Powell’s AEW Dynamite Hit List: Beach Break with Jon Moxley vs. Samoa Joe in a cage match for the AEW World Championship, Will Ospreay and Hangman Page vs. Konosuke Takeshita and Josh Alexander

By Jason Powell, ProWrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)

AEW Dynamite Hits

Will Ospreay and Hangman Page vs. Konosuke Takeshita and Josh Alexander: The show opened with a quality tag team match that added to the tension between Ospreay and Page. One negative is that Alexander has been in AEW for just under a month, and yet there was no doubt in my mind that he’d be taking the loss for his team. Sadly, it seemed pretty obvious that Alexander went from TNA World Champion to AEW role player when he lost his AEW debut match to Page. It will be interesting to see what the final angle between Ospreay and Page will be heading into their Owen Hart Cup tournament final, which looks great on paper.

AEW Women’s Champion Toni Storm vs. Mina Shirakawa vs. Skye Blue vs. AZM in a four-way eliminator match: A quality match with a quality comeback performance from Blue following her long injury layoff. Shirakawa pinning Storm was a quick way to set up their title match at Double or Nothing.

Ricochet vs. Zach Gowen: A soft Hit. I may be in the minority on this one, but I enjoyed seeing Gowen back on television again after all these years. Better yet, it was nice to see his family there to enjoy the moment with him. Ricochet going over was the obvious call, but the match laid out to let Gowen show heart before he took the loss. Ricochet got good heat for the post-match attack, and they did a nice job of setting up a future match between him and Mark Briscoe afterward. All of that said, this match probably would have been better suited for Collision rather than the A-show, in part because of how rushed the build was.

Bobby Lashley and Shelton Benjamin vs. “Top Flight” Dante Martin and Darius Martin: A soft Hit. Dante delivered his most passionate promo to date, only to be manhandled by Lashley. The match was fine for what it was. That’s more than I can say about the lousy post-match angle that set up Dustin Rhodes and Sammy Guevara vs. Lio Rush and Action Andretti for Collision. On the bright side, they did a good job of giving viewers a hook by telling them that the MJF verdict would be coming up soon. Lashley giving MJF a thumbs up was a mild surprise, but I’m guessing things fall apart next week during the contract signing. By the way, MJF’s character is rich, so why would he have AEW’s resident ambulance chaser as his attorney?

AEW Dynamite Misses

Jon Moxley vs. Samoa Joe in a steel cage match for the AEW World Championship: The majority of the match was a Hit. There was one lousy spot where they had a rope break, even though there are no disqualifications in a cage match. What would have happened if either wrestler had blown off the referee’s five count? Are we to believe there would have been a disqualification in a cage match? The bigger issue is that they completely lost me by going with a shit finish. I like Gabe Kidd’s work. I’m fine with bringing in Kidd early to set up something at Forbidden Door. I just despise that modern bookers can’t be bothered to book clean finishes in cage matches. It’s simple. If you can’t deliver a clean finish, don’t book a cage match. The post-match angle set up an Anarchy in the Arena match for Double Or Nothing. And that would normally be fine, even though I can take or leave the gimmick match, but the idea of having Moxley on one team as opposed to having him defend the title on the pay-per-view is disappointing.

Daniel Garcia, Nigel McGuinness, and Stokely Hathaway: If you listened closely, that was the sound of a live crowd that consisted mostly of fans who aren’t watching AEW Collision. They reacted with merely a polite round of applause both times that Garcia brought up McGuinness teaming with him against FTR. Does Matt Menard take offense to Garcia asking McGuinness to be his partner and finally turn on Garcia to put an end to the lamest alliance in AEW history?