Sports Entertainment

What predictions/wishes do people have for AEW in 2022?

Mine:

-Hangman doesn't have a very long reign. I don't think he's ready for it and a long good guy reign when the good guy isn't super-over might hurt the ratings. I think Moxley (after returning to a hero's welcome) wins it from him at DON, and has the reign in front of crowds that he should have had to begin with. Then Hangman wins it back from Moxley at the end of the year to become the first two-time champion and has a much-longer second reign before eventually losing to MJF late in 2023 (if he's a lock to stay with the company in '24).

-Danielson vs. Omega Iron Man match on PPV to settle the score.

-Cody gets killed by Hook who takes the TNT championship.

-Thunder Rosa vs. Britt Baker for the women's title main events Revolution.

-Ruby Soho is the first TBS champion, handing Jade Cargill her first loss (barely, and with shenanigans).

-Brian Cage is the first person of note to leave AEW for WWE.

Woefully Inept said:

Mox getting it back immediately is a no brainier. The live crowd might actually explode after the 3 count.
I hadn't watched watched in a few weeks so I didn't know much about Hook. Now it seems like it'd be foolish not to do something big with him. And people will go even more crazy because he'll be kicking Cody's ass. lol

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Yeah I really hope they give Moxley a PPV title win when he comes back. It could be one of the biggest wrestling returns ever and the guy deserves it. Give him the title at DoN, let him be a face champ all summer and get the reign he should have had before, then turn him heel in the fall leading to him losing the title back to Hangman. Heel Moxley was incredible in NXT back in the day, sorta diabolical like Ledger's Joker.

Here's a wrestling board I used to frequent:


Since mid-2020 it has turned into nutjob-ville where people spend way too much time critiquing things for offensiveness and looking for things to find offensive in other people's posts. You're forbidden from discussing anything related to BLM pro or con, but you ARE allowed and encouraged to put BLM in your sig (but not anything against it), creating a weird indirect echo chamber.

They've run off most of the normal people. Case in point, this thread, where I'm guessing the guy posting it didn't mean anything by it.

Nyla being billed as from The Valley of Headless Men of Northwest Canada, or some obscure island, would probably fit the character more than Washington DC, but whatever.

Sucks because otherwise it was a good board for a long time.

Kirun said:

I'll never understand the Hangman push. He reminds me of Roman Reigns. Just a total borefest yet the company just constantly jerks him off.

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He's the protagonist of the company. The good guy hero. Like Jax in Sons of Anarchy. The audience stand-in, the guy we identify with. He's got problems but he fights through them, kind of thing.

His "beer drinking party animal" persona was a good time, but now they can't go back to it because they made the story into him being an alcoholic and him overcoming it. I was all for this change at the time, as someone who doesn't drink anymore and knows people who waste themselves on it, but now I don't think it was the right call in terms of making him a fun character.

Everyone, and the company itself, are so over right now that this is the time to make new stars, so Hangman's push is happening when it needs to.

That said I agree that he's the most boring champion out of the four so far and that's really unfortunate. He needs to pick it up somehow or nobody's gonna be clamoring for him to have future title reigns.

Araxen said:

If Page doesn't job next week, and DB isn't allowed to ruled AEW till Kenny comes back fuck you Tony Kahn. It needs to be!

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I'm actually starting to think this is the plan. Bryan and Omega have unfinished business. I'd personally just have them do a grudge match without the title when Omega comes back. They don't need the title involved, and Omega doesn't need to win another title again so soon.

However, the way they're doing things makes me think Bryan might actually walk out with the title just to throw everyone for an absolute loop.

I think it'd do a lot of damage to Hangman to have his title reign ended so quickly, though. It wouldn't make the audience sympathetic to him and clamoring to see him win it back, it'd make the reign seem like a waste of everyone's time.

What I would have done is had Hangman beat Bryan at like minute 28 of their first match, then go around pointing out how he did what Omega wasn't able to do. Thus using Omega to get himself more over while Omega is gone, before proceeding to whatever his next big feud is.

It's pretty telling that most of the world title related talk I've heard since Hangman won the title has been "who is he going to lose it to?"

I think it's gonna be either Moxley, Miro, or MJF. Doubt Cole is getting it any time soon because they aren't gonna put their title on a guy closely associated with being NXT's top guy. It'd make them seem like they're NXT-level, when they're not. A couple years down the line with his character tweaked a bit to be more like the ROH guy, yeah.

Everyone expects MJF to win the title this year but I'd hold off on that until after he re-signs for 2024. This both A) Is a carrot on a stick for him to re-sign, knowing he'll immediately win the title and go on a tear. B) Lowers his value for the Bidding War. WWE will pay a lot more for a former AEW champion than they will for a promising AEW midcarder, making it easier for AEW to keep him in-house. Course, if he isn't going anywhere and his bidding war talk is all for show, then this is all pointless. If I were TK I wouldn't be so sure until pen is put to paper, however.

Instead of Hangman->MJF I'd have the title go Hangman->Moxley->Miro this year. Moxley deserves a few months in front of crowds, and Miro is a heel champion that'll actually move the numbers. Too much WWE? Yeah, maybe, but after Miro's reign I can see the champions all being non-WWE guys.

They also have heel Cody that they could move into the title picture for nuclear heat. I mean TK has an absolute embarrassment of riches right now that any promoter would kill for. The only downside is people like Malakai Black, Ricky Starks, and PAC will probably never get near the title because there's just too much competition. Those guys would be able to carry an entire regional indy as the main event scene.

/essay off

LOLOL

Sammy's haters can suck it

Needless said:

Sammys a boring champion too but thats actually hilarious, tay is dimes and you cant blame a dude for something tony probably pushed anyway since WWE was doing that dumb shit at the time too, and her 'homewrecking' is a retarded take, if you arent into a relationship then don't stay in it.

Also their street fight they had the other day was actually pretty wild, i like the bunny a lot more now lol

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Rampage has been REALLY good, so much so that it's almost like they're saving all the best stuff for it. The stuff that should be closing out Dynamite. It's unfortunate that only like a third to half of the people are watching it as Dynamite.

It actually wouldn't kill me if they just moved it to Weds and made Dynamite 3 hours. If the same level of quality was maintained it'd work out great. RAW just poisoned the well for 3 hour shows.

I'm not up to date on NJPW, but by "new belt" are you guys referring to this one:



And by "old belt" you mean this one:



?

Cause if so, yeah, the old belt looks 10x better. I assumed they'd bring it back by now.

Though the "new" one at least is a callback to their world title from like, the 90's or so IIRC.

Didn't NJPW break off as kind of an AEW-like splinter group of disgruntled people from AJPW? Or am I thinking of AAA and CMLL?

I'd DMOR but it's late. But yeah I'm pretty sure the Divas Title looking belt is a revival of their 90's belt, while the one Styles is holding became a thing during their resurgence in the late 00's and they probably had another one in-between.

To me the one held by Tanahashi, Styles, Okada, and Omega is the "real" one. Not unlike how the Winged Eagle and Big Eagle belts are eternally my favorite WWF belts due to being held by Shawn/Bret and Austin/Rock/HHH respectively. Nothing since has looked legit.