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Welcome everyone!
It’s PPV week! While I am excited for the show I do miss when AEW ran less PPV’s. All Out feels like a quick turn around but it’s nothing close to the quick turn around of All In and All Out back in 2023 when we had just a week between them.
So let’s look back at who I thought looked strong, and who looked not so strong, heading into the to home show for All Out.
RISING STAR OF THE WEEK
DARBY ALLIN
I went back and forth on who should be in this spot and who should be in the runner up spot. Darby, obviously, won out.
It’s crazy that we are 7 years from Darby’s first match in AEW. Do you remember the match? He went to a 20 minute draw with Cody Rhodes at AEW’s Fyter Fest.
Since then Darby has been one of the most consistent performers on the AEW roster. His connection to the fans and the way he throws or allows himself to be thrown around is amazing.
I have told this story before but Darby is the first wrestler that I became a fan of because he reminds me of my son and his friends. Then over the years that connection has grown more and more. Especially when he paired up with a childhood favorite of mine, Sting.
Now, as we go into All Out, Darby will be teaming with Sting’s son Steve Borden against Kyle Fletcher & Kevin Knight. The match will be for a shot at the AEW Tag Team Titles. The tag titles that Darby never lost but were vacated when Sting retired. Which makes this match a toss up.
Going forward I think that Darby and Borden are a great match, as a team. I think a run together as a team for a couple of years would be great. Then, again after a few years, you could have Borden turn on Darby. Something that happened to his dad all the time but that Sting never actually did.
RUNNER UP – PAC
Pac has been doing some great subtle work for the last few months, hell his entire AEW run. If you pay attention to a lot of Jon Moxley promos where Pac is around he is not happy with the new Mox. In fact, on Dynamite, Pac felt more akin to The Dogs and their aggressiveness over the methodical mind games of Mox and the Death Riders.
The question is, especially after Pac’s promo on Collision, are we about to see a change in management, so to say, with the Death Riders? Is Pac positioning himself as the new leader? Or are we finally about to see the implosion of the Death Riders when Mox loses to Will Ospreay this Saturday Night?
All questions I want to know the answer to and am happy to sit back and watch develop this week.
ARTICLE CONTINUED BELOW…
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FADING STAR OF THE WEEK
BANG BANG GANG
I am completely over these guys as a group. If you go one member at a time they are definitely talented but together they do not work for me.
Jay White should be, at least, in the hunt for a secondary title. Instead he is fighting with a group, The Dogs, that’s story was started in New Japan and we’ve gotten barely a Clif’s notes version of it in AEW.
Juice Robinson as the wild man to White’s more serious attitude works. In the group though, Juice is just too much.
The Gunns are a team that could be players within the tag division. Maybe now that there is a focus on that division we will see them rise back up the ranks. If not the let’s get Colten Gunn away from the group and see what he can do.
Ace Austin has never been given a fair shake in AEW. He debuted, lost his first and second matches. Then was put in this group. Ace should be on his own or with someone that compliments him better. Nick Wayne having Ace with him would be an easy way for Ace to potentially get over and shed the goofiness of the Bang Bang Gang.
So, yea, for me this group is much better off away from each other.
