https://www.youtube.com/embed/BdK4kW9BtBU
This is it; the final stretch before REVOLUTION 2023 comes to you live on pay-per-view from Chase Center in San Francisco! The excitement began on the official AEW YouTube channel on Monday with the latest DARK: ELEVATION, continued on Tuesday with DARK, and kicks into high gear this Wednesday night when All Elite Wrestling invades the historic Cow Palace!
Among a great deal of highlights, last week’s action saw a bloody Evil Uno fall to Jon Moxley, Jay Lethal and Jeff Jarrett qualify for the PPV World Tag Team Title match with The Acclaimed and Gunn Club, Jamie Hayter challenge both Saraya and Ruby Soho to fight her on Sunday for the Women’s World Championship, and The House of Black confronted The Elite clearly in relation to their World Trios Championship!
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With this final DYNAMITE before REVOLUTION 2023, fans will witness the fourth, and final, team qualify for the World Tag Team Championship Four Way this Sunday via Casino Tag Team Royale, Chris Jericho will be in action against Peter Avalon, both MJF and Bryan Danielson will share their final thoughts heading into their 60-Minute Iron Man match, and The Firm will have two huge opportunities as HOOK defends the FTW Championship against Matt Hardy and Orange Cassidy defends his All-Atlantic Championship against Big Bill! Plus Toni Storm and Riho will collide, and the Face of the Revolution Ladder Match will go down on DYNAMITE with the winner earning a future TNT Championship bout!
https://www.youtube.com/embed/rSp3ByZP78g?start=413
The action gets underway in San Francisco at 4pm local time, and DYNAMITE kicks off live at 8pm ET/7pm CT on TBS, and at AEWPlus.com for our international audiences! And, as always, the best place to get ready for the jam-packed week of AEW events is over at the official AEW YouTube channel for highlights from previous episodes of DYNAMITE and RAMPAGE, plus the latest editions of AEW DARK: ELEVATION, AEW DARK, and ROAD TO!
ALL-ATLANTIC CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH
Orange Cassidy(c) vs. Big Bill (w/ Stokely Hathaway)
Stokely Hathaway’s Firm has a pair of tremendous opportunities this Wednesday night on DYNAMITE, and the biggest comes with Big Bill challenging Orange Cassidy for the All-Atlantic Championship! Possibly the hardest-working man in All Elite Wrestling, “Freshly Squeezed” is coming off his 12th championship defense in 140 days, his 4th of 2023, having turned away ROH Pure Champion Wheeler Yuta to accomplish that feat. That ringer was as emotional as it was physical, but once again Orange finds himself jumping into the fire on behalf of his Best Friends, and stepping up to the largest challenge he has ever faced in a singles match.
Yes, he has been in the ring with Satnam Singh, unquestionably the biggest human in the AEW locker room, but those were multi-man situations and as such no championships were at stake. Yes, Cassidy has been in the ring with Luchasaurus, Wardlow, Miro, and Powerhouse Hobbs, and even managed to find wins against Hobbs in their encounters, but Big Bill is seven feet tall and just shy of 300 pounds of lean muscle mass. On top of that, he’s a rather untested commodity when it comes to singles matches here in AEW, only having competed in two beginning with his debut in May 2022 against Wardlow.
So it will be this Wednesday night that Big Bill has the biggest opportunity of his AEW career when he faces OC for the All-Atlantic Championship. Bill marks the second member of The Firm to try and end Cassidy’s championship reign following Lee Moriarty’s failed attempt on the 2/8/23 edition of RAMPAGE.
Given the intense championship schedule that “Freshly Squeezed” has undertaken, one has to question if and when it will catch-up to him, and if a foe like Big Bill is the right man in the right place to take advantage of the situation. Plus with the numbers advantage held by The Firm, and a question of whether or not The Best Friends will be in any condition to watch OC’s back, it feels like the perfect storm for Stokely Hathway’s crew to bring gold to their unit.
