Timbo Slice

Because the talk wasn’t about Hansen’s skill, but his recklessness. The general consensus is that if a wrestler is good in-ring, shit gets overlooked, but they aren’t mutually exclusive. Nobody said that because he was reckless, he sucked. It was that he was reckless. More like the other side of the coin than shitting on him.

Page/Danielson is a lock for December 15, which seems really soon and seems like a big issue given how Danielson has been booked. Tony isn’t a hot shotter, so it’s gotta be Page winning, yeah?

Meltzer has always preferred style over substance and a guy with Ibushi’s arc fits right into his narrative. And there are a ton of folks who think Bryan’s decade in the WWE was a waste of time.

You know how you get around the issue of jobbing out guys on their debut? You give them squash matches against folks who can take an L. Wild thought, I know.

Janela’s strengths were always outside the ring. And him being able to go enough to make other folks is as valuable an asset in the business today as anyone else.

There was nothing that could be done, to be honest. They didn’t want to run a super Indy, they used COVID as cover to make changes in desperation, and they don’t have the voices backstage to do something worthwhile that isn’t Vince or Bruce-led. I’m surprised it took three months for it to happen.

QT is also from Chicago and Punk knows him well so this is a make good. People reading too much into this.

None of those are really “major” though, to be fair.

Basically: “Cowboy Shit.”

FULL CARD: AEW Championship: Kenny Omega (c) vs. Hangman Page. AEW Championship Eliminator Tournament finals: Bryan Danielson vs. Miro. CM Punk vs. Eddie Kingston. AEW Women's Championship: Britt Baker vs. Tay Conti. AEW Tag Team Championships: Lucha Brothers vs. FTR. Darby Allin vs. MJF. Falls count anywhere: Christian Cage and Jurassic Express vs. Adam Cole and The Young Bucks. Street fight: The Inner Circle (Chris Jericho, Jake Hager, Sammy Guevara, Santana and Ortiz) vs. Ethan Page, Scorpio Sky, Junior dos Santos, Andrei Arlovski and Dan Lambert. Pac and Cody Rhodes vs. Malakai Black and Andrade El Idolo. Preshow match: Nyla Rose and Jamie Hayter vs. Hikaru Shida and Thunder Rosa. I know Coach Tony hates non-finishes but you HAVE to do it with Kingston/Punk.

A go-home show for a PPV that almost seems like a letdown of sorts. The go-home show, not the PPV.

For me, it’s always come down to tone and pace for Kenny. He talks too fast and it doesn’t allow for folks to catch on to his stuff sometimes.

The idea of melodrama always comes down to delivery more than content. When someone says something is melodramatic, it’s because it’s DELIVERED as such, and Kenny isn’t a good promo unless he’s being a dick, and even then that’s generous. And when one guy is like that, it’s hard for the other guy to come off good, too.

I hate Indy standoffs but Moriarty and Dante just killed it.

Ishii is working some US dates so yeah, he’ll be showing up at some point. Okada coming in should be a huge deal.

I think it’s just the start between the two of them. It’s too hot to burn off so quick. But when Tony straps up Eddie for the big one, I think it will be bigger even than Hangman. At this point, he has to win it.

I’ve been going through a lot of personal shit along the lines of what Eddie has been experiencing and I have tears as I’m typing this. I never got into as dark a spot as he did, but I coped with food and alcohol a bit too much lately and the anxiety and panic I’ve been experiencing has really affected me severely. But that article made me feel hopeful by the end. I’ve never had more respect for a wrestler in my life.

AEW’s house style is entirely predicated on the idea that folks are tape hounds and will go back to look for Easter Eggs while peppering high spots in to wow the live audience.

Yeah, that’s hiding behind your gimmick. No need to even have your gimmick go that far.

Don’t think you want to use the term “groom” with Ol’ Party Marty.

Cary, more than likely.

Naw, they should absolutely Brock Lesnar SummerSlam 2002 him.

Danielson vs. Solow is not what I would have guessed for Bryan’s Dark appearance.

AEW seems a lot more harmonious, so even with Andy there, I don’t get why AEW would take a chance on someone who would cause such strife from the start.

Because there’s more to a match than the moves and the action. That’s what I meant by the base assumptions holding too much water. Dragon has had matches that are very much catnip to these fans. He’s played up the striking and showing a diverse move set because that’s the expectation of him at this point. The idea of him being unleashed from the shackles of WWE. It does him a disservice for what he DID do in the company even with both the implied and actual limitations placed on him. To lean on that as the main reason his work in AEW has been so well-received is flimsy at best, and confirmation bias at worst. Meanwhile, Punk has undoubtedly worked a smarter style than Dragon has, and what everyone has perceived as issues with him have actually been strengths and a model for match efficiency. In all four matches, he knew as soon as he had his best shot to end it, he ended it. Darby or Sydal trying to speed him up later in the match? Better figure out a way to hit the GTS. Hobbs’ strength making things worse the closer they got to that 15 minute mark with Hook looming? Have to swing for the fences at the best opening he could get. Knee taken apart by Garcia because he’s at the absolute top of his game? Pull out the piledriver and the Vice and don’t look back. Dragon has been more performative and has had points in his matches that really scream fan service (especially in the Suzuki match), whereas Punk has really leaned into coming across as a guy who is probably way over his head and is getting by on guile alone, even if he has a rep for being a GOAT candidate. I know that fans have been more conditioned to a wrestling style much more like Bryan’s than Punk’s since Punk left, but historically, the way Punk is working is in some ways a better brand of pro wrestling than just being able to do what you want when you want, even if the guy being unleashed is the best wrestler ever. It’s just incredibly fascinating to me and is why I brought it up in the first place, because I’m hearing more about the settings being more influential than the work itself, and that’s not nearly as compelling to me.