It was just over a week ago when AEW held their annual All Out pay-per-view in front of thousands in Chicago, and millions watching around the world. The PPV should have been everything wrestling fans could dream of and more. Between the main PPV card and the Zero Hour card, All Out featured fifteen matches. Fifteen!! Yet, a mere eleven days have passed and it seems not many conversations surround the event remain. I get it, I live for the drama as much as anyone else. But as someone that was in the arena for the PPV, it’s a little mind-boggling that so many parts of the show have been overshadowed by the weeks events.
This is the part where I say if you’re confused, if you don’t know what in the world I’m talking about, this is where I say you’re living under a rock. Oh-kayyy Patrick Star, here’s what went down: newly crowned AEW World Champion performed his first championship duty and joined Tony Khan for the post-PPV- media scrum. This media scrum was unlike media scrums of the past. Meaning, not a single reporter got to ask a question before CM Punk went off the rails. You might be asking, isn’t the term “went off the rails a little harsh?” Personally, I think if you believe online rumors and proceed to degrade your EVPs and your fellow coworkers while putting down your boss (who’s sitting right next to you) in the process and then you physically confront said EVPs and coworkers for absolutely no reason, “off the rails,” is actually a very nice way of putting it.
It’s supposed to be a marvelous time in the professional wrestling world. We’re supposed to be focused on the wrestling. I’m not trying to dismiss what happened, it genuinely is a big story. But when backstage drama and politics cloud the incredible things happening in the ring, it’s really hard to enjoy what’s going on.
With the suspensions of Kenny Omega and the Young Bucks, and the unknown status of CM Punk, came new champions. That’s a little bit exciting I suppose. Jon Moxley’s promo last Wednesday seemed to reignite a fire in fans and his fellow coworkers- another good thing. Maybe this whole situation will turn out to be a good thing too. But isn’t a little infuriating that CM Punk had the whole world in his hands, and threw it all away over rumors? Rumors that several wrestling media personalities have proven false, by the way. Isn’t it infuriating that there’s so many moving parts to this story and so many people involved? I haven’t even mentioned Colt Cabana and Hangman Page. For the first day or two, the news was like a train wreck- so bad but you couldn’t look away. But now? Now that eleven days have passed since All Out and still nobody is talking about Eddie Kingston vs Tomohiro Ishii or Bryan Danielson vs Chris Jericho? It all seems very, very sad. What’s even sadder is the fact that the only thing to drown out the conversations of this fight and suspensions is the PWI 500 list.
Hooray! More negativity from wrestling fans!!
When did wrestling stop being about wrestling? When did backstage drama become big enough to overshadow a fifteen match card? How do we let rumors get in the way of the thing we supposedly love the most? How did we go from a media scrum full of big hugs and smiles to one that ended in suspensions of multiple top stars, and how can we get back to the former?
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