3 of the 4 BCC members in a 3 week stretch), then having Danielson be the final boss if he's close to coming back. The Steamboat thing is obviously a setup for someone else to answer the challenge. No clue who really fits if they're keeping Punk off the show. Hangman would be a good fit stylistically, but no way he's getting any support in Chicago taking Punk's spot. Wardlow could be dusted off I guess.

I think something that hasn't been touched on in this whole mess is that Jack grew up in just about the most privileged situation imaginable. It's unlikely that he's had too many people tell him no over the course of his life. Even if Punk wasn't an asshole, I doubt he would've handled any unsolicited advice or criticism well.

With Punk's involvement up in the air, I feel like Kingston vs. Mox would be a worthy match to add. I know Mox vs. OC has basically been announced, but I'd trust Eddie to cut a "Hey Jon, I know you're thinking about a title, but we got business to settle" type promo.

Punk is more 90s Shawn than 90s Hogan. Except Punk is presumably sober the entire time, so I don't know if that makes it better or worse.

I guess "suspended pending investigation" allows for the investigation to end by Saturday.

Might wanna check out UFC 203.

I never watch the scrums, and I always miss a bunch a stuff. Two weeks of ppv seems like a suboptimal setup, but whatever. It's better than the 2-day Mania structure, more like running Mania and Backlash one week apart. If they're gonna suspend Punk right before a Chicago ppv, they might as well just get rid of him altogether. The fact that they can run the United Center a few times a year is the only thing he does to help the company at this point. I don't know that Collision is gonna take that much of a hit from college football. Out of the group of people who go out of their way to watch wrestling on Saturday Night, I doubt there's a huge subset that will switch over to college football every week.

I assume All In/Out won't be on consecutive weeks next year. All Out definitely feels like AEW's first B-ppv, kind of Fast Lane-ish. I assume they'll add a bunch of stuff this week to keep it from feeling like those 2003 single-brand ppvs. Punk vs. Starks in a strap match seems pretty likely. Fenix probably gets a showcase for his trouble. Lucha Bros vs. Claudio/Yuta or PNP seems reasonable assuming they go with Mox/OC. Wouldn't be surprised if they rush MJF/Cole vs. The Kingdom so they can move on to Cole/Roddy and hopefully steer towards MJF/Punk. I think that program could probably simmer until Revolution, but with each passing week of the "real world championship" being treated like a legitimate thing with no one official saying it's worth as much as the FTW title, the more it's hurting everyone. Might as well just get right to it so Punk's fake belt can go away.

I thought this show was close to perfect. No blow-away matches like Ospreay/Omega, but everything met or exceeded expectations and this show was all about the moments and spectacle, which hit all the right notes. This was absolutely the Wrestlemania equivalent it was aiming to be. At first, I was a little eh on Aussie Open dropping the belts so hastily, but after letting it sink in, it made perfect sense. In the context of this show, MJF is the star and Cole is the co-star, so of course they go over a young team that's early in their AEW run. In the near term, Roddy is going to cost BTYBB the belts against the Kingdom soon, so it's not like MJF and Cole will be slumming it in ROH. Aussie Open can be main roster now and get programs with the Bucks, FTR, etc. The booking was right here. Jack/Hook over-delivered. The car spots were more violent than I expected earlier in the show. I mark for petty shoot comments so the real glass thing got a good laugh from me. The low blow counter by Hook was super smooth. Punk/Joe was a good choice for the opener. Once Punk stops feuding with heels and fully brings his shitbag persona to the screen, there's gonna be so much good content. The pepsi plunge was a good finishing choice since the vampire match showed neither guy is in the right shape for the GTS these days and it works as a call-back to the beginning of ROH and, well, you can understand the implications of interpreting just as a pedigree. The 6-man was stayed entertaining without the participants needing to go top gear. Good spot to sneak in a heel win with Takeshita getting some heat on Kenny. Bucks/FTR was a fittingly epic conclusion to their rivalry. Great finishing spot, and I respect everyone's awareness that FTR was the right team to go over. The Bucks still have gas in the tank, but they're on the downhill side of their careers while FTR is still at their peak. Stadium Stampede was exactly what I wanted it to be: Over the top violence with a little bit of silliness blended in. Couple of bad botches in a vacuum where guys had to nonsensically no-sell to get back in position because it was a big spot, but the action was so fast those barely registered. OC's broken glass punch was a perfect finishing spot. Great to see the Best Friends get a big moment here. Eddie was great throughout as expected. The women's 4-way did what it needed to do. Split the Outcasts, and give Saraya a career highlight. Shida isn't really ace material, but I like that they did her a solid and let her have a brief run with live crowds including a match with 80k fans. Saraya kind of got left behind when the 4HW took off, so it's great to see her get a truly huge moment for her work setting the table for the 4HW. The coffin match was the usual Sting/Darby gimmick match fun. Loved Sting throwing his whole body on Swerve to break the table. Swerve was so great selling that finish with just his hands. Jericho/Ospreay was fine, given they knew they were going to be working with opposite crowd reactions than what the feud called for. Ospreay was mega over. Hopefully TK will break open the bank to sign him next year. The trios match was the only slight booking misstep I thought, but it was still justifiable. Kinda thought HOB winning after Billy puts up a much stronger fight before coming short then retiring for real would've been a better play, but honestly, there's nothing wrong with giving The Acclaimed a moment here. The main event was perfectly cheesy in a good way. Cole not being able to stop himself from hitting the Panama Sunrise on the ref is my new favorite ridiculous destroyer spot. Obviously the Summer Slam 92 tribute was in full force with the face/face match ending in a roll-up, even if there were a ton of attitude era shenanigans along the way. MJF and Cole standing tall together is the right way to close the show. Running it back next year should be easy. Ospreay/MJF for the belt with Ospreay going over, and Jamie Hayter getting her moment. Danielson and Mercedes special attraction matches if we're so lucky. There's another 80k tickets.

