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Yep. This is fun. It reminds of when I watched Midsouth, WWF, NWA, and even a little AWA. Not being cult committed to any one fed seems like a fun way to enjoy this stuff. If folks can deactivate the ‘I can only care about the show that is the best right now’, or some kind of brand war/this OR that type internet argument bullshit, fun could be had by anyone who just likes rasslin. Maybe I’m just old and I loved wrestling well befor nWo/Attitude Era so I don’t feel like Vince is going to cut me out of a will if I watch other stufff.

WWE is going bigger/hoss/ex-athlete. And they have some grand folks who fit that. Reigns works now and it’s gonna keep going for like another half decade.

There’s a slew of dudes who aren’t big who can go and be good overall. And clearly, WWE doesn’t mind cutting these small dudes as well as people who fit what the rumors are saying they’re going for. So AEW has choices and money. When they started, a big question was ‘who can they even sign away to go with the New Japan dudes and the rando indy folks?’. Now, that question has a growing list of answers that most reasonable people would have been happy with if it had been provided to them 3 years ago.

They got Jericho to start off. He got fat, got fit again, and is still over af. And he’s helping people. After that: Tommy End. Adam Cole. Bryan Danielson. Christian. Rusev. Any dude from the Shield even if it was ‘just Ambrose’ would’ve been cool. Even a guy like Andrade. Oh, and they got CM Punk out of retirement after WWE fumbled a shot at him and it looks like he can pretty much still wrestle.

So….What’s the problem!? I see folks online and have friends IRL who are acting like this AEW is WCW 2000. I keep saying ‘clearly you didn’t see or you can’t remember 2000 WCW if you think AEW right now is that shit’.

I’m not even saying they’re the best or perfect. But it’s pretty easy to see they’re on the way up as long as they can settle it all in. And it would help if folks can quit making up wild standards to hold them to that no show basically ever could stand up to with any regularity. My random raw/Superstars/Nitro/whatever challenge still stands.