AEW Five Fingers of Death 2/2 - 2/8

AEW Collision 2/7/26

Parking Lot Brawl: Eddie Kingston/Ortiz/Zachary Wentz/Dezmond Xavier vs James Drake/Zack Gibson/Big Bill/Bryan Keith

Here's the thing about pro wrestling. It's like life. It doesn't end. It doesn't have off-season. You can shut your eyes but it doesn't go away. It's still there. It's always there. It's always pulling and prodding you. It's always tugging you. It's always pulling you back into the ring.

Eddie Kingston had finally done it all. 

Before that though, he had been on the verge of selling his boots, of giving it up, (of being free), during the pandemic, but he cut a promo with nothing to lose and it opened the last door left for him.

Behind that door? At first, nothing. An opportunity. Not even fans in seats. But he made the most of it, made his mark, and when the world started back up again, it welcomed him with a loving roar.

So he fought and climbed and scraped, and it was all rewarded. He met his idols. He even battled against some of them. He won New Japan gold. He defeated his hated rival to win the ROH title. He put that on the line against all of his enemies and one of his few friends and he triumphed in the first Continental Classic. Top of the world. He earned the American Dragon's respect.

A wonderful end to an embattled story. 

But pro wrestling never ends. Life goes on and it's so damn hard. He lost one title after the next. He lost his ability to walk. He lost a year and a half of his career. 

And yet, here he is, back once again. 

Wrestling saved his life. It gave him purpose. It gave him direction. It gave him a way out from a far darker fate. And the price he paid for all that? Only everything that he ever was and ever will be. That's pro wrestling for you.

It's just like life. You can have amazing moments, weddings, the birth of your child, promotions, but the Earth doesn't care. It's going to keep spinning. The sun isn't going to care. It's going to rise the next day. 

Over time, we get old. Some things get easier.

Getting up? That's not one of them. 

Eddie Kingston is 44 years old. Something they don't tell you at 14 or 24 or even 34 is how hard 44 can be. At some point, it becomes harder to sleep through the night without having to pee. At some point, it becomes harder to just sit up. To roll out of bed. To bend down to tie those shoes. And that's without a lifetime of getting battered around the ring.

Eddie knows it. Eddie shows it. He needs to fight, hell, want to fight, but he wants finality too. When it's time for something to be over, for a grief to be settled, he wants it to be over. He's even managed it since his return. He somehow managed to move on from LFI without facing RUSH. 

He couldn't move on from the GYV though. They wouldn't let him. 

They've been off in their little corner of the world waging a private war. Eddie came out of his match with Samoa Joe wanting to stretch, wanting to show what he still had left in the tank, so he ran right through Nathan Cruz, a young associate of Drake and Gibson. That drew their ire so he fought his way past one and the next. No shame to either. They've been tagging. He's Eddie Kingston. They gave him a fight. He was ready to move on.

They didn't let him. 

Instead, they ambushed him after the Gibson match, and it was up to Ortiz to return to make the save. Ortiz and Eddie beat them with the help of an errant (more like purposeful) madball. Eddie was ready to be done. They weren't. Wrestling's wrestling though. You fight long enough and you're going to draw others into your circle. A magnetic pull, the sweet allure of violence.

So we have the Rascalz helping their Uncle Eddie and Bill and Keith bounty hunting their way beside GYV.

A parking lot, but not the claustrophobic garage attached to Daily's Place. They're up on the rooftop, the Vegas skyline behind them. 

Room to move. Room to breathe. Room to wage war.

And war they did wage. This had all the bells and whistles of cinematic pro wrestling. The Rascalz got to show off, leaping off cars, pulling Keith into a limo to smoke him out. They bled, a baptism by fire in their second match. Welcome to AEW. Hope you survive the experience.

And of course Bill was Bill. This was a perfect showcase for him. When he pressed a Rascal over the limo, it looked like we were back in 1995 and he had tossed him right off the building. Then, giant that he is, he leaned back the car, took his jacket off and brought a foot up so Eddie could run right into it. 

So yeah, while it may not have had the emotional stakes of some of the previous parking lot brawls, it had the right mix of chaos and creativity, of broken glass and nasty bumps. At one point Isla Dawn came out and it sort of made you wonder why she didn't come out earlier or later and why Reed came out only to counter her. They'd just been hiding behind cars the whole time? You say it's fun and not to question these things, but if someone had questioned and came up with an answer, everything could have been tighter and still just as fun. 

