By Jason Powell, ProWrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)
AEW Dynamite Hits
Samoa Joe, Powerhouse Hobbs, and Katsuyori Shibata vs. AEW World Champion Hangman Page, Eddie Kingston, and Hook for the AEW Trios Titles: It was refreshing to see AEW run a basic angle that turned this into a title match. The occasional non-title or eliminator match is fine, but high stakes more interesting. Case in point, the best-of-three series to determine the advantages in Blood & Guts matches made each of those matches more compelling than they would have been without stakes. The actual match went well and did an effective job of setting up Page vs. Hobbs in a Last Man Standing match for next week.
Samoa Joe confronts Tony Schiavone: This really needed to happen after Hangman Page masqueraded as Schiavone last week. Hopefully, there’s more to come, as it would be awkward if Joe lets this go with no storyline explanation. Nevertheless, it was a good show-opening segment that recapped last week’s big angle and set the table for the AEW Trios Title match later in the show.
Willow Nightingale and Harley Cameron vs. Mercedes Mone and Athena in an AEW Women’s Tag Team Title tournament first-round match: So much for the expected tournament finals of Mone and Athena vs. Toni Storm and Mina Shirakawa. The tournament started with a minor upset last week and an even bigger upset this week. No complaints. It’s good to see teams consisting of wrestlers who are not pushed as top singles acts being featured prominently as tag teams.
Claudio Castagnoli vs. Orange Cassidy in a Blood & Guts Advantage Battle: Castagnoli and Cassidy work well together. It was nice to see a clean finish, even if it did bring the live crowd down temporarily. This match benefited from being the first of the men’s Blood & Guts Advantage Battles, because it felt like either wrestler could win. In general, AEW did a really nice job of dedicating the majority of this episode to building up next week’s Blood & Guts show.
Darby Allin vs. Daniel Garcia in a Blood & Guts Advantage Battle: Conversely, the outcome of this match felt predictable, as it seemed highly likely that Allin would win to even up the series and force a deciding bout on Collision. Allin going over was the right call, but it’s sad that Garcia went from struggling as a singles babyface to playing the same role that Wheeler Yuta was already playing in the Death Riders.
Megan Bayne vs. Mina Shirakawa in a Blood & Guts Advantage Battle: It’s unfortunate that Queen Aminata had to bow out of this match and next week’s Blood & Guts, but Shirakawa is a logical replacement. Bayne beating Shirakawa to win the match while Marina Shafir attacked Toni Storm served as effective hype for Blood & Guts, and a likely showdown match in the AEW Women’s Tag Team Title tournament.
AEW Dynamite Misses
AEW National Championship: For the love of God. Women’s Tag Team Titles? Cool. Another men’s singles championship? Why? Tony Schiavone said it had been over 40 years since a national championship title had appeared on TBS. Why would anyone under age 50 give a shit? I loved the Crockett Era as much as the next old guy, but I can’t even imagine how I would have reacted when I started watching wrestling if the AWA was obsessed with things that happened 40 years earlier. Worse yet, they also started talking about the lineage of the NWA National Championship as if it somehow carries over to AEW, even though Billy Corgan reintroduced the NWA National Championship in 2018. It gets worse. I asked Tony Khan during a recent media call if the creation of the AEW Unified Championship meant that we’d seen the last of the AEW Continental and AEW International Championships. I was disappointed when he said no. Sure enough, if you look at the AEW roster page, Kazuchika Okada is actually listed as three times as the AEW Unified Champion, the AEW Continental Champion, and the AEW International Champion. Throw in the AEW World Championship and the TNT Title, and the addition of the new championship will bring the count up to six men’s singles championships. Again, why? Who wants this? Khan has to know that every time he adds a secondary title, it lessens the value of the other secondary championships. I’ve reached the point where the AEW World Championship is the only AEW men’s singles championship that I even take seriously. The rest of the titles are interchangeable trinkets. What’s next, Khan introducing an AEW Western States Heritage Title? And, yes, whataboutists, I have repeatedly complained about the absurd number of title belts on NXT television these days, so spare me your tribal feedback.
(Jason Powell, founder and editor of ProWrestling.net, has covered pro wrestling full-time dating back to 1997. He hosts a weekly podcast, Pro Wrestling Boom, and also appears regularly on the Wade Keller Pro Wrestling Podcast. Reach him via email at dotnetjason@gmail.com and on social media via @prowrestlingnet.bsky.social or x.com/prowrestlingnet. For his full bio and information on this website, click here.)
At their peak popularity, Aew had 4 titles. So somehow the answer to bad attentance/ratings = more titles.
It’s not ‘tribal feedback’ to suggest your negativity is FAR seen FAR more towards AEW than WWE.
Sadly you’ll just say “that’s not true!’, because somehow that is all you think proves you’re not biased against AEW and/or towards WWE.
Sure.
BTW what was said about how long it’s been since that title was on TBS was true. And maybe stop believing how much YOU care or don’t care about something is how everyone else feels?
