AEW Five Fingers of Death 8/3 - 8/9 Part 1

ROH TV 8/6/26

Eddie Kingston/Ortiz vs RPG Vice (Trent Baretta/Rocky Romero) 

MD: Where's Eddie Kingston?

Oh, well, have you seen Eddie Kingston lately? He had had a bad leg injury. 

Yeah, well, I have seen Eddie Kingston. I saw him vs Joe. I saw him vs Charli. I saw him in Germany vs Tihanyi and in London against Manders and in 8 man action on ROH. I haven't seen him again Cannon and Hot Sauce though but he's done that too. 

As I write this on Friday, the day after ROH aired, he's about to face Mason and then he'll be back on AEW TV in the Continental Cup against Doyle (edit: I'll hit that next week, but we all saw him there).   

So I have seen Eddie Kingston and I can speak to Eddie Kingston. One thing I can say, without a doubt, that there's no scenario more compelling for the sometimes fascinating and always frustrating morass that is Jon Moxley's last year than to see him interact with Eddie Kingston.

But that's beside the point. 

The point is that Eddie is right here on ROH, teaming with Ortiz against RPG Vice. This was set up by Eddie and Ortiz talking about how they want to face the hungry young talents and by RPG Vice saying they just wanted an easy win. It was set up by RPG Vice being taken by surprise by Warner and Zayne and Eddie and Ortiz making the save post match. 

It's on ROH TV. It's studio wrestling. It feels like wrestling for the sake of wrestling. It hits just right.

What it feels like, and I mean this in the best way possible, is 1997-8 WCW Saturday Night where you'd have the NWO B-Team facing off against Rick Steiner and ... let's say Brad Armstrong. I don't know if that specific match ever happened, but it's something which makes the world seem a little more vibrant and lived in, something with low but personal stakes. A skirmish in a broader war between the Don Callis Family and everyone else.

And in some ways, Eddie feels like Rick Steiner in 98. Still as over as can be. Still a presence. Still a Star. The fans would pay to see him. The fans would chant his name. He can get under someone and throw a suplex. He hits hard. And when first Rocky and then Trent tried to get in his face late match when he had the Stretch Plum on, one stare from Eddie had as much of an effect on a crowd as ten moves from someone else.

He's credible. People believe in him. 

A great booker could make magic out of that. I think there are only two or three guys on the roster that can move a crowd the same way (Bandido, Briscoe, and maybe Hangman though that's frayed a bit). 

A matchmaker though? That makes it a little trickier. But I think the answer remains true, because I saw the Manders match and the Joe match and I especially saw the Evans match. I can imagine Eddie against any member of the Death Riders and what that could look like with the right positioning and the right framing? 

Do I think he could have Omega vs Okada or Komander vs Dorada or Fletcher vs Ospreay right now? No. But they're already on the roster, more or less. Do I think Omega vs Kingston would be special? Yes. Do I think Fletcher vs Kingston would be special? Yes. Do I think Moxley vs Kingston would be special? I think there isn't a match the company could currently put on that would be as potentially special if it was framed by Kingston calling Mox out like no one else could. MJF vs Kingston is up there as well. It'd have a different flavor than MJF vs Briscoe. 

Do I think that there's a heel run in Eddie where he could base for all other guys in those equations? Yeah, I do think that too. World got away from him. Chip on his shoulder. Fans love him but I think he could get heat if anyone could. He stands out as different on a roster which has so many overlaps, but he could still interface with those guys in so many compelling ways.

Ortiz worked the brunt of this one. It had multiple bits of heat with multiple comebacks, a fairly unconventional style. Trent and Rocky's arrogance caused them to slip up once or twice. It was compelling. It had the crowd. There were Eddie chants. There was even a This is Awesome chant. It felt longer than it was, but not in a bad way. It felt like it could have gone either way. There were a few very specific things that Eddie did (a hand sell after a Gotch Pile Driver, turning his head at the start of the match in surprise as the fans chanted for him, the way he handled those Stretch Plum moments) that were as good as what anyone else in the world is doing. Post match, RPG Vice got their heat back laying out Eddie and Ortiz and then Eddie in the back (with Mance and Ortiz with him), cut the most human, believable, compelling promo I heard all month, just like that. Again, it felt like the NWO B-Team and some people will tell you that's a problem, but not me. There was real utility to those guys doing their things in their own way on Saturday Night, a big fish in a smaller pond making the world feel more lived in. 

So where's Eddie? He's right here, and if you can't see the unique value he offers in 2026, it's you who have a small idea of what pro wrestling is and what pro wrestling can be. 

 Athena vs Janai Kai [Proving Ground]

MD: I came into this one thinking it wouldn't be too unlike the "Athena In Action" match on Collision a few weeks ago against Ava Everett. I thought Athena did a good job there emotionally selling Everett getting one over on her and surviving one of her moves, even if she didn't give her much offense.  

Hierarchy matters in my mind. Yes, I know you can have Omega give a long match to Angels or Flair to Mike Jackson or whatever and they could be good and they might even still serve purpose, but maybe they're almost too good for what is needed for the big picture and maybe they could serve a more important purpose in a better way. The more over someone is, the more established they are, the more dangerous and protected they are presented, the less it takes to get an opponent something tangible with them.

There are people who will disagree with me on the balance. It works the other way as well. The more a heel like Athena gives her opponent, the more it means when she goes over them. Theoretically, there's a balance where she gives a lot and that puts over both the opponent and Athena. But how much was Ava Everett supposed to get over on her? How much did Athena need to show Everett was an opponent worth facing? It's a balance, right? And I think the balance for Everett was different than the balance for, let's say Persephone or Maya World, and somewhere in the middle, you have Kai.

Athena started the match (post left handed dainty handshake, of course) with a lock up. When she didn't get her way she immediately stepped on Kai's exposed foot and got a headlock out of it. Already, it raises a flag. Why would Athena have to go to such lengths. Kai lifted her leg for momentum and turned things around. Athena got the better of the exchange and mocked Kai for being called the Kick Demon. Kai came back with a kick. Athena ducked away in a panic, barely dodging it, and then jumped into Billie's arms on the outside. Athena, on her way back in, started immediately in on the legs, showing how dangerous she felt Kai was and how seriously she was taking her.

If Kai got nothing else the entire match, that would have been substantial. She got Athena to go dirty early. She got her to scurry out. She got her to treat her like an actual threat. Considering the hierarchy difference, that's actually a lot. It's a ton. Yes, Kai is a name to those who pay attention. She's been featured on MLW. She's a unique wrestler. But she's 0-8 in ROH coming into this match. If she didn't get a single piece of offense in the rest of the match, she'd still come out looking better than she came in just for putting Athena on her back foot and making her take her seriously.

But they seem to be pushing her towards a bigger role and she ended up getting quite a bit more, coming back with kicks, forcing Athena to pull the hair, forcing Billie to get involved on the apron, surviving a nasty curb stomp, and then only losing because Billie intervened with the title belt. Maybe she would have lost anyway, but you got the sense she was going to survive the ten minutes. 

With just that first bit, she would have come out better off, entirely on the strength of her own confidence and Athena's ability to let things get to her and give things emotional resonance, to cash in on the value she has banked up over the last many years. But by giving Kai all the more (and by Kai taking it for her performance matters here just as much), she came out of this with a post-match promo and a match with Billie ahead of her and it all feels entirely credible. Details matter and the details here worked exactly as they were supposed to. 

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