AEW Rampage Preview for August 5, 2022

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On Wednesday night’s edition of Dynamite, fans in Columbus, and those watching around the world, watched as Chris Jericho maintained his AEW Interim World Title at Quake by the Lake next Wednesday when he defeated Wheeler Yuta. In addition, ThunderStorm dropped their tag team bout to Team Britt, The Gunn Club were indeed The Trash Boys after The Acclaimed got finished, and Powerhouse Hobbs made a definitive statement after his betrayal of Ricky Starks last week!

Plus Adam Cole and reDRagon attacked The Young Bucks only for Hangman Page to make the save, Christian Cage defeated Matt Hardy just to be ran off by Jungle Boy and Luchasaurus when he tried to assault Hardy afterwards, Ethan Page made his thoughts on the state of AEW heard loud and clear, Jay Lethal topped Orange Cassidy in singles competition, and Eddie Kingston challenged Sammy Guevara to meet him at All Out 2022!

That brings us to this Friday night and a LIVE Rampage from the Van Andel Arena in Grand Rapids, MI! Even with a title fight coming on Wednesday, Jon Moxley will be in action against the independent fan favorite known as Mance Warner! Plus Swerve In Our Glory will engaged in a Friday Night Street Fight with “Smart” Mark Sterling’s duo of Tony Nese and Josh Woods, and we will also see the in-ring debut of the newest addition to AEW’s Women’s Division, the highly decorated multi-time Women’s champion Madison Rayne!

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The action starts Friday night on TNT at 10pm EDT/9pm CDT on TNT, and on AEWPlus.com for our international audience, but be sure to visit the official AEW YouTube channel, the AEW Twitter feed, and the official Facebook page to catch up on Dynamite highlights, and watch TWO episodes of Dark: Elevation, as well as the latest editions of AEW Dark, Road To, and the Control Center with Tony Schiavone.

AEW INTERIM WORLD TITLE ELIMINATOR MATCH…

Jon Moxley(c) vs. Mance Warner

We all know AEW Interim World Champion Jon Moxley is a fighter, at 54 victories, he’s got more singles wins than any other man in All Elite Wrestling, he’s tied with Jungle Boy for the most overall victories with 79, and he’s got 91 total fights to his AEW resume. Right now, with 15 straight singles wins, he’s on a hotter streak than anyone else in the company, and even with a title fight waiting in the wings on Wednesday night’s Dynamite: Quake by the Lake episode, Mox will still be in action on Rampage giving one lucky man the chance of a lifetime.

We saw Jon do it with Takeshita several Friday’s back, and now he will do once more this Friday with one of independent wrestling’s most beloved figures, Mance Warner! Now Good Ol’ Mancer is coming off a victory over Serpentico on Thursday night’s Dark: Elevation special, but his career in wrestling runs back almost seven years to his training with Billy Roc, the same man who first trained Ruby Soho.

During the course of his career, Mancer has traveled many of the same roads that Moxley did in his early days. He’s been down the back roads of Indiana for IWA: Mid-South, stepped in-between the black and gold ropes of Combat Zone Wrestling, bled in Death Matches, captured championships in Game Changer Wrestling, and has even fought many of the same foes as the defending Interim World Champion. Mancer has stepped into combat with men quite familiar with fighting Moxley, men like Eddie Kingston, Ethan Page, Wheeler Yuta, Nick Gage, and Moxley’s former tag partner Sami Callihan. Mancer has fought everyone from The Briscoes to Jerry Lawler to Kikutaro to The Powers of Pain, and is the longest reigning AAW Champion in that company’s 15 year history. Suffice to say he is quite seasoned in his seven years, and even rebounded this year from a broken leg suffered last Halloween that could’ve ended his career. Tack on winning the Bunkhouse Battle Royale at the Ric Flair’s Last Match event, and Mancer has all the makings of a genuine threat to Jon Moxley.