I'm trying to think of matches that had more "irresistible force vs. immovable object" energy this century than the first Shield/Wyatts match. Cena/Lesnar at Extreme Rules 12 is the only one in the neighborhood from WWE I think. The first Omega/Okada match maybe?

Hopefully AEW will be able to run Wembley (or another decent sized stadium) yearly and everyone can eventually get an "All In moment."

He doesn't have to be your favorite wrestler to recognize that anyone who puts their body through the WWE meat grinder as part of a grand goal to entertain us for a couple hours a week and dies at 36 with a young family behind is a tragedy. The quality of his work is immaterial. I don't think I liked much he did on screen from like 2016 on, but this is a top five hardest hitting wrestling death for me, and it's pretty sad that's actually a category. As for his on-screen legacy, I think his career will be remembered more fondly than it was received in real time due to his tragic death, but no doubt first-run Wyatt Family was an all-time stable. He also maintained a "shit's about to get real" aura well into his career. The lights going out in the 10s is up there with Taker's gong and Brock's guitar screech. In a promotion with more creative leeway, it's easy to imagine he would've accomplished a lot more.

Holy shit, Bray is the same age as me down to the month. It's extremely chilling to hear of the death of a guy who I saw essentially his whole pro career start to finish, and less than half of the total time I've been watching wrestling.

In this case, the ramification of not being able to work on the biggest wrestling show ever is already an excessive sacrifice. I imagine at any point in Fox's career, the prospect of getting locked in a casket by Sting in front of 80,000 people would've been a dream come true for him. There's ways they can recover, but I think Jrag's point is that it's far more likely that Fox slips through the cracks instead of TK making a concentrated effort to regain the momentum he had once he gets back. The fix was pretty simple too if Fox couldn't make it. They brutalize Nick Wayne, then he shoves the bloody shirt in mom's face and gets suspended for touching a fan (trusting that at least a few people will remember that no-no list that cited touching fans and bleeding in the crowd). Then you film a segment with Mogul Embassy scrambling before Christian walks up to bail them out (for a hefty fee to be paid by Nana) for Collision. Hire me, Tony. I'll move the family to Jacksonville.

The best they could do with the situation now I think is a fired up AR Fox promo on Dynamite or Collision next week saying he wasn't 100% there due to his family situation. Then let him and Swerve recreate their LU matches at All Out, which looks like it needs even more material than a normal AEW ppv does 2 weeks out. Maybe even let Fox go over for his trouble.

The AR Fox thing sucked so bad. They had a great heel team going that should've been tag champs by the end of the year. Darby might have reason to forgive Fox, but it makes no sense for Nick Wayne to do the same. It's a testament to how good Swerve is that he's able to constantly withstand being the worst booked wrestler in the company by a lot. Christian's promo distracted from the fact that he's a total letdown as a last minute replacement. Otherwise this was a solid go-home show. Good promos from most everyone, and I actually like the change to 5 on 5 with stadium stampede. BCCPNP vs. Eddie/Penta/Best Friends is pretty tight and ties together a lot of storylines past and present. Definitely making the most of the hand they were dealt. The Cole/MJF program is hitting all the right notes and is set up to be surprising no matter how it ends. It feels like All In is WM 17 meets WM 15.

With Fenix's issues, I imagine BCC will put a sufficient beatdown on him to take him out of the match.

As a fully cynical American, I suspect Cash will get charged with whatever the Khan family tells the DA to charge him with, either directly or via the various state officials they have in their pockets.

Random thought of the day: How much better would the AEW universe be if Tony Khan was a huge Robert Rodriguez fan and decided to prop up Lucha Underground instead of ROH?

To be fair, I think it was more 45% crush, 45% graze, and 10% actually went according to plan.

That's exactly how that spot went 90% of the time in RVD's prime too.

The Bucks get a lot of shit here, but that was an impressive carry job. They moved fast when they could, but did it in a way that made it look like the Hardys could keep up. They bumped like crazy and were willing to stand in there and take stuff I wouldn't be trusting the Hardys (especially Jeff) to pull off safely in 2023. The 3D was a nice touch and I'm surprised it had Excalibur tongue-tied.

AEW's biggest problem with the women's division is that when the company took off, WWE had 90%+ of women's wrestlers worth a damn that wanted to work in the US under contract because they had been pushing women's wrestling seriously for about 4 years at that point. The fact that AEW's women's division has improved to the point it has with quite a few fresh prospects on the horizon is an accomplishment in and of itself. They have also had a lot of bad luck with people getting hurt right when they got hot (Stat, Rosa, Hayter). Not being able to ink Mone was bad too, but that might have been unrealistic expectations from fans, I don't think we really know how much she was considering it. That's not to say they couldn't have done a lot better with what they have, mind you. Opting for a second singles belt over tag belts was big miss, not just stylistically, but in terms of getting double the number of women on tv per segment. They built Jade up, then let her fizzle out. Earlier this year, we were seriously discussing the prospect of a women's blood and guts, and instead we got the same Outcasts match every week for months while the faces looked like idiots not forming even enough of an alliance for a regular trios blowoff. One thing they've done well is showcase women's hardcore wrestling in a way that even WWE hasn't, so missing B&G was a real letdown.