FTW CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH…
HOOK(c) vs. Matt Hardy (w/ Stokely Hathaway)
And speaking of The Firm holding gold, here is there second tremendous opportunity of the night as Matt Hardy attempts to wrest the FTW Championship from the grasp of HOOK at Stokely Hathaway and Ethan Page’s bequest. This title fight has come about as a result of some legal machinations, the trade-off for letting HOOK back into the fold, and the responsibility has been placed on the shoulders of Matt Hardy.
Why Hardy as opposed to Ethan Page? Perhaps “All Ego” is afraid of HOOK, perhaps it’s more about seeing Hardy hurt then actually bringing the FTW Championship into The Firm, or perhaps it’s about trying to soften up HOOK for another day. After all, he’s been a thorn in the side of Stokely Hathaway for quite some time now, between HOOK’s title fight with Lee Moriarty, JungleHOOK’s bouts with Firm members, and that little confrontation between Big Stoke and HOOK that led to the FTW Champ’s suspension.
Now it’s Hardy’s turn to try his hand against the undefeated “Cold-Hearted, Handsome Devil” in a one-on-one battle. Matt’s done the dance in tag team action alongside Ethan, dropping a match to JungleHOOK back on January 25th, but now he’s got a shot at redemption and scoring his first championship since coming to AEW. The FTW Title may not be officially sanctioned by AEW, but men like Ricky Starks, Brian Cage, and now HOOK have made it a point to turn the title into a prestigious one in its own right.
Will The Firm walk out of the Cow Palace with one championship, two championships, or will they leave it with only their broken hearts in their hands?
CASINO TAG TEAM ROYALE…
***WINNER EARNS A SPOT IN THE REVOLUTION 2023 CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH***
Aussie Open (Kyle Fletcher & Mark Davis), Best Friends (Chuck Taylor & Trent Beretta), Blackpool Combat Club (Claudio Castagnoli & Wheeler Yuta), Dark Order (Alex Reynolds & John Silver), The J.A.S. (Angelo Parker & Matt Menard), The Kingdom (Matt Taven & Mike Bennett), LFI (Preston Vance & Rush), Lucha Brothers (Penta El Zero Miedo & Rey Fenix), Top Flight(Dante & Darius Martin), and The Butcher & The Blade
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Last Wednesday night in Phoenix, it was Jay Lethal and Jeff Jarrett who came out of the REVOLUTION 2023 Tag Team Battle Royale with a spot in the World Tag Team Championship bout this Sunday night on pay-per-view. With The Gunns set to make their first title defense against four other teams, Austin and Colten know they’ve got The Acclaimed in one corner, Lethal and Jarrett in another, but just who will occupy that fourth spot?
We will all find out this Wednesday night when ten teams compete in the Casino Tag Team Royale for the golden opportunity! Eight of these teams were embroiled in the situation last week in Phoenix only to come up short, but now get a second opportunity to try and make the championship cut. The only question among that lot is whether or not, after being assaulted by The Firm, The Best Friends will be in any condition to enter into combat.
As for the other two teams, The Blackpool Combat Club and The Kingdom enter into this with the same hope as all the others, that of being part of Sunday’s pay-per-view extravaganza and getting their World Tag Team Championship shot! Which duo will hold the winning hand?
FORMER CHAMPIONS COLLIDE…
Riho vs. Toni Storm
https://www.youtube.com/embed/iQEsreJ44y0?start=413
After toppling Willow Nightingale last Friday on RAMPAGE, thanks in part to a distraction provided by Saraya, Toni Storm is stepping back into the ring on DYNAMITE, and welcoming back a true AEW original!
It’s been nearly four months since we last saw the original AEW Women’s World Champion in competition, but this Wednesday night Riho returns to the fold to take on another former champion in Toni Storm! It feels apropos that Riho would come back to pick up this fight, this battle Saraya and Storm have elected to wage against the women of All Elite Wrestling, especially since she was the first flag bearer for the division.
