AEW All Out 2022

[Supremo]

I’ll never forgive Punk for doing this and distracting us from the real headline, which is Kenny Omega billing himself as, “Kevin Nash’s new favourite wrestler.”

I suspect all the EVPs have been on the phone with Cody.

Edited September 5, 2022 by Supremo

[d-d-d-dAz]

3 minutes ago, Supremo said:

I’ll never forgive Punk for doing this and distracting us from the real headline, which is Kenny Omega billing himself as, “Kevin Nash’s new favourite wrestler.”

I suspect all the EVPs have been on the phone with Cody.

I rarely say this, but everyone should listen to Jericho and just say less.

It’s needlessly fucking distracting from what is a quality wrestling company (on the whole).

It’ll be hard for big Tony if he’s forced to choose between his first borns and his new daddy. I suspect I know how he’ll pick.

https://wrestlingnews.co/.amp/aew-news/report-very-important-names-in-aew-threatening-to-walk-out-over-cm-punk-comments-during-media-scrum

What a load of eejits. Say less either to the media or publically.

 

[DavidB6937]

So the MJF situation took away from Wardlow, and now the Punk situation takes away from MJF. Madness.

[RedRooster]

10 minutes ago, Duke said:

Punk riding an adrenaline rush and losing control of himself a bit there. The mask slips again.

Far be it from me to defend Punk, but does it really? It’s not like he ever tries to hide who he is. Tony Khan should haven known what he was signing in Punk, but is seemingly too passive to keep control of a toxic situation.

On to the show…Clash at the Castle had me eager to watch more wrestling, and this led to me buying the show quite late. I’m glad I did. While it wasn’t the best AEW show, it was certainly one of the most interesting.

Firstly, the Casino Ladder Match. I didn’t like it too much; there was an awful lot of wrestlers waiting around, inexplicably not going for the poker chip. I really liked the ending though, and I think they might have made a mistake by rushing to the reveal at the end of the show. A whodunnit is generally a lot of fun, but I don’t think it’s ever been done in the context of a mystery number one contender, leading a dangerous stable. 

Sure, it might have leaked that it was MJF, but as with Punk’s Rampage debut, you never really know until you do. A title match where CM Punk faces The Joker could have been really interesting.

That said, this will probably still be a lot of fun.

It’ll be interesting to see if the reactions to The Acclaimed and Swerve in their Glory carry over to shows elsewhere. Much against my expectations, this was my favourite match of the entire weekend. If I was Tony Khan, I’d have been tempted to call an audible and have The Acclaimed win…but that might have been a bad call. Play it right, and you have a red-hot heel act in Lee and Strickland. That act versus FTR at Full Gear could be a real money match.

It was a risky move to do what they did with Christian/Jungle Boy, but it worked for me. Not only did it help with the pacing of the show, but it was entirely logical. If you paid money to see Christian get his comeuppance, I could see why you’d feel short-changed, but if you want to get everything that you can out of JB/Perry, I think repackaging him and distancing him from the Jurassic Express era makes a lot of sense. I also think there’s a lot of money in this version of Christian. A feud with Wardlow could be really fun. 

The trios title match was a lot of fun, but I’m still not convinced that there’s any need for it to exist. It was nice to see the Dark Order get an opportunity to shine, though. 

Moxley/Punk was decent, but I’m not convinced that taking the title from Moxley was the right idea, even with MJF’s return on the horizon. I strongly suspect that this will culminate in an Austin/Hart style role reversal, whether they want it to or not.

[TheDude]

Here's hoping sexy MJF makes Pepsiman cry and he leaves. AEW doesn't need his toxuc bullshit. 

[Jacko]

This company will tear itself apart from the inside the way it is currently going, bloated roster so going to be disgruntled wrestlers,massive egos back there and seems like some fucking assholes in the back to.

Massive shame as bell to bell it’s an amazing show with some of the biggest names in the business currently just feels like they are teetering on the edge of no return.

[Nick James]

MJF as the Breaking the Magicians Code chap was great and revealing it in a video rather than an attack was genius. Made him feel like an absolute megastar and made the Joker gimmick actually useful for once. I was convinced the Joker was going to be Adam Cole. 

Jade Cargill looked phenomenal. Such a look. 

Imagine watching WWE not pull the trigger on a red hot crowd with Drew, then being in the same position, but opting for Keith Lee and Swerve instead. There's no reason the tag titles couldn't have been switched. 

I honestly thought the fellow that did Bryan's theme was the guy from the Trustbusters. Instead, he was a short MGK. Another example of the wrong guy winning, Bryan feels a bit Luke warm these days. You're guaranteed a banger of a match, but there's not much stock in him.

EDIT: Just seen the Punk non-sense. There's no way that it's a work, not a chance. If it goes the way it's looking like going, it could be that bringing Punk in may have been the worst decision of all. I can't see The Bucks being happy about being called out and blamed for it all and then with that, you take Omega with it as well. 

