AEW Continental Classic Round-up – Week Three: Assessing the tournament so far and looking ahead to this week’s match-ups

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With just two weeks left before the league finals, things are beginning to crystallize for one league while they only get more unpredictable for the other.

Gold League

Things in the Gold League continue proceed as expected. Swerve Strickland won a competitive match against Mark Briscoe. Jay White defeated Jay Lethal via roll-up, a less decisive finish than I would’ve preferred. With these losses, both Briscoe and Lethal were officially mathematically eliminated from winning the tournament. Jon Moxley and Rush had an extremely physical match that went all around ringside and even into the crowd at one point. Mox was able to apply the Bulldog Choke and force Rush to pass out.

Right now, Mox and Swerve sit tied at 9 point each. They will face each other at “Winter is Coming” tonight. A win by either man would clench him a berth in the league final. A draw would maintain the tie for another week.

Jay White, currently at 6 points, is right in the thick of things. A victory this week would put him in position to clench a spot in the league final next week.

Rush isn’t technically eliminated, but he’d need a lot to go right in addition to winning his final two matches. Given the momentum he has, it feels like Swerve can’t be stopped. I believe he’ll beat Mox this week, Lethal next week, and go a perfect 5-for-5 into the League Final while Mox and White battle out for the other spot.

Blue League

The Blue League remains the more unpredictable and interesting of the two. Announced on Dynamite after this column dropped last week, Bryan Danielson battled Daniel Garcia on Rampage. Those two put on a technical clinic. Garcia, back in his classic trunks and sporting his black towel, was no-nonsense and kept up with Bryan almost move for move. He survived some of the American Dragon’s best shots and had him seemingly right where he wanted him when the temptation to dance overtook him and became his undoing.

Bryan hit a Busaiku knee which Garcia survived only to find himself trapped in the LeBell Lock. Garcia never tapped, but his body gave up and he passed out. Afterwards Danielson spat on him, an action he explained in a promo on Twitter.

The next night on Collision, Danielson took on Andrade. A quarter of the way into the match Andrade removed the patch over Danielson’s injured eye and went after the surgically repaired socket, opening up the surgical scar in the process. As a result, Danielson spent the majority of the match on defense, fighting with one eye. Because he’s Bryan Danielson, he nearly had the match won a couple times before Andrade caught him with a vicious back elbow and a couple stiff shots to the injured eye followed by the running knees to the back of the head and capped off with the hammer lock DDT for the win.

Between these two matches, a total of around 35 minutes over two nights, Bryan is really adding to his late push for Wrestler of the Year.

Earlier in the show, Eddie Kingston and Claudio Castagnoli beat the brakes off each other. It was as physical a match as you’d expect between these two enemies, heightened by the fact that Eddie was fighting for survival in the tourney. The finish of the match was a mirror image of the finish of their match at Supercard of Honor in March, this time with Eddie picking up the surprise win.

With Danielson going 1-1 and Eddie finally picking up his first win, the standings for the Blue League are as follows:

Brody King, Danielson, and Andrade are in a three way tie for first place with 6 points each
Eddie and Claudio are tied for second with 3 points apiece
Garcia remains on the schneid

The battle for the Blue League final will be dramatically shaped by the yet-to-be-announced schedule for this week’s Rampage and Collision. Given that he had last week off, I expect Brody King to wrestle twice this week. With either two victories or a victory and a tie, Brody would clench a berth. Eddie must win his match this weekend to remain in the hunt while Bryan and Andrade could each lose and still remain alive into the final week. It feels like we’re heading to a Bryan vs. Brody League Final, but we shall see how things shake out.

I failed to mention this last week so shame on me, but the promos the combatants in the tournament have been cutting both on TV and on AEW’s Twitter page have been top notch, maybe some of the best of the year. For instance, Danielson cut a promo while meditating in the trainer’s room while getting his eye cleaned up that was just fantastic. I highly recommend you go check it and the other promos out.

OR CHECK THIS OUT AT PROWRESTLING.NET: Powell’s AEW Dynamite Hit List: Christian Cage vs. Adam Copeland for the TNT Title, Toni Storm vs. Skye Blue for the AEW Women’s Title, Continental Classic tournament matches