In the end, during the DDT that won the match, but well before it, certainly after it, the camera found Eddie. He's a photogenic bastard in his own way. Why? Because he's the must human wrestler there is. Maybe the most human wrestler that ever was. The pain, the agony, the effort, it all just radiates off of him, the consequence that gives pro wrestling meaning and weight.

When Eddie wants to wrap up a backstage interview, wants to get out of the ring and get back to he hotel, wants to avoid all the bullshit that everyone has to go through in order to put pro wrestling on tv, it's not because he doesn't care. He spends his whole life caring. He cares too much. When that bell rings, no one cares like Eddie does. 

It's that he's spent. He's tired. He hurts. He aches. Inside and out. The eyes reach the soul and the soul is a weary thing.

But still he fights on, because life keeps coming at all of us and it comes at him more than anyone. Scowl on his face, muttering all the way, letting out a groan that we can feel in our gut, Eddie Kingston will fight on, and hey, if he can fight on, then so can we. That realization, more than anything else, is what makes him so precious and special in a world that gets harder for all of us each and every day. Just maybe don't tell him that, because that's the last thing he wants to hear. Life's hard enough without having to inspire people.

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NXT UK Worth Watching: Dar! Dawn! Niven! Seven!

Noam Dar vs. Trent Seven NXT UK 9/1 (Aired 9/25/19) (Ep. #61)

ER: Dar is a really annoying guy, but he also works stiff, and a really annoying guy who kicks really hard while annoying you is a great heel character. Dar also never shies away from a beating, so we had this great situation where Seven was returning after a few months and Dar kept taunting him, so Seven just started hitting Dar harder and harder. That's a great way to work a match. Dar gets too cocky with his taunting and every single time it lead to him eating a harder lariat and it was great. Dar works quick around Seven, bites him, yanks at his beard, annoying shit. Seven lands with a thud on a nice crossbody and hits a nice senton, but Dar is always really slippery and great at twisting things back to his advantage, and before long he's throwing hard kicks and uppercuts, crotches Seven on the top rope and kicks him in the collarbones. Dar keeps not only mocking Seven, but Tyler Bate as well, and winds up eating a nasty DDT going for a Tyler driver. Seven hits a nice tope and I really enjoyed the work around Seven's lariats. Dar makes Seven's 7 Star lariat look better than ever, running into it like a garage door got slammed onto his head. Dar kicks Seven's arm on another attempt and hits a nice lariat of his own, then rubs Sevens towel on his balls before getting hit with an even harder lariat. Dar pisses off Seven so much that Seven pounds away on him after that second lariat and goes on long enough to get DQ'd. Nobody really loves count out or DQ finishes, but NXT UK has been good at working strong DQ finishes on TV matches. I really liked the Joe Coffey/Dave Mastiff fight that ended with both guys counted out, and this was a cool match long story of Dar being the expert troll and chipping away at Seven until Seven snapped. A DQ felt inevitable in some ways and this was a satisfying conclusion here. 

Isla Dawn vs. Piper Niven NXT UK 9/1 (Aired 10/3/19) (Ep. #62)

ER: This was really cool, a slower more deliberate match with gritty matwork that we haven't seen in NXT UK women's matches. Niven always wants to work these modern go go go matches where the sequences seem too rehearsed, and Niven can't actually get up off the mat in time to keep the timing right. This was different. The mat and limb work is slow but satisfying, Niven working over Niven's arm and little micro swings in control. None of it ever builds to a stupid forearm exchange or mapped out reversals wrestling, just some smothering matwork with a few bursts of offense in between. Niven's slams had more purpose because Dawn wasn't getting up and running into her own next move, they were just planting her into the mat. Simple bodyslams, and then hitting something signature like her low crossbody. I like how Niven sold all of Dawn's strikes, and Dawn threw some sharp elbows before Niven would try to smother her again. Niven worked a cool straitjacket choke, but it's always interesting because it's never just Dawn sitting in the move in agony. Dawn pulls limbs out, fights against it, and it always looks difficult for Niven to hold onto. Dawn comes back with an awesome Saito suplex that Niven sells by staggering to her feet, then getting put down with a running Dawn knee. Dawn's suplex looked awesome and the ways she came back against the larger Niven were strong and believable, but I loved how Niven decided to stop fucking around and just grabbed Dawn by the hair and headbutted her. This was a little gem that was not worked how I was expecting it to be.

COMPLETE GUIDE TO NXT UK

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NXT UK Matches Worth Watching: Devlin! Gallus! Ripley! Isla Dawn! Mustache!

