WWE: Clash At The Castle

WWE treated Clash at the Castle like it was one of the four major PPVs from the week long access to WWE superstars to the event itself and even to its post-event “press conference”. All in all, Clash at the Castle was a big success that drew close to 63K people who were pretty red-hot throughout the event.

The Results:

• Kick-off: The Street Profits & Riddick Moss def. Alpha Academy & Austin Theory
• Bayley, IO Sky & Dakota Kai def. Bianca Belair, Asuka & Alexa Bliss
• “Walter” def. Sheamus to retain Intercontinental Championship
• Liv Morgan def. Shayna Baszler to retain SmackDown Women’s Championship
• Edge & Rey Mysterio def. The Judgment Day
• Seth Rollins def. Matt Riddle
• Roman Reigns def. Drew McIntyre to retain Undisputed WWE Universal Championship

Takeaways:

• Damage Control Has The Juice Now: Bayley, IO SKY and Dakota Kai have put the entire women’s division on notice since joining forces at SummerSlam. They furthered that point by decisively beating the team of Belair, Asuka and Bliss. Even more glaring was Bayley getting the pin on the RAW Women’s champion Belair. This clearly sets up Bayley gunning for the women’s title while IO & Dakota have unfinished business in their pursuit of the Women’s Tag Team titles. WWE has a history of cooling off on factions right as they’re being built so here’s hoping that things change in the Triple H era.
• “Walter” & Sheamus Did That Work: You knew the Intercontinental Title match would be physical but how many of you had it as a Match of the Year candidate? “Walter” and Sheamus laid it all out in the ring and delivered an absolute CLASSIC. Enough can’t be said of just how good and under-appreciated Sheamus has been for over a decade. Give that man his flowers. The best part for me was the reunion of Imperium. Here’s hoping this faction gets pushed as well… and that Walter gets his name back so I can stop putting his name in quotation marks.
• Dominik Betrays His Father: Edge & Rey Mysterio got the win over The Judgment Day (remember what I said about WWE & factions? It applies here.) thanks to interference from Dominik but neither man acknowledged Dom’s efforts and that was the final straw for Dominik. A kick to the groin for Edge and a wicked clothesline to Rey shocked the red-hot crowd and Dominik instantly garnered nuclear heat. The big question will be can Dominik truly make it on his own. We’ll never know unless the training wheels are taken off. They have… and now Dominik must show & prove.
• The Visionary of Drip Never Misses: Seth Rollins paid tribute to Elton John with an amazing cosplay and then proceeded to use Matt Riddle’s emotions against him to pick up the win. It was a much needed win for a guy some consider to be the MVP of WWE this year. Seth has made no secret of his desire to chase Roman Reigns for the titles and this win will hopefully set him on that path. His remarks at the post-event presser were even better:

• The Bloodline Grows: Roman Reigns had all he could handle and then some with Drew McIntyre but just when it looked like McIntyre finally had Roman’s number enter the newest member of the Bloodline – The Usos’ younger brother Solo Sikoa. Sikoa pulled the referee out of the ring right before the 3-count and distracted McIntyre just enough for Reigns to hit a spear and pick up the win to retain the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship. Sikoa showing up means the Bloodline has new life and now seems indestructible. Sikoa is currently in NXT so it seems his call up to the main roster is imminent. Afterwards The Tribal Chief shared his distain for the Cardiff crowd during the post-event press conference:

acknowledge him ‼️ #WWECastle

Originally tweeted by oliver stark’s gf (@reiqning) on September 3, 2022.

AEW: All Out

All Elite Wrestling took over Chicago this past week and it culminated with the All Out PPV last night. There was much talk about the main event of the PPV leading up to the event but while the main event and the card overall went over well it was the post-PPV press conference that set the internet ablaze.

The Results:

• Pre-Show: Sammy Guevara & Tay Melo def. Ortiz & Ruby Soho to retain AAA Mixed Tag Team titles
• Pre-Show: Hook def. Angelo Parker to retain FTW Championship
• Pre-Show: Pac def. Kip Sabian to retain AEW All-Atlantic Championship
• Pre-Show: Eddie Kingston def. Tomohiro Ishii
• Casino Ladder Match: The Joker wins after receiving chip from Stokley Hathaway to earn an AEW Title shot
• The Elite def. Dark Order to win AEW World Trios Championship
• Jade Cargill def. Athena to retain AEW TBS Championship
• Wardlow & FTR def. Jay Lethal & The Motor City Machine Guns
• Powerhouse Hobbs def. Ricky Starks
• Swerve in Our Glory def. The Acclaimed to retain AEW World Tag Team Championship
• Toni Storm def. Britt Baker, Hikaru Shida & Jamie Hayter to win Interim AEW Women’s Championship
• Christian Cage def. Jungle Boy
• Chris Jericho def. Bryan Danielson
• Miro, Darby Allin & Sting def. House of Black
• CM Punk def. Jon Moxley to win AEW World Championship

Takeaways:

• Sometimes Less Is More: WWE did the right thing when they made WrestleMania a two-night event to keep the tentpole PPV from being 6+ hours on one night. All Out having 15 matches in one night meant some of these matches would get the short end of the stick. Starks & Hobbs only getting 5 minutes when they did everything they could to promote the match is borderline criminal. Jade Cargill/Athena got about 5 minutes as well. While Jade has improved AEW can’t keep having these short matches or her act will get stale. With the Zero Hour included, All Out clocked in at 5 hours and that’s too much for even the staunchest of wrestling fans.

• The AEW Tag Title Match Steals The Show: While many were expecting Punk/Moxley, the Trios Tag Title match or Danielson/Jericho to have the match of the night it would end up being Swerve in Our Glory & The Acclaimed taking home that honor. Keith Lee & Swerve Strickland really leaned into the heel roles and along with The Acclaimed delivered a wild banger. The crowd was hot for the whole match and even hotter for the underdog Acclaimed.

• CM Punk Wins But The Joker Reveals Himself: In the main event, CM Punk and Jon Moxley went to war for the AEW Championship and delivered in every sense of the word. The crowd was obviously white-hot for Punk and hot for the match. The near falls brought the crowd to a fever pitch and Punk going over was the right call. As Punk celebrated, the lights went out & a voicemail played of Tony Khan talking to someone about ‘one final chance’, a raise and a spot at the Casino Ladder Match and then this bit of brilliance:

MJF MAKES HIS RETURN TO @AEW 🚨 https://t.co/EiJf4CiR5K

Originally tweeted by Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) on September 5, 2022.

• MJF making his long, awaited return to a massive pop in Chicago ended the night. You would think that would be the biggest talking point but….

• WTH Was That Press Conference?: Instead of talking about the All Out PPV, the matches and the return of one Maxwell Jacob Friedman, the wrestling world was set on fire with the post-PPV press conference as new minted AEW World Champion CM Punk went nuclear:

• First & foremost, I really like CM Punk but this press conference wasn’t the right place to air his grievances. Did he have a right to defend himself? Absolutely… but at the same time his presser is getting all the talk and the return MJF and the PPV has been overshadowed. What’s worse is that the owner of the company sat next to Punk and looked a kid who sits meekly as his parent curses out the school teacher. This press conference put a huge spotlight on the lack of control Tony Khan seemingly has with his company. It certainly appears as though the inmates are running the asylum. If what Punk said about the Young Bucks is true then that further shows the complete madness that is happening backstage. The unfortunate thing is we’ve seen this before with WCW when certain talent had creative control. WCW imploded because there were too many cooks in the kitchen. It is going to be very important for Tony Khan to stop being the friend & fanboy and start being the CEO and getting this backstage drama under control.

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