Tony is in quite the predicament now. I really don't envy his situation, what does he do now? Does he punish Punk and potentially run the risk of him taking his ball home? Does he ignore it and run the risk of The Bucks and Omega doing the same? 

I agree, Punk doesn't have a mask. He has always been and come across as a prick in real life, but he was being pricks to the McMahons before so he was the anti-hero. Now hes being a prick to Uncle Tony so it'll be interesting to see how it plays out.

Edited September 5, 2022 by Nick James

[Duke]

25 minutes ago, RedRooster said:

Far be it from me to defend Punk, but does it really? It’s not like he ever tries to hide who he is. Tony Khan should haven known what he was signing in Punk, but is seemingly too passive to keep control of a toxic situation.

Yeah, I think so. When he first arrived he was trying to be the happy warrior, but that's dropped over the last few months and he's reminded everyone who he actually is, a less athletic Cristiano Ronaldo who thinks he's Wolverine.

Your second sentence is bang on though, it does feel like Tony lacks the leadership skills to actually manage this situation. Vince would've taken him aside and told him about how he wants to eat people in wheelchairs by now.

Quote

It feels like the company is going through a period of growing pains, and I suspect it’ll get messier before it gets cleaner.

I think this is true, but I'd go farther and say wrestling is going through some growing pains, at least with how it handles media and outside attention. The previous norm of "tell no one anything" doesn't work in 2022 (and creates environments that cover up for people like Vince and Johnny Ace) but now they've over-corrected to leaking all sorts of crap.

Acting like Punk did should be grounds for suspension, but he won't get it because he's the champion and they've just set up the programme, so he now knows he can say what he wants, like Scott Steiner in 99.

Edited September 5, 2022 by Duke

[FLips]

I was all ready to talk about the PPV (which was OK) but that Punk thing is bizarre. You really do get the idea that since Cody left and they bloated the roster with ex WWE/NXT guys that the wheels are really starting to fall off. 
The TV has been inconsistent and in some cases downright bad for months now, and in the space of a couple of weeks to go from having to do a talent meeting because your wrestlers are all miserable and going into business for themselves on TV to then having your world champ sat with the owner of the company and just burying wrestlers and the EVPs is insane.
For all of his millions of faults can you ever imagine Vince McMahon sat there with Punk while they sat and shoot buried the roster and staff? He wouldn't have dared. 

Punk in WWE was one of the best things in recent wrestling history but Punk in AEW has been a burden because Tony Khan is too scared to rein his shit attitude in so he's just a grumpy and abrasive old man shooting on people in scrums and getting injured. I really hope when his contract is off they collectively decide to bin him off.

Poor Colt Cabana as well, the lad hasn't been heard from in forever and his name is getting slapped about left and right. He tried slinking off to ROH in silence and still got dragged into it.

[Guest]

Punks a fanny of a man. First having a pop on tv at hangman who couldn’t hit back, and now at Colt who can’t either. There’s nothing big or clever in that. At least someone has finally asked the question about Colt, been bubbling too long waiting on it coming up 

[d-d-d-dAz]

Given Tony said ‘I should have stopped Nick, that’s on me’ it doesn’t feel as clear cut as Punk being wrong AND an arsehole. He might just be being an arsehole.

It’s not completely unbelievable Punk is right more than he’s wrong, but then just handles situations in a toxic manner. Wrestling is so full of bellends, it’s perfectly possibly he’s been treated badly by this many people.

That said, it doesn’t matter. You can’t just dump on people in that way, forgetting your grievance it just distracts from people like Mox and MJF, who you’ve supposedly got no issue with and should be the talk of the wrestling world right now.

I think Punk was on to something when he said about the place being ran by children, but I’m not sure he’s got a seat on the grown-up’s side.

Edited September 5, 2022 by d-d-d-dAz

[The Gaffer]

Fine way for Punk to cap off what should be a career night for him, joining New Jack and the Honky-Tonk Man in the shoot meltdown hall of fame. All those presser clips are missing is the RF Video backdrop. It's like something I stumbled over on TWC back in 2005 at 1 in the morning. 

Anyway on a brighter note...MJF is the man! 

Edited September 5, 2022 by Gay as FOOK

[Supremo]

There’s an alternative universe where Moxley wins the main event and the press conference is boring as fuck, with the founders of the company not threatening to walk.

[Matthew]

I’m intrigued what would be the negative people would have clung on to, if that media scrum (which cannot be defended at all) hadn’t happened.

Great show, great story arc with the main title, and the MJF return was great, but then I love the guy anyway.

[d-d-d-dAz]

2 minutes ago, Matthew said:

I’m intrigued what would be the negative people would have clung on to, if that media scrum (which cannot be defended at all) hadn’t happened.

Great show, great story arc with the main title, and the MJF return was great, but then I love the guy anyway.

I’m not sure there was one (though the video of Sammy dumping Ruby on her head gets worst the more you watch it).

That title match was superb, a great fight and that presser should have been about how great Mox was and how much he’s looking forward to beating MJF up.