Powell’s AEW Double or Nothing Hit List: Will Ospreay vs. Hangman Page and Mercedes Mone vs. Jamie Hayter in the finals of the Owen Hart Cup tournaments, Anarchy in the Arena

By Jason Powell, ProWrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)

AEW Double or Nothing Hits

Will Ospreay vs. Hangman Page in the Owen Hart Foundation men’s tournament final: An outstanding match with a finish that surprised me. I thought Ospreay would win since he announced his involvement in the tournament, though the build to the final match left me less confident in that prediction by the week. I’m cool with Page winning and challenging Jon Moxley for the AEW World Championship at All In Texas. I just hope they aren’t waiting too long to go with Ospreay as the world champion. There’s a chance that the wait could make an eventual AEW World Championship win more special, but there’s also a chance that fans cool on Ospreay before they get to the big moment. Nevertheless, this was a classic main event with some terrific near falls that packed a punch due to the uncertainty of the outcome.

Kenny Omega, Swerve Strickland, Powerhouse Hobbs, Samoa Joe, Katsuyori Shibata, and Willow Nightingale vs. Jon Moxley, Matthew Jackson, Nicholas Jackson, Claudio Castagnoli, Wheeler Yuta, and Marina Shafir in an Anarchy in the Arena match: This type of match isn’t really for me, but it was the best Anarchy in the Arena match to date. There were some Hits and Misses throughout the match itself. Playing of The Pointer Sisters’ “I’m So Excited” was hilarious. Drowning Pool’s “Bodies” was a great choice as the main theme, but they really should have stopped playing it after the second airing. I could have done without the Young Bucks wearing Revolutionary War-themed gear while comedically playing up their Founding Fathers’ status. That would have been fun on an episode of Dynamite, but it felt out of place in a hardcore war. The big brawl clearly clicked with the live crowd, and this was probably a blast to see in person. I remember how crazy fans went when Kevin Sullivan and Chris Benoit would brawl into the crowd and into the concourse area on WCW Nitro back in the day, and they do that in this match with a double-digit number of wrestlers spread out in various places. Here’s hoping they find a way to give the match some actual stakes. How about the person who gets the deciding pin or submission earns a title shot of their choosing? That would make the match feel a little more important, and they could even have some fun creatively with some teammates being at odds over who gets the pin or submission.

Mercedes Mone vs. Jamie Hayter in the Owen Hart Foundation women’s tournament final: A strong opening match. The outcome felt predictable, but only because it sets up the logical showdown match between Mone and Toni Storm for the All In Texas event. Here’s hoping that there’s a bounce-back plan for Hayter.

Toni Storm vs. Mina Shirakawa for the AEW Women’s Championship: Predictability was also a factor in this match, but it was also entertaining enough to land in the Hit section. It’s bizarre that there was no mention of Mariah May during the build to the match, given her history with both wrestlers. It makes no difference if the rumors are true that May is WWE-bound once her contract expires. She’s still under contract, so why not get as much out of her as possible before she leaves?

Kazuchika Okada vs. Mike Bailey for the AEW Continental Championship: This was one of Okada’s better AEW matches, but Bailey’s hard work was the primary reason. It’s a shame the match was just sort of thrown together and felt like it could have been a strong Collision main event as opposed to being a bit lost in the shuffle in the pay-per-view lineup (more on that later). But the actual match stood out from the crowded field, and that closing spot with Bailey going for the Ultima Weapon and being dropkicked in midair by Okada was perfectly timed.

Ricochet vs. Mark Briscoe in a stretcher match: I’m not sure why Briscoe went crazy with the blade job. Sure, a little blood enhanced the match, but he went overboard with a full crimson mask. I believe the storyline reason was that it somehow occurred when Ricochet slammed Briscoe’s face on the stretcher after the pad was removed, which doesn’t seem like something that would open a gusher. Putting that aside, this was one of the better stretcher/ambulance matches I’ve seen. Okay, so that’s not saying a lot, but it was an entertaining match, and it was good to see Ricochet get a needed win.

AEW Double or Nothing Misses

Kyle Fletcher, Konosuke Takeshita, and Josh Alexander vs. “The Paragon” Adam Cole, Roderick Strong, and Kyle O’Reilly: A needless buffer match that played to a crowd that was still coming down from Anarchy in the Arena. Rather than waste a match to let the crowd catch their breath, why not go to an extended preview of the main event? Five or ten minutes dedicated to the broadcast team and others speaking as they typically do in boxing and UFC events would make the main event feel special and give the crowd a chance to come down. AEW’s nonstop matches approach to pay-per-views is grueling and simply too much of a good thing.

Bobby Lashley and Shelton Benjamin vs. Dustin Rhodes and Sammy Guevara for the AEW Tag Team Titles: I can’t get over MVP making the babyfaces sound terrible by claiming on commentary that they didn’t want to put their ROH Tag Team Titles on the line in a title vs. title match. What purpose did that line serve? It was also strange that AEW never bothered to advertise that MJF would appear in the corner of Lashley and Benjamin. No one took Rhodes and Guevara as serious threats to beat Lashley and Benjamin, and this felt like a television match.

“FTR” Dax Harwood and Cash Wheeler vs. Nigel McGuinness and Daniel Garcia: A soft Miss. This was the best match of those that landed in the Miss section, but it’s sad to see this rare in-ring appearance of McGuinness treated like undercard fodder. Sure, it’s main event material on Collision, but the quiet live crowd seems to suggest that a significant portion of the AEW audience isn’t watching the B-show. Perhaps that would change if AEW worked harder to make Collision feel important.

Marathon Show: I hoped that Tony Khan’s thrill of producing pay-per-view events would simmer down just enough that he would stop holding marathon shows. Unfortunately, he’s moving in the wrong direction, as the last two shows have both surpassed the old midnight Eastern end time. In this case, Double or Nothing was a six-hour show if you count the needlessly long pre-show. It’s good that Khan showed some discipline by only having two matches on the pre-show, but is there really a need for a 90-minute pre-show? And, yes, I’m well aware that WWE holds two-hour pre-shows, which are also needlessly long. The difference is that WWE pre-shows rarely feature matches these days, so they don’t contribute to the live crowd burning out late in the show. Less is more in some cases. Khan could have cut any match listed in the Miss section, along with the AEW Continental Championship match, and turned them into television matches that look better than anything currently advertised for tonight’s Dynamite. I really enjoyed Double or Nothing, but it would have been even better had Khan trimmed some of the fat.