DavidB6937 Posted January 2 Share Posted January 2 HAPPY NEW YEAR! Well, 2023 was quite something wasn't it? Not exactly the year anyone saw coming. We still had some of the best wrestling TV ever. We still moaned about consistency. We still moaned about ROH sometimes. It took all year but finally the assumption that Andrade was on the way out came true. Surprisingly QT Marshall left. And WWE made another big signing in Brian Pillman Jr. TAKE THAT TONY! We ended the year with Jade Cargill and CM Punk in WWE and Adam Copeland in AEW and his buddy Christian arguably being the best thing about the company and it's all a bit crazy out there but it's great! Who knew Toni Storm would turn out to be so entertaining? I'm so sorry to Bryan Danielson for ever doubting him. Where does MJF end up? At least we know who the Devil is now. 2024 starts with Joe as champ. Eddie Kingston actually winning stuff. We still wait for Mercedes Moné. Ospreay officially becomes All Elite. Who else does? And will TK wear that hat while he signs their contract? Sting finally retires this year. Sadly with Ric Flair by his side. Say what you want about AEW and TK but their existence has made the wrestling business a hell of a lot more fun and exciting and 2024 should be another great year. This Wednesday so far.. International Title - Orange Cassidy (c) vs Dante Martin Mariah May's in-ring debut   Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loki Posted January 2 Share Posted January 2 2023 was the year when the goodwill from AEW's creation finally wore off, both for fans and for the wrestlers. Â It's a fantastic thing to have a second major wrestling company in the US, it's good for fans and great for wrestlers. Â And AEW was born from the seeds of the Elite, their friendship and their super-indy appeal. Â It was all stories about old friends being given a payday, dream matchups, cross-promotional excitement, and so on. But that initial burst of enthusiasm was only going to last so long before the company had to transition into being a genuine long-term competitor to WWE, and unfortunately for AEW 2023 was the year WWE really began its turnaround under Hunter. Â Their product is fresh again, exciting, and the new regime is attracting major talent back to the company. Which leaves AEW struggling to find a new identity in 2024. Â It's no longer the "all friends together" super indy - I think the CM Punk saga put paid to that. Â And once you've done the various combinations of The Elite wrestling with or against each other, you have to move on, which seems to be where we're at now. Â Some of the big name WWE signings really haven't panned out, but what AEW does have is an absolute TON of younger homegrown talent, some of whom have been waiting a long time for their moment to shine. 2024 needs to be the year of change, of solidifying what AEW is going to be for the next half-decade, who they are going to put their faith in, and how the organisation is going to run. Â IMO they need to allow a bunch more early-era talent to leave, put their faith in the Hobbes, Wardlow, MJF, Swerves etc. and consider jettisoning ROH entirely to be its own separate promotion. They also do need to address the growing perception that they are the natural home of sex offenders. Â I know we joke about it, but they really do have too many problematic characters around, and WWE has put a lot of effort into cleaning up its image in recent years so AEW could easily become perceived as the worst working environment, which would be a pity considering its original aspirations to be the "good" wrestling organisation. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members LaGoosh Posted January 2 Paid Members Share Posted January 2 (edited) Wehay! Another year of the best, worst, most exciting and most frustrating wrestling tv show ever. I think 2024 has to be a turning point. What they've been doing works, but only to a point and isn't really sustainable. Hopefully this year they go all in on all the new, fresh and high potential young talent they've got, focus on maintaining momentum and make sure that established stars with lots left to offer like Hangman Page are booked regularly and appropriately. Build, build, build. Don't sign any new male talent unless a real can't miss, high potential talent becomes available. Definitely don't sign any ex-WWE guys. Sign top female talent from the indies/Japan. Build a hoss division and book big guys as big guys. I hope they just ignore WWE and just do their own thing to the best of their ability. I hate WWE's current product and it's not what I want from pro wrestling at all. Hopefully AEW can just stick with being AEW and realising that being different is their key selling point. Most of all, bin off Jericho, Flair and don't let Tony tweet. EDIT: and bring back the rankings! Orange Cassidy vs Dante Martin will be a banger and a good start to the year. Edited January 2 by LaGoosh Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Healys Chutney Spoon Posted January 2 Share Posted January 2 Just for reference of where the end of 2024 ends up, we start with the following champions:  AEW mens champion - Samoa Joe TNT champion - Christian Cage International Champion- Orange Cassidy Continental champion/ROH champion - Eddie Kingston AEW tag team champions - Big Bill/Ricky Starks AEW trios champions- The Acclaimed&Billy Gunn  Women's champion - Toni Storm TBS champion - Julia Hart  Be interesting to see who is the belt holders come Dec 31st. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Kamran Posted January 2 Paid Members Share Posted January 2 For those that subscribe to AEW Plus via Fite/Triller TV, I got the below email today: Quote Your AEW Plus will change from $6.99/month to $7.99/month on 01/16/2024.You can continue your subscription at the new price by clicking on Continue Subscription button below.If you do not update your subscription, it will not renew on 01/16/2024.  Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WyattSheepMask Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 (edited) 1 hour ago, Kamran said: For those that subscribe to AEW Plus via Fite/Triller TV, I got the below email today:  They just cancelled mine without warning. To be honest I might leave it for a bit any way, I’ve not been upto date with Dynamite for a while and only watch Collision on a case by case basis as it is. I’ll keep up to date through results/reports but might give it a rest until after Revolution Edited January 3 by WyattSheepMask Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DavidB6937 Posted January 3 Author Share Posted January 3 Actually most interested in listening to Christian out of those three.. Â Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Lorne Malvo Posted January 3 Paid Members Share Posted January 3 Garcia vs Swerve is an odd choice of match. Right now, both of those could do without a loss. Garcia getting the hard-fought loss after winning his previous two matches might feel like a bit of a backwards step. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members JLM Posted January 3 Paid Members Share Posted January 3 Yeah that did jump out as some odd booking. I’m assuming there will be HOB nonsense involved so they don’t have to commit to either clean finish here. Would rather just have Danny beat someone clean though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members I Bent My Wookie Posted January 3 Paid Members Share Posted January 3 Are we expecting them to shit a brick and try and get something in place for this evening? WWE has Rock and CM Punk back and an announcement teased for tomorrow morning in America for the press to get behind and AEW is coming off a PPV saved by 2 or 3 matches, covered in all the chaos and shit from Jericho and Tony's stupid hat and the antagonist and protagonist of their long running big reveal both being injured and unable to really progress it any further. Where are we at on WWE releases being able to work for other companies from the last wave of sackings? Do they push to get an 11th hour deal with Mone done so that she can debut tonight? It just feels with how much they are hyping it's 5 years of AEW and the first show of 2024, there's absolutely nothing major in the air from Saturday that can continue forward. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andrew "the ref" coyne Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 (edited) 18 minutes ago, Shy Dad said: Are we expecting them to shit a brick and try and get something in place for this evening? WWE has Rock and CM Punk back and an announcement teased for tomorrow morning in America for the press to get behind and AEW is coming off a PPV saved by 2 or 3 matches, covered in all the chaos and shit from Jericho and Tony's stupid hat and the antagonist and protagonist of their long running big reveal both being injured and unable to really progress it any further. Where are we at on WWE releases being able to work for other companies from the last wave of sackings? Do they push to get an 11th hour deal with Mone done so that she can debut tonight? It just feels with how much they are hyping it's 5 years of AEW and the first show of 2024, there's absolutely nothing major in the air from Saturday that can continue forward. Joey Samoey is my world champion. That's enough for me. #Don'tCallItAComback #MommaSaidKnockYouOut Edited January 3 by andrew "the ref" coyne Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members I Bent My Wookie Posted January 3 Paid Members Share Posted January 3 4 minutes ago, andrew "the ref" coyne said: Joey Samoey is my world champion. That's enough for me. #Don'tCallItAComback #MommaSaidKnockYouOut Oh absolutely the reason I'll get up at 6 to watch it before work, skipping through dregs and adverts I'll be done by half 7, but you have to imagine there's something up their sleeve. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andrew "the ref" coyne Posted January 3 Share Posted January 3 Just now, Shy Dad said: Oh absolutely the reason I'll get up at 6 to watch it before work, skipping through dregs and adverts I'll be done by half 7, but you have to imagine there's something up their sleeve. New challenger comes out... immediately regrets it. Long live the true tribal chief. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Lorne Malvo Posted January 3 Paid Members Share Posted January 3 Â 26 minutes ago, Shy Dad said: Are we expecting them to shit a brick and try and get something in place for this evening? WWE has Rock and CM Punk back and an announcement teased for tomorrow morning in America for the press to get behind and AEW is coming off a PPV saved by 2 or 3 matches, covered in all the chaos and shit from Jericho and Tony's stupid hat and the antagonist and protagonist of their long running big reveal both being injured and unable to really progress it any further. Where are we at on WWE releases being able to work for other companies from the last wave of sackings? Do they push to get an 11th hour deal with Mone done so that she can debut tonight? It just feels with how much they are hyping it's 5 years of AEW and the first show of 2024, there's absolutely nothing major in the air from Saturday that can continue forward. I really hope they don't shit the bed just because Luke Hobbs showed up on Raw. The best thing AEW can do right now is keep their heads down, so to speak, and just focus on creating good TV with a lot of momentum and an emphasis on their young hungry talent. Knee-jerk signings and rushed angles to combat WWE having The Rock and Punk on their shows won't be a good thing in the long-run. Besides, whose on the market right now who could match up to those two? Ziggler suddenly appearing isn't going to put a dent in WWE's momentum. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members I Bent My Wookie Posted January 3 Paid Members Share Posted January 3 6 minutes ago, Lorne Malvo said: Besides, whose on the market right now who could match up to those two? Obviously not on the same name level at all, but Mone would get the wrestling world talking and try and take some of the stink off the weekend. It would be a major coup for AEW if she has been chatting with WWE and they couldn't get it over the finish line. It won't make any major network news or do anything in the social media numbers close to Rock or Punk's return but it would directly be a "those at the top of their game right now want to work for us" that you feel like Khan is interested in parading. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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