AEW DYNAMITE HITS & MISSES (12/10): Speedball vs. Fletcher in a match of the year contender or not, Babes of Wrath win belts, Joe defends against Kingston, Callis’s great hypocrisy

Winter is HERE and it’s spectacular!

HITS

BABES OF WRATH ARE TAG CHAMPS!

If this were the March Madness college basketball tournament, the Babes of Wrath would be the bracket buster. I did not have them winning this tournament when it was announced but I have no problem with it now. It was quite a journey for Willow Nightingale and Harley Cameron, who I didn’t even think would make it past Mercedes Mone and Athena in the first round.

You have to give a lot of credit for this to Harley. Had she not come such a long way with her in-ring skills, this would not have happened. Sure, she is far from a finished product, but she held her own in the ring with wrestlers with decades of experience and you could certainly see how much this meant to her as she wiped the blood from her mouth and held up her first title. In addition, the lack of predictability in this tournament should help in future tourneys as well.

It was also nice to see an in-ring interview after the match to get an immediate reaction from the winners. This should be done more as it gives a less-scripted feel to that reaction.

KAZUCHIKA OKADA VS. JACK PERRY

Kazuchika Okada may not be giving us “PPV Okada” in the Continental Classic, but he is giving us a more engaged Okada. The match with Jack Perry was fantastic and reminded fans that Perry can be pretty darn good in a singles match. The story-telling was strong with some quality wrestling, but also with the biting of numerous body parts including the crotch. Ouch! The previous upsets allowed viewers to believe there was a chance Perry could get the win, but he ended up selling the Rainmaker like a champ and giving Okada three big points.

KYLE FLETCHER VS. “SPEEDBALL” MIKE BAILEY

Match of the year? Okay, perhaps a little recency bias and my 50+ year old memory failing me, but it was certainly up there! If you were to show a young wrestler what the ideal chemistry you are looking for in a match is, this is the match to show them. They mixed up the elite athleticism of Bailey with power based excellence of Fletcher, and yet each can handle both sides of that equation. There were a number of spots that got audible gasps from the crowd and in my living room. The slam on the barrier was sick.

This was clearly set up to be one of those terrific matches with the predictable finish, but with every near fall (and there were some amazing ones), the previous upsets had you thinking maybe Speedball had a chance. The crowd was very into this match as many stood for much of it. Once the time limit was approaching, that got into the viewers minds as well. They could have easily had this go to a draw and given Bailey a moral victory, but giving him the win in the last minute was a welcome surprise and the fans reacted huge.

This tournament is now very unpredictable even if we still assume the final will be Okada vs. Takeshita. But it certainly will be fun getting there.

ARTICLE CONTINUED BELOW…

Check out the latest episode of the Wade Keller Pro Wrestling Post-show covering the latest episode of Dynamite: CLICK HERE (or search “wade Keller” on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or any other iOS or Android app to subscribe free)

SAMOA JOE VS. EDDIE KINGSTON

First, I loved seeing backstage interviews earlier in the show promoting and setting up this main event. Joe was his usual serious and menacing self promising pain, and a victory, while Eddie was vulnerable and loveable as an underdog.

As for the match, I was very curious to see if Eddie had knocked the rust off since his injury and would be able to handle a high profile main event and I thought he passed with flying colors. Eddie held his own in a tough physical fight. We knew we were not getting the flips and off-the-charts athleticism in this one, but it wasn’t needed. This was an old school battle. I loved Eddie’s facial expressions and little stories weaved throughout the match like Joe rolling out of the ring after a DDT to save himself from the move that beat Shibata last week.

Eddie may have come up short in the end, but did a lot to show he still has it and can be a factor moving forward. He also furthered the story when or if they eventually decide to tell a story about him finally winning the world title.

QUICK HITS

– I love that they are utilizing Renee Paqette as a sideline reporter in recent weeks. It’s a fresh way to provide information to the viewers.

– Mark Briscoe’s in-ring promo was strong and he can sell his match with Daniel Garcia despite the fact Garcia can never really back up his talking.

– Don Callis continues to be very entertaining. My favorite part on this show was him saying “possession is nine-tenths of the law” while he sat in on commentary, then 15 minutes later in a backstage promo, totally contradicted himself. Heel gold right there.

– “Hangman” Page and Swerve Strickland teaming up against Powerhouse Hobbs and Katsuyori Shibata was a fun match. They gave a small taste of hardcore with some solid hard-hitting wrestling once the match officially began. It was nice to see the former enemies team up, but they kept their distance from each other and weren’t all of a sudden pals despite the fact they are both babyfaces now.

MISSES

Folks. No misses. I loved this episode of Dynamite start to finish and hope they use this as a blueprint for future weeks! (Wade Keller even called it “The Perfect Dynamite” on his post-show on Wednesday night.)

PODCAST PLUG

Don’t forget to check out the weekly free podcast I’m part of, “The All Elite Conversation Club” that typically drops on Fridays the PWTorch Dailycast lineup. Joel Dehnel and I have a great time breaking down all things AEW. Search “pwtorch” on your podcast app to subscribe. Send questions and comments to allelitecc@gmail.com.