Now they may have traveled some similar paths, bled in similar arenas, and fought similar foes, but Mox and Mance Warner have never been in the ring together until now! It’s the chance of a lifetime for Good Ol’ Mancer, and should he upset Jon Moxley, Warner would be the first man to beat the champ since July 21st of last year. There is one question to the algebra of this situation though: if Mancer does beat Moxley to earn a championship match, and Jericho defeats Jon in their August 10th championship match, will “The Wizard” honor the results of this Eliminator Match?

FRIDAY NIGHT STREET FIGHT…

AEW World Tag Team Champions Swerve In Our Glory (Keith Lee & Swerve Strickland)

vs.

Josh Woods & Tony Nese

“Smart” Mark Sterling and Tony Nese are nothing if not relentless. It seems as if Nese has never forgotten, nor forgiven, losing to Swerve in Strickland’s first AEW match back in March, and has used any means necessary to try and rid AEW of Swerve. He and Sterling tried a petition that, despite allegedly garnering sufficient signatures, ultimately went nowhere after Nese failed to defeat Orange Cassidy in a match where, if OC lost, he’d have to sign.

The pair even tried to stack the odds against Swerve in a Handicap Match where Keith Lee was banned from ringside, and still they couldn’t get the job done as Strickland topped “Smart” Mark to win that one. At least, if nothing else, there always seems to be plans-within-plans for the Law Offices of Mark Sterling because, while Swerve was occupied with that bout, former ROH Pure Champion Josh Woods was busy laying out “Limitless” Keith Lee on behalf of Tony Nese and Sterling.

That assault has now brought us to this Friday Night Street Fight between the four men, no championship on the line as this is just the second-ever teaming for Nese and Woods following Thursday’s Dark: Elevation special, but individually they are both such threats that united “The Goods” and “The Premier Athlete” could make a strong run at the AEW World Tag Team Titles. A bid for those championship belts could start right here on Rampage with a victory over the champs, but if the tide is in favor of Swerve In Our Glory, and they shut down Nese and Woods, perhaps Swerve can finally be free of the machinations of “Smart” Mark Sterling and his ilk!

AN ELITE DEBUT…

Madison Rayne vs. Leila Grey

It was recently announced by All Elite Wrestling that Madison Rayne would be joining the AEW coaching staff in the women’s division, starting with Wednesday night’s Dynamite that took place in her hometown of Columbus. Now this Friday night with Rampage, Rayne will make her in-ring debut of AEW as part of the live broadcast from Grand Rapids, MI and the Van Andel Arena!

Rayne comes to AEW with over fifteen years of wrestling experience under her belt, across numerous professional wrestling promotions such as ROH, IMPACT, OVW, HWA, and JAPW, to name a few. During the course of her career, Madison has held multiple championship titles, including status as a 5-Time Women’s World Champion, and in those battles she has faced competitors quite familiar to AEW audiences like Mercedes Martinez, Dr. Britt Baker, Kiera Hogan, Thunder Rosa, and Serena Deeb, just to name a few.

With so much experience under her belt, Rayne should be considered an immediate threat to any competitor she faces, and an inevitable challenger to either (or both) the AEW Women’s World Champion or the TBS Champion. In addition, Layne’s knowledge will prove invaluable as a coach to all those looking to learn from an athlete who has experienced as much as her since breaking into wrestling back in 2005

The Friday night action returns with a LIVE Rampage featuring AEW Interim World Champion Jon Moxley in action, the AEW World Tag Team Champions in action, and the All Elite Wrestling debut of Madison Rayne! The action starts at 10:00pm EDT/9:00pm CDT on TNT, as well as at AEWPlus.com for our international audiences, so make sure to visit the official AEW YouTube channel to get caught up with Dynamite highlights, two episodes of Dark: Elevation, AEW Dark, Road To, and this week’s Control Center with Tony Schiavone! And do not miss out Saturday night when Battle of the Belts III gets underway on TNT at 8pm EDT with the ROH World Title, the TNT Title, and the AEW Women’s World Title all at stake!

Article source: allelitewrestling.com