Ongoing 2022 Matches Of The Year

 #11. Arik Royal vs Kevin Ku, ACTION The Movement Begins! 4/3

Royal and Ku have been two of the better under the radar guys of the recent IWTV period, and this was a Ku’s biggest singles match to date as he challenged for the ACTION title. Lots of hard shots dished out and tight grappling. Ku in particular was really fired up his big match and was laying it in with his kicks and lariats. Royal has a pretty strong ground game for a guy his size and tried to grind Ku down, and the big Kobe on the apron late in the match was a nice big match spot in front of the 300 odd fans who were there live. I though the false finish was a bit unnecessary, but boy Ku was really going for it at the end and cranking up the violence to lead to a really satisfying finish.

#4. Eddie Kingston vs Chris Jericho, AEW Revolution

Two heavyweight veterans beating the crud out of each other. I was a high voter on the AEW Jericho vs Omega match - Jericho punching guys in the nose is better than him trying to do his 2001 routine - and this was more of that type of match. Kingston is one of the all-time greats at selling 'small' body injuries and the stuff with his orbital bone added a lot. Kingston is the type of talent who elevates everyone he works with, and in fairness Jericho delivered one of his best showings in years. He was matching Eddie blow for blow on the stiffness and I was taken aback by some of the head drops he took on those suplexes. Jericho's chest got turned to blue steak, lots of malice, and another really satisfying finish with Jericho tapping clean.

#3. CM Punk vs MJF, AEW Revolution

This was a match with lofty ambitions and I think they pulled it off. Of course the entrances alone are worth a mention for how great they were. Like the TV match I thought this went a few steps too long and had one or two ideas too many, but they got the stuff that mattered right. It was violent, bloody, hate-filled, and cathartic. The Dog Collar gimmick was used well and the tacks bumps were all appropriately brutal. I don’t think the body part stuff added much though, and it felt a bit tacked on to try and get another half a star rating. Unlike the TV match I didn't feel like the Wardlow story undermined the MJF-Punk story, and the finish felt like MJF’s chickens coming home to roost. It wasn’t enough that he beat Punk in Chicago, or that he had Wardlow over a barrel, he had to poke and poke, and the bear bit back hard. Minor quibbles aside this was still 2 of the most charismatic workers in the world having a big violent grudge match and it gets a big thumbs up.

#2. Bryan Danielson vs Jon Moxley, AEW Revolution

This may have suffered a little for following both Punk vs MJF and Jericho vs Kingston, which were two other high end violent slobberknockers, but again I felt they achieved most of what they set out for. I gave this a second watch without PPV fatigue and thought it was pretty excellent. Considering the build to this was all about violence and they telegraphed the blood so heavily in all the promos, the spot that lead to the double juice was surprisingly tame. All that said, this banged. I dug the matches they had a decade ago, but Moxley especially is a different beast now. He’s developed his skill-set insurmountably, especially when it comes to grappling, and that aspect of this match was all pretty great. Both guys really laid in the stiffness, and it avoided the pratfalls of the NJ style of you-hit-me-I-hit-you matches by way of sheer personality of the two guys dishing it out. This wasn’t two guys rotely going through the motions, this was a show of heart and pride. All of Danielson’s targeting to Mox’s mid-section was great, really loved the fake out of the head-kick to set up a gut shot, and Mox’s selling was pretty great while trying to fight back. Mox’s bladejob was another top tier crimson mask and everything after the blood was superb - every time he found a counter there was a sense of urgency. We all know Danielson is the best worker in the world, but Mox was with him every step of the way here and had one of his career performances. Cap it all off with an excellent finish, and an even better post-match moment with Regal, and we have another strong MOTYC.

Ongoing Best Of 2022 Matches

 #4. Biff Busick vs Slade, Beyond Wrestling 'Day 91' 4/2

What a bloodbath. Slade looks like he belongs in prison and is akin to a horror movie villain, just constantly absorbing whatever gets thrown at him and piling bodies up. Both these dudes hit hard as fuck, and I liked how Biff worked from beneath for all of this. He was coming back from a long lay-off, against the new hotness, and got absolutely mauled. He bleeds a bunch, gets murdered with chairs and door, and for most of the way Slade looks unstoppable, almost to a comic extent. But when Biff blasts him with a chair out of nowhere and Slade did the gig, this kicked into another gear. I don’t know where Slade cut, but he obviously nicked something he shouldn’t have because he was jet-washing the whole place with plasma. I could have totally bought him passing out from the amount of blood he was spilling. He still dominated Biff, but it showed vulnerability, and Biff believably worked his way back in by trading hands. Finish was disgustingly violent as Biff had to murder this guy with a bunch of straight trash can blows to the dome. A triumphant return for Biff and Slade is a scary, scary man.

#2. CM Punk/Jon Moxley vs FTR, AEW Dynamite 9/2

A few cool threads going on here with the setup, being a rare unscheduled match and a classic two great singles guys vs great tag team match. Punk and Mox felt like an all-star team and clicked really well together. We know FTR can be great at old school cut the ring in half wrestling, we know they can be great at big spot-filled home stretches, but often they have a tendency to focus too much on the latter. This was very well structured with the body of the match all being really meaningful, with Punk getting his leg worked, the exciting brawling off the Mox hot tag, then the longer more focused heat section on him after he got put through the table. All that heat building paid off with a really satisfying final run with some big counters and a couple great false finishes that had real peril to them. The Doomsday Device will always, always rock and all the stuff with the stereo finishers was awesome. The only flub was the Tully spot, but god bless him for trying and wanting to take the GTS. I had a blast.

#5. Hangman Adam Page vs Lance Archer, AEW Dynamite 9/2 [Texas Deathmatch]

Hats off to Page, he is beginning to look like the guy AEW wants him to be. A couple lengthy title epics and now a quality garbage match to his reign. This was a slightly above average plunder brawl, elevated by a few things. Hangman has already accumulated enough scar tissue that he can bleed on command and he wore another top tier crimson mask, looked like someone threw a bucket of red paint on him. Page has always been a good athlete and he throws himself into the big bumps, and that Blackout onto the steps was a Darby-level insanity bump. The stuff with the top rope being removed was a clever twist to lead to the finish, which was also imaginative but looked a little silly. Having your big bloody death-match end with a ref being used as a pummel horse is a choice move.

Ongoing Best Of 2022 Matches

#2. CM Punk vs MJF, AEW Dynamite 2/2

I am probably in the camp who thought this was more "very good" than "MOTYC", it seemed to reach a certain level and stay there, rather than boiling over and reaching a crescendo, but there was still a lot of content here I liked spread across the long 40 minutes. MJF once again delivered a really fun heel performance in his quarterly showing, from the obvious stuff like the cheating and running away through the crowd to the smaller stuff like his face-biting and see-sawing in the ropes off Punk’s punches.

The false finish was executed superbly, for once AEW refs looking competent and the crowd trying to rally Punk as he went down was a tremendous moment. All the limb-work stuff was solid and gave the match some focus though I’m not sure it justified the length. Punk’s bar since returning has been very high and this was a great performance built around his selling of the cumulative damage and fatigue. I dug how he folded on himself off that reverse rana, usually guys hit that move too cleanly and suddenly - it’s a high risk move and this one looked like it hurt Punk on it too. I can’t say I have missed the Pepsi Plunge, but it was neat to see it brought back as a big match moment.

I wasn’t too hot on the finish despite it being very well executed, felt like they chose furthering the Wardlow story at the expense of a cleverer finish, and we have seen the Diamond Ring bit done a thousand times now. Still, I thought this was a strong bit of business and a good effort from both men, and you could tell MJF was geeking out by the end.