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ALL ELITE WRESTLING DYNAMITE PREVIEW 6/8: Hangman vs. Finlay, Championship Implications Abound as Battle Royal with Winner Facing Moxley, Max and The Gunn Club

BY FRANK PETEANI, PWTORCH.COM CONTRIBUTOR

June 7, 2022

SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)...

ALL ELITE WRESTLING DYNAMITE PREVIEW
JUNE 8, 2022
INDEPENDENCE, MO. AT THE CABLE DAHMER ARENA
AIRS ON TBS NETWORK, 8:00 p.m. EST, 7:00 p.m. CST
BY FRANK PETEANI (@FrankPeteani), PWTORCH.COM CONTRIBUTOR

Announcers: Excalibur, Tony Schiavone, Jim Ross

Last Week

  • AEW Champion CM Punk and ROH & AAA Tag Team Champions FTR (Dax Harwood & Cash Wheeler) defeated Max Caster of The Acclaimed & The Gunn Club (Austin & Colten). After the match CM Punk called out his challenger for Forbidden Door, which turned out to be New Japan Pro Wrestling’s Hiroshi Tanahashi.
  • MJF cut a long promo regarding his situation in AEW and demanded he be fired by Tony Khan. When he called him a f**king mark, his microphone was cut off. NOTE: The promo is not acknowledged by AEW in their “results” section. He is not listed as an active member of the roster, and you can’t find his merchandise on the Shop AEW website.
  • The returning Miro defeated Johnny Elite, who had issued an “Open Contract” Challenge.
  • William Regal, on behalf of Eddie Kingston, challenged Chris Jericho and his Jericho Appreciation Society to a Blood and Guts match. Jericho accepted; on the condition he have a Hair vs. Hair match with Ortiz who had attempted to cut Jericho’s hair.
  • ReDRagon (Bobby Fish & Kyle O’Reilly), The Young Bucks (Matt & Nick Jackson), and Hikuleo of New Japan Pro Wrestling’ Bullet Club defeated AEW Tag Team Champions Jurassic Express (Jungle Boy & Luchasaurus), Christian, Matt Hardy (with Jeff), and Darby Allin.
  • Tony Schiavone interviewed Athena, who stated her intention to pursue Jade Cargill and the TBS Championship. Like Double or Nothing, this turned into a standoff between Cargill and her Baddies (with Stokely Hathaway) and Athena & Kris Statlander & Anna Jay.
  • Wardlow defeated J.D. Drake.
  • Ruby Soho & Toni Storm defeated Dr. Britt Baker & Jamie Hayter.
  • Jon Moxley of the Blackpool Combat Club defeated Daniel Garcia of the Jericho Appreciation Society. After the match, he said to “sign me up” for Blood and Guts.

Arena

AEW returns to the Cable Dahmer Arena in Independence, MO., about 20 minutes from Kansas City. The venue opened in 2009 as the Independence Events Center and seats just under 6,000 people. It has hosted several concerts including Ariana Grande, Bruno Mars, Alan Jackson, and more. The February 26, 2020, and November 3, 2021, editions of Dynamite emanated from this area. On a personal note, the November 3 edition was the first episode I previewed for the Torch after doing the same job for WWE Raw and Smackdown for three and a half years.

So far only three matches are advertised but I expect more to come.

“Hangman” Adam Page vs. David Finlay of New Japan Pro Wrestling

The crossovers between AEW and New Japan Pro Wrestling are underway, so to speak, as former AEW Champion “Hangman” Adam Page goes one-on-one with David Finlay. Page is coming off a grueling defeat in which he lost the AEW Championship to CM Punk at Double or Nothing. He looks to rebound here and (maybe) work his way back to the championship.

Finlay’s more recent success came as part of the team FinJuice in which he partnered with Juice Robinson, now of the Bullet Club. They won the 2019 edition of New Japan’s World Tag League and captured the IWGP Tag Team Championship at Wrestle Kingdom 14 (2020 edition). In 2021, they appeared in Impact Wrestling and defeated The Good Brothers (Karl Anderson & Luke Gallows) for the Impact Tag Team Championship and held it for a little over two months before losing to Violent By Design (Rhino & Joe Doering). Finlay is the son of Fit Finlay (also named David), long-time WCW and WWE performer who was key in the development of numerous wrestlers including Goldberg and Batista.

https://twitter.com/thedavidfinlay/status/1533278416123965440?s=21&t=ijUelu_SOZCeB9EkK04-qQ

Frank’s Analysis: I don’t understand why Page isn’t in the world title picture. He’s ranked third and Jon Moxley is ranked number one. I don’t get their ranking system anymore but whatever. Page is the former champion, fresh off a loss. Doesn’t he get the Moxley spot even though Mox is ranked number one? Anyway, the match with Finlay should be fun. I can’t see Page losing, which is probably what they want, but I said what I had to say here. By the way, are we going to hear Page speak? It’d be nice to hear from the man who just lost the title to see where things stand for him right now.

Battle Royal: Winner Faces Jon Moxley; Winner Goes on to Forbidden Door to Wrestle for Interim AEW Champion

By now you’ve either watched Rampage to hear Excalibur’s announcement, heard about it on various podcasts here at the Torch, or read about the complicated situation regarding the AEW Championship. On Rampage, CM Punk announced he has a “bad wheel” and will have to have surgery. He will miss an undisclosed amount of time. He said he did not want to “hold up” the championship.

Later in the show Excalibur announced that Jon Moxley was ranked number one and would face the winner of a Battle Royal on Dynamite (that would be this episode my friends). The winner of that match would go on to Forbidden Door to challenge for the Interim AEW Championship. Now he wasn’t clear whom that individual would face. Would it still be Hiroshi Tanahashi since he was announced on Dynamite as Punk’s challenger for Forbidden Door? Anyway, AEW “cleared it up” in a press release. The winner of the deal between Moxley and the Battle Royal winner would face the winner of a match at Dominion (June 12 on New Japan World) between Hiroshi Tanahashi and Hirooki Goto at Forbidden Door. Anyone’s head hurt yet?

Once CM Punk is medically cleared to compete, he will face the Interim Champion and “unify” the titles, returning to a full-time AEW Champion. Here’s the press release:

Frank’s Analysis: I talked about this earlier, so I won’t repeat myself. Now I get Tanahashi was going to face Punk at Forbidden Door. That’s one thing. They’re doing a deal between AEW and New Japan Pro Wrestling at the PPV. Fine, but this is different. They need to crown a new company champion. Why does Tanahashi get to compete for the Interim Championship? Where on earth does Hirooki Goto get off getting in on this deal? Now I don’t watch every New Japan show but I watch enough to know Goto, while a very solid wrestler, is mid-carder/tag team wrestler at best. What’s the point of a ranking system if you’re not going to use it to crown a new company champion? New Japan guys have no place challenging for a vacant title, I’m sorry.

Max Caster and The Gunn Club to Appear?

Max Caster of The Acclaimed and The Gunn Club will likely be on hand tonight if social media is any indication:

Follow Frank on Twitter @FrankPeteani.  Thank you for reading!

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