AEW Five Fingers of Death 1/1 - 1/7

AEW Collision 1/6/23

Darby Allin/Sting vs. Workhorsemen

MD: I was going to start this one with "Everything has to matter." I'm not quite sure I can get away with that though. I mean, I probably can. If you're reading this, you know what you're in for. I'm already sparing you guys another dissertation on how the commercial break saved Darby vs. Takeshita from itself (you're welcome). I just think sometimes it's worth spelling this stuff out lest it get overlooked in the sea of sensation and innovation, right? 

This was a short match full of things mattering. Let's lead with purpose. Why does this match exist? They wanted to get Sting in front of the Charlotte crowd one last time. They wanted to heat things up a bit for the Takeshita/Hobbs match. Maybe it was a bit of an achievement award for the Workhorsemen too, to be in their home base and up against a lifelong hero. It was there to start the show off hot, maybe even to help with the first quarter rating? In and out in ten minutes with Flair and Sting/Darby's entrance, outroing to a video package for Wednesday's tag, with their promo coming later in the show. So you can't just have Sting and Darby run over the Workhorsemen, but you couldn't have the Workhorsemen take too much of it either. You needed a wedge, a point a reason. You needed Stan Hansen smashing his arm into the post on the outside and then having his arm worked over by someone who needed a wedge to get the advantage and stay in it. 

It all has to matter. Hierarchy has to matter. An ambush before the match has to matter. Henry's slick skill and Drake's size and timing have to matter. Sting's preternatural ability to stand up to a chair without flinching and Darby's preternatural ability to take endless amounts of punishment have to matter. Darby fighting from underneath has to matter. Henry's ability to cut him off has to matter. The potential of a guy Drake's size flipping feet over head and landing with all of his weight from the top rope has to matter. The impact of that missing has to matter. Darby's dive from the top to the floor has to matter, and Sting being able to destroy someone twice his size with the Stinger Splash and Scorpion Death Drop, well, it has to matter.

And they nailed it. The ambush created the wedge but not without having to overcome Sting being Sting (which allowed for a tremendously short shine on the outside given the overall length of the match). That wedge, combined with Henry's skill, was just enough to sweep Darby out on the apron and take out Sting's leg. Darby immediately fought back but was cut off in the ring. It built to Drake going for and missing the moonsault, and then Sting taking care of business on Drake while Darby hit the coffin drop to the floor on Henry, taking him out of the match. The Workhorsemen are great. This match could have been greater with another five or ten minutes. It wasn't supposed to be a "great match," though. That wasn't its purpose. For one thing, they couldn't overshadow the main event. This was to be a celebratory moment of Sting (and Flair) in Charlotte, with just enough friction and tension to make it feel earned and worthwhile for the crowd that got to enjoy it. They don't give out stars for that, but everyone in this one absolutely shined for what they were set out to accomplish.

Eddie Kingston vs. Trent Barretta

MD: As I've written about (at length, it feels like), we've generally seen Eddie Kingston as ROH champ ace, primarily in Proving Ground matches against younger competitors. We've seen him grow into the next evolution of that role during the Continental Classic, getting torn down so he could build himself back up. In this, his first defense of the newly formed Crown, he came in poised and centered and up against, interestingly enough, someone who had his own chip on his own shoulder. 

Eddie has a few years on Trent, but you can argue, quite easily I'd add, that Trent had outpaced Eddie throughout much of his career. He made it into WWE developmental, and even won titles there. He made it onto the main roster, even if without a big splash. He was a champion in New Japan. He was a debut AEW talent. Yet here, after Eddie's ascendant year, Trent failed to capitalize big opportunity after big opportunity after big opportunity. 

So he came in swinging against Eddie, who held back, game and ready. He got a few shots in early, but in a lot of ways, it felt like Trent was wrestling as Eddie had in the past. He was wrestling to prove his toughness, to prove that he fit in, to prove that he deserved to be there. He wasn't wrestling to win. Suddenly, Eddie wasn't just a guy carrying a brand or a roster or a show up on his shoulders. He was the bar. Somewhere along the line over the last tumultuous, hard-fought months, Eddie had taken that "Proving Ground" moniker and made it something real. He was the paragon, the iron that honed iron, the symbol of excellence for professional wrestling.

And Trent needed to throw everything he had at him in order to show the world (and his mom) that he belonged. Unfortunately, that didn't mean wrestling a perfect match but instead a chippy, aggressive one. It meant that Trent always had a show to fire back with, even maybe when he shouldn't. As Eddie was blasting him in the corner with the rapid fire chops, Trent was able to get a shot in. Eddie, almost reflexively, chopped him right between the eyes and opened him up. That took the tone of the first few minutes of the match and led them to doubling down on it. Trent wrestled Eddie's match, comported himself well along those lines, proved his toughness, proved that he belonged, proved that he could stand and fight with the best of them, and absolutely, unquestionable, undoubtedly lost, his nose busted open by the bar that he couldn't make it past, Eddie's chopping hand. One wonders if after the match Eddie might have looked in the mirror and saw in Trent who he had himself so recently been, but the answer is probably no. Eddie's the ace now. He can't look back, only forward, to Wednesday because he wants to keep the defenses coming.