Rhea Ripley vs. Isla Dawn NXT UK 10/14 (Aired 12/19/18) (Ep. #17)

ER: Strongly worked women's title match with a nice build and no overkill, plus a ton of very engaging headlocks and collar elbows. Their lockups looked really good and both looked like they were putting full weight into them, and both leaned really heavily into every chinlock, headlock, and submission. Ripley was really pressing her weight on a grounded chinlock and Dawn's standing side headlock looked really wrenching. This was the toughest Ripley has looked so far and she looked really dominant stomping the hell out of a collapsed Dawn in the corner. Her kicks, clubbing strikes, and then cool low angle Saito suplex all send Dawn folding in believable ways, and they never lose that sense of actually working for a move. Dawn fights out of another suplex but gets locked in the standing cloverleaf. Ripley had fought to get the cloverleaf earlier and got kicked off, and I loved how that played out because it actually looked like Ripley stumbled getting it on which gave Dawn the opening to kick her off. This time there was no fumble and she was able to lock it in convincingly, leading to a nice rope break (with Ripley awesomely kicking Dawn's rope grab arm after she broke the hold). Dawn's comeback looks good, she brings sharp elbows with her full body being thrown into them, dodges Ripley's dropkick and gets to run hard into the ringpost. I really didn't love the standing exchange, thought the strikes were the weakest part of the match, and thought the exchange felt totally out of place within the match they had been working. But I liked Dawn returning the Saito suplex favor with a nice one of her own, and I liked how succinct the finish was. Oddly, the middling strike exchange did a nice job of setting up the sudden finish, with Dawn again going back to standing kicks and missing, leaving her wide open to getting her arm trapped and then getting planted with the Riptide. 

Jordan Devlin vs. Kenny Williams NXT UK 11/24 (Aired 12/26/18) (Ep. #19)

ER: Devlin has been unexpectedly good at these 5 minute matches with interesting stories and satisfying internal builds. Devlin worked this like a squash and loudly kicked and elbowed Williams around the ring, and it made Williamses' big comeback come off huge. Devlin worked quick on the beating, with that same Dynamite Kid-style domestic bully speed, pursuant. If Williams would spill to the floor Devlin would just out immediately after him to beat on him some more. And when Williams started firing back Devlin put that same energy into bumping hard to the floor, and starting it all off by catching kneebone right to the balls as Williams counter the standing shooting star. Williams hit a great tope, running around the ring determined to do the dive no matter where Devlin was going. But Devlin was not down for long and always came back more vicious than before. He catches and throws Williams with a half nelson suplex that has a very non-WWE allowed arc to it, and yanks Williams by the arm into a sick Saito suplex. Williams has a lot of offense that requires his opponent to be in a specific place and that leads to hitches and phoniness in his matches, but Devlin is really great at anticipating his marks and because of that brought about the best Kenny Williams match so far. 

Wolfgang/Mark Coffey vs. Tyler Bate/Trent Seven NXT UK 11/24 (Aired 1/2/19) (Ep. #21)

ER: I always heard NXT UK crowds were quiet, but apparently nobody else is watching loud main event tag matches like this one. The crowd kept getting louder and louder for a Trent comeback as Gallus kept holding him down with awesome bearhugs and body vices. I thought this was a standout performance from Wolfgang and Coffey, both working convincing bearhugs without losing any of the drama. I'm someone who's already going to be interested in long grounded bearhug sequences, so getting two from Wolfgang and one from Coffey is going to make me happy. Coffey is really mean whenever he tags in to work over Seven, really laying in some forearms and even driving a fist into a kidney. The crowd gets rightly invested in Seven fighting closer and closer to making tags, Gallus great at cutting him off and laying in boots. Seven gets tossed rudely to the floor by Wolfgang, and when Coffey goes out to retrieve him he catches a hard surprise vertical suplex on the floor from Seven. Seven tags in and Bate runs through both with a nice hot tag, hitting a pair of topes, including one that would have sent him into the 2nd or 3rd row if Coffey hadn't slowed him down. I do think Bate's hot tag goes on a bit long and has a couple of his strongman spots that requires opponents to get into tough positions naturally. This one was wearing Coffey as a backpack and while also German suplexing Wolfgang. That's a tough spot to make Gallus get plausibly into position for that, but the crowd eats it up and it gets a genuine (loud) NXT chant. There's some ringside distraction from Joe Coffey and Pete Dunne and the vibe the match had been building to kind of went out the window, but overall this was a good tag. NXT UK has been kind of light on quality tag wrestling so far, their best matches clearly leaning towards main even singles and hot 5 minute singles. But Mark Coffey and Wolfgang seem to be the reason for the best stuff so far, the ones that have the best heel tag shtick for babyfaces to work off. 