But will Riho be able to put a stop to this crusade of theirs, at least for the night, perhaps stall some of the momentum Storm and Saraya are aiming to build as the latter heads towards her championship opportunity at REVOLUTION 2023?
FACE OF THE REVOLUTION LADDER MATCH…
***WINNER EARNS A FUTURE TNT CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH***
Action Andretti vs. AR Fox vs. Eddie Kingston vs. Komander vs. Konosuke Takeshita vs. Ortiz vs. Powerhouse Hobbs vs. Sammy Guevara
In 2022, it was “The War Dog” who ascended the ladder to claim victory in the Face of the Revolution Ladder Match and would go on to face Scorpio Sky for the TNT Championship several weeks later.
In 2021 it was, coincidentally enough, Scorpio Sky who was the first to achieve that feat, and who then moved onto battle Darby Allin for the TNT Title just a few days later.
The one thing they both have in common, besides being former TNT Champions, is that both Sky and Wardlow failed in the championship opportunity they earned from winning this Ladder Match, although each would claim said title at a later date.
In 2023, this Wednesday night specifically, eight more men will try to follow in their footsteps, at least the first part of them, and be the first to parlay victory here into a TNT Title reign. There’s so much wrapped up between the men involved in this match: Kingston and Ortiz, Kingston and Guevara, Guevara and Ortiz, as well as Andretti and Guevara all have history in AEW. Then there’s Takeshita and the newest addition to the All Elite field, Komander, who have history from this year’s BATTLE OF LOS ANGELES tournament for Pro Wrestling Guerrilla. Overall it’s a pretty combustible field of eight all vying for a TNT Championship match with either Wardlow or Samoa Joe, depending on who walks out of REVOLUTION 2023 as champion.
ONE-ON-ONE…
Chris Jericho vs. Peter Avalon
Peter Avalon was simply trying to answer the Open Challenge that “Absolute” Ricky Starks had laid out last week, but instead of an opportunity to step up to the fight, the Wingman was greeted with a Judas Elbow to his face. Not just any elbow either, but one delivered while the former AEW World Champion was wearing a spiked jacket. It was absolutely beyond necessary, Avalon was not even looking for a fight with Jericho in that moment, but now that is exactly what he wants!
This Wednesday night, Peter Avalon will get the biggest opportunity of his AEW career when he faces Chris Jericho in one-on-one competition, seeking some recompense for Le Champion’s unnecessary assault. Will we see Jericho upset yet again but a man he doesn’t respect or even rate? Can Avalon shake Jericho’s world just days before his REVOLUTION 2023 bout with Ricky Starks? Tune into TBS starting at 8pm ET/7pm CT to see if it is indeed PPA All Day!
WE WILL HEAR FROM MJF & BRYAN DANIELSON
https://www.youtube.com/embed/c8WVHoKT0cg?start=316
A week ago Bryan Danielson was pushed past his limit of tolerance for MJF’s garbage. Match-after-match-after-match was one thing, competition inside the ring is what “The American Dragon” is involved in professional wrestling for after all, but the family? Now that’s an entirely different story, a bridge too far, and the AEW World Champion ended up knocked out for his efforts to get underneath Bryan’s skin, as well as his efforts to continuing proving to the world (and himself) that he’s the worst of the worst.
This Wednesday night on DYNAMITE, with their AEW World Championship 60-Minute Iron Man collision just four days away, we anticipate hearing from both champion and challenger. What will each have to say to the masses before the enter into The Hour?
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AEW’s Cow Palace debut in San Francisco begins at 4pm Pacific, with DYNAMITE getting underway on TBS starting at 8pm ET/7pm CT on TBS, and at AEWPlus.com for our international fans! Before the action begins, head on over to the official AEW YouTube channel for highlights from previous editions of DYNAMITE and RAMPAGE, as well as the latest offerings from AEW DARK: ELEVATION, AEW DARK, THE CONTROL CENTER, and ROAD TO!
https://www.youtube.com/embed/z4naipVlvBoArticle source: allelitewrestling.com