JUST a suggestion
I have a suggestion for you. When you have no defense for something as asinine as a company having six men’s singles title belts, stop playing the bias card. You’ve done this for far too long, and for two different companies now. You cried about a bias against TNA in the weird manifestos you sent to me and other staff members. And now you cry about a bias against AEW. I want every company to succeed, whereas you cheerlead for whoever the top challenger brand is because you don’t like WWE. You are living proof of something I’ve said numerous times – the first people who cry bias are typically the most tribal.
hmmm. so I’m guessing National Tag team champions is out of the question in your mind, and I would surmise that you are not celebrating Giulia surpassing Chelsea green as the longest reigning us women’s champion either-LOL.
In all seriousness, I liked your hit list and also agree that AEW didn’t need another mens title, but as a wrestling fan I’m not going to get up in arms about it, because in the bigger picture it really doesn’t matter and probably doesn’t to the general public at large either, at least in a way it would make them watch or not watch, in my opinion.
I would argue that your bias is based more on what you like or dislike regardless of the company and across the board is pretty equal.That being said I don’t think anything MJOSEPH said was out of bounds or tribalistic, rather he stated an opinion(which is his right to have) and offered a pretty nice suggestion at the end of his post, which I think we all could learn from.
I’m only saying it because i don’t want to see a repeat of what happened a couple of weeks ago with the greatest one, who I rarely agree with and generally don’t like the way he expresses his opinions, but I hesitate there because I really enjoy the passion he has for the type of product he loves(even if i don’t like the other stuff), and on that night he was the only one adding any sort of valuable contribution while being bullied relentlessly, and I’d rather live in a world where everyone’s opinion counts for something even if we don’t always agree with them.
There’s a breaking point when it comes to titles. AEW has reached a point where they have so many secondary men’s singles titles that none feel special to me. Have you noticed that despite all the talk about the negatives of this new championship, no one seems to be asking the first question typically asked – Who is going to win the title?
As a fan, you can react however you want. My job is to give my honest opinion. I am passionate about wrestling. I get excited when I see a great show, a good match, or a cool angle. I get annoyed, and I express it when I see things I consider foolish or bad for business.
When it comes to Angry Mike, it’s been well over a decade of him crying bias. This started with him losing his shit over TNA criticism, even when that company was at its dirt worst. He sent long, angry manifesto emails to me and various staff members. There were no counterarguments. It was long, angry rants about how we were all biased. I’m not sure when he finally jumped off the TNA train, but this behavior resumed here in the comment section with AEW. He hates WWE. That’s his right, but stop calling the rest of the world biased just because they don’t share your hatred. He has also made several comments that caused him to be labeled by other readers as racist and misogynistic. I have encouraged him to seek mental help because I sincerely think he needs it.
Even putting all of that aside, I stand by what I wrote. If he or anyone disagrees with something I write, state your case. You might make me see things differently. Maybe we’ll agree to disagree. But explain why you disagree with me or a staff member’s opinion, don’t resort to crying bias when the truth is that you can’t offer a good defense. If I offer even the most minor constructive criticism of AEW, he cries bias. So while you claim that his post wasn’t tribal, over a decade of history tells me otherwise.
Finally, I don’t have empathy for anyone who constantly shits on others and then gets a taste of their own medicine. This applies to life in general and isn’t directed at anyone here, but I can’t forgive shitty people who don’t think they’ve done anything wrong. However, I am all for giving people a fresh start in most situations if they show contrition.
Anyway, I appreciate the honest feedback. Even if you still disagree with me on these matters, I hope you have a better understanding of where I’m coming from.
Jason, the reason why I take issue with the number of belts in NXT as compared to AEW is that in AEW it’s all theirs. At least in NXT it’s titles from other promotions – even if WWE is in charge of AAA and Evolve. Yes I do understand where you are coming from, but it’s not as though WWE is packing out either Raw or Smackdown with their own extra titles like AEW is. WWE has the numbers right. Each brand has one main, one secondary and one tag team for the guys, and one main and one secondary for the girls with their tag title overlapping the two brands. That’s not the case with AEW and that’s the whole problem. Corgan’s doing the same thing in the NWA and he’s not getting it any more than Khan is. It hurts the business as a whole and that irks me more than anything.
Both are problems. If so many people are walking around with title belts, then most of the titles don’t feel important, regardless of the company name on the belts.
One world title, one secondary title, one womans title, one tag team title, thats the ideal # for an entire company.
I would also argue that the more titles you have, the clearer it is you don’t know how to tell stories that are interesting without them. Titles are supposed to enhance the storytelling for any given angle, or add drama that may or may not be enough without them. When you have so many titles, nearly all your storylines have to revolve around them. That suggests to me that you’re not creative enough to tell stories that don’t need them. (I haven’t had my coffee yet so apologies if that is written terribly LOL).
This is a general criticism. I love AEW. I want to see NWA, NXT, TNA, WWE etc succeed so this is not a tribal thing for me. It’s an I-Love-Wrestling thing.