Yep. Any time there was a round of releases a year or two ago you could look at the list and reliably predict who theyâd bring in, whilst not needing any of them lol.
Thatâs calmed down a bit now, but It used to be CONSTANT.
Thereâs a few guys coming through right now who theyâre building up really well, but youâre definitely right, that mass ex WWE hiring made the roster just absolutely monstrous.
Big issue that was called out at the time.
Iâd say the wrong champions were pushed were a big problem, Jon Moxley is a 4x champion. Which is lol. Bryan Danielson wins the belt 3 years too late. If I recall CM Punk came in and was facing nobodies when he came in.
He did have a few pretty questionable match ups thatâs for sure, some of which were aggressively average.
I know he was THE draw, but Punks in ring stuff was incredibly average outside of a few matches, id have much rather Danielson been given the championship run and took the belt of Hangman than Punk. His run was a disaster⌠Though granted he did break his foot diving into the crowd, so that aborted the run before it even had a chance lol.
It isnât just one issue, itâs multiple things.
Too many cooks in the kitchen, too many shows, too many wrestlers, inmates running the asylum, lack of worthwhile stories and continuity, too much focus on dream matches with poor or even nonexistent builds to them.
A lot of these factors do not give an incentive to the fans to follow their product on a weekly basis.
Their biggest issue of them all though is that WWE just isnât fucking around anymore. You donât have disgruntled WWE fans deciding to give an alternative a go.
The shine of AEW being that up-and-coming promotion is gone as well, theyâve been around for 5 years and have built a rapport with wrestling fans, a LOLTNA rapport.
I think your second paragraph is the big one tbh. WWE is no longer the drizzling shits and is a competent product again, so thereâs no reason for WWE fans to look elsewhere. They didnât want an alternative, they just wanted WWE to be good.
I actually disagree.
What WWE is doing wouldnât matter if AEW stuck to being the alternative it originally promised it was going to be. Those big numbers early on were based on that promise and desire.
It was immediately obvious outside of fanboys it was WWE-Lite at best. At the worst it was a Indy-wankfest which is niche, always will be niche and never popular. As a consequence it shares the same âdirectâ audience as WWE. It was going to slide anytime WWE improved.
I donât even think WWE is even that interesting to watch still, but Iâm a very lapsed fan.
I think of it like WCW 1996, the nWo angle was good, but WCW was offering a wrestling viewing experience you wouldnât find on WWE (and still wouldnât for a couple years, or ever because WWE are pretty shit at factions).
AEW has their stars going toe to toe with jobbers thatâs another big issue I remember from back when I watched them.
You shouldnât have your main event guys in competitive matches with job guys.
They never learned to create the true impression that the top guys are the top guys.
I think where my enthusiasm for AEW has waned somewhat is Iâve always been a BIG 90s Japanese wrestling fan and prefer the in ring focus to anything else, so for me any promotion that focuses on the wrestling is for me, and when I first started watching AEW it did feel like that was what it was. Sure there was always story stuff but the in ring stuff was there too and was the focal point.
As the years have gone on the balance has shifted to more story orientated (which is fine if they land) but too often those stories end up missing the mark or being mediocre. Thereâs gems along the way (Hangman/Omega with Hangmanâs title chase, Hangman/Swerve and MJF/Punk are the main ones I enjoyed) but far too quite often stories start, take away from the in ring aspect and then get dropped or end poorly.
Tony needs help with booking/creative, but seems either bring in the wrong people or just doesnât listen and books it how he wants to book it, leading to middling results.
There is a good product there when they focus on the right stuff, but too often it does feel like theyâre trying to be too WWE-like instead of forging their own identity at times.
Didnât they bring in that dude from Fightful whoâs cousins with Swerve? He was supposed to help out and I swear itâs gone worse since.
Edit: Remembered his name. Itâs Will Washington. Donât even mean to be rude to the dude, fair play for landing the gig, he looked like a decent chap from what Iâve seen but Iâm not entirely sure what qualified him as a hire to help out Tony creatively.
I didnât realise he was his cousin tbf!
Not sure who it was who booked Swerve/Hangman, but they need more of that.
I know the violence wasnât for everyone, but the gritty and personal stuff usually works really well in AEW.
It was pretty simple, but the characters of Swerve and Hangman just made it work and it was easily my favourite fued of the the past year or so. Theyâre both still selling the effects of what they did to each other and thatâs the sort of thing they need to get better at booking imo. Long term story telling can add so much.
They waited a year to post this.
What a day that was. Unbelievable piece of business from Nick and Hunter.
Thatâs mental thatâs a year ago already. Times flying yoâŚ
Was Full Gear any good?
Canât get it on the firestick at all. Iâll have to do with Carragherâs scouse whining on telly instead.
Yeah I enjoyed it! It wasnât my fav ppv but it was still really good.
Ospreay/Fletcher and, somewhat surprisingly, Statlander vs Mone were my fav matches!
And of course AJ/QT bringing the boom was a 5* banger.
Ospreay and Fletcher did have an excellent match on Dynamite during summer. It was crying out for a rematch.
Yeah for sure! No chance it wasnât gonna be great with those two tbh. Fletcher has really come into his own recently imo.
Not one of his biggest fans but I actually think Owens pulling an upset victory against Cody could go a long way for both and would be a great way to kickstart Saturday Nightâs Main Event.
It would but it wonât be happening.
Whoâs watching War Games?
I was skeptical about the pre-taped segment from Punk and Reigns yesterday on SD but that was actually pretty decent and I liked the implications that came out of it.