COMPLETE GUIDE TO NXT UK

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Mae Young Classic 2018 Episode 4

Rachel Evers vs. Hiroyo Matsumoto

ER: I thought this was cool. It got a lot of time for a 1st round match and was worked differently than all the other matches we've seen so far. For a crowd who was completely in the bag for Kairi Sane last year, and were clearly well aware of who Meiko was this year, Matsumoto didn't really get much of a reaction in this one. Evers was over huge with the local crowd, and it just made them really silent for Matsumoto, which was really surprising. I thought both looked good, liked Evers with an early shot to the shins and a nice low dropkick to the face; Matsumoto was pretty mean, dropped double knees to the stomach, both threw some hard shots and I especially liked their standing flat footed lariats, and the fans stayed really into Evers. Evers hit a nice senton and a cool twisting legdrop off the ropes. I wasn't expecting Evers to get the loss, but Matsumoto really did launch her with some big throws, a nice German, big powerbomb, and a vicious Saito suplex. This was good, probably best non-Meiko match of the 1st round.

Jessie Elaban vs. Taynara Conti

ER: Oh jeez, this is the first I'm seeing of Jessie Elaban and after that promo package I am one gigantic NOPE on her. Nobody at all needs that "I'm SUCH a NERRRRD!" try hard nonsense. "I'm such a klutz and nerd, I have these comically large glasses that I wear and I've seen THREE Star Wars movies! I'm attainable, and sometimes I just lie on my tummy and kick my legs in the air as if I was on my bed talking on the phone about boys I like!" I want Conti to snap her in half. And NO just in case anybody is thinking it, I have not ever had my heart broken by someone who would ever be considered "adorkable". This girl just immediately rubbed me the wrong way, like when Chili's tried to hip up their "baby back ribs" song. This woman has all the charm of a Kars 4 Kids jingle. But I liked the match. Elaban predictably didn't work at all like she described, but she had a cool high kick and a nice senton. Conti was real vicious in this, going after the arm in a few cool ways, bending it over the ring ropes, bending Elaban's wrist at rough angles, and slicing Elaban's finger webbing (finger crotch?) over the ropes. The arm stuff didn't really go anywhere, and Elaban didn't really acknowledge it much, but I liked the journey. Conti was pretty new last year, and she's made some nice strides. Aside from the arm work she had a couple of great judo throws, and a cool moment where she sidestepped Elaban and kind of hotshotted her, looked cool.

Nicole Matthews vs. Isla Dawn

ER: This had some good moments, but was also fairly messy. Some of the messiness worked, some of it made things look like a mess. I like Matthews as a kind of lesser Tessa Blanchard bully, though there were moments where set-up was clunky. Possibly Dawn's fault, not sure. Matthews has personality though, beyond "I'm going to win this tournament!" and that's important. Kicking at Dawn's back while talking trash gives her a little something the others don't have. I liked Dawn kicking Matthews' arm in the ropes, her Saito suplex looked good, Angle slam looked sloppy but effective, but this thing was all sorts of disjointed. The match ending Lion Tamer by Matthews looked good, but again, several things here looked good. There just wasn't really any kind of flow.

Xia Brookside vs. Io Shirai

ER: How the heck did I not do the math on who Brookside's dad was when I saw her last name? And this is somehow the first time he's seen her wrestle? That's...weird. Did they really say that? That makes no sense. This was an Io showcase but Brookside got a lot: Her forearms to start looked good, rattling hard into Shirai's collarbones, her chinbreaker looked good, she had no problem leaning into Shirai's strikes. Shirai came off like a star, but really a lot of her offense here was made by Brookside having no problem getting kicked or taking knees to the face. Even Shirai's match finishing moonsault came up a bit short, meaning Brookside took knees right to the gut. Shirai is good, and has a good chance of delivering in subsequent rounds, but Brookside has a ton of potential going forward and will no doubt be in NXT any day now.

ER: Second round starts next week, and I'm optimistic it will deliver some quality. After the Meiko match, most of the rest of the first round saw some good individual performances without there being many actual good matches. Evers/Matsumoto was a bright 1st rounder from tonight, probably the best non-Meiko match so far.

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