2023 Pro Wrestling Thread

Not sure who wrote it, but I saw an article a couple weeks ago that talked about how Wardlow was really screwed over by the MJF thing. He was red hot, then MJF pulled his disappearing act right when Wardlow was set to capitalize on the angle, and it took away a lot of the buzz. Wardlow has never fully recovered and it doesn't seem like they know what to do with him.

Moxley seems pretty damn over as a face. The Acclaimed are white hot right now. Danielson, of course.
I'm not sure what Meltzer means as a "drawing" babyface? They don't have any faces on the level of Cena or the Rock, but few talents ever reach that level.

 

Someone people tune in to see, I assume. He’s got his metrics on ratings and ticket movers — Cody for instance moved significant tickets when announced for some house show recently

I dont know, a lot of times Meltzer is FOS, but AEW has def cooled off and it struck me as interesting that they’ve kinda botched the whole Bryan thing. He doesnt want to be the face of the company, he wants to work his style with Daniel Garcia down the card and put people over….. but that’s bad for the company

Anyway Hurricane Punk is the best reason why. They debuted too close together and Punk sucked up all the oxygen. Bryan drawing/losing to Omega didn’t help either in hindsight

 

It does feel like AEW kind of blew this a bit by debuting so many guys in such a quick span of time, but, talent might have forced their hand on this anyway. Wrestlers aren't really known for their patience, and if they're signed, they probably want to be out there and work.

They also haven't had a wrestler "pop" and crossover to the mainstream, really. Rhodes was near that level, but left. Jericho is old. Orange Cassidy has kind of stalled out in the midcard.

 

Dunno if this is true, but it’s fun to speculate:



Rollins can do the Joker dancing down the steps.

Miz and Maryse dance to Berlin.

Heyman jumps into a pool while wearing a headpiece.

Rhea and Dominick sing “Neverending Story.”

 

Rhodes was near that level, but then they stuck him as a judge on that stunt show and gave him a reality show. He was on TV three nights per week (not counting reruns). Then he got that awful neck tattoo.

 

That mid-card role you mentioned is also something that Jericho seems happy to fill. Like you said, they don't need Danielson to be that guy, they need him to be THAT guy.

Something else that I think AEW has struggled with is their secondary push with guys. A bunch of people come in and get a huge pop, or hit on a hot feud — like Orange Cassidy, Adam Page, Wardlow, Sammy Guevara, even MJF to a degree — and then when it's time to transition to the next one and get the push to a higher level they seem to recede into the background for one reason or another.
I don't know if that stems from impatience, bad booking, or a bloated roster. Probably some combination of all three. Injuries and other factors are certainly part of it as well. Getting over for a lot of these guys has a short shelf life, and AEW seems to miss the boat on it a bit too often. The Acclaimed seems to be one of the few they've successfully hit the button on at exactly the right time.

 

I wonder if a returning Adam Page might become the main face ... if he wants to work as a face.

 

Darby Allin fits that bill too. He always seems close to a monster break through and then kinda disappears for a few weeks

 

He's definitely another one. A crowd-pleaser who seems like he's been stuck in feuds that end with a spectacle of a main event on Dynamite, but rarely anything more, for the past two years. And he's actually held one of the 2,378 title belts in circulation in AEW.

 

Leave it to Max Caster to offer his condolences to Jeff Jarrett and call him a douchebag in the same line.

 

And somewhere, I'm sure Jerry Jarrett is smiling over it.

Meanwhile, we're almost certain to get a sequence in this match between Jeff Jarrett and Billy Gunn — in 2023. Let that sink in a bit. Those guys wrestled each other in 1995, probably before some of the people they're in the ring with were even born.

 

Oh look. Jon Moxley is bleeding.