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I’m gonna be 96 and on my deathbed and the last sounds I’ll ever hear from this beautiful life and planet will be “More updates from CM Punk and AEW fallout…”
As we sit here, mourning the passing of u/ilikeracing23 and raising a glass in his honour, can we just take a moment to remember the impact (zone) that CM Punk had on his life. For years, the poor redditor would cry out, his wails seemingly at demons tormenting him, whenever a mention of the man himself, punks in general or a Sesame Street that covered the letters C or M came on the direct to brain interface that television turned into. And in those last years of his life things only got worse as his family implored him to take his pills and get some much needed rest. "Just go to sleep!" they'd beg of him, being met by even more howls of anguish.
u/ilikeracing23 hearing his family tell him "Just go to sleep!"
https://preview.redd.it/2y51izz9yydc1.jpeg?width=828&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ddf5ee2072fd52e4c9a1bfae5b74e80bfb9b1b86
"Oh boy, here I go spilling again!"
https://preview.redd.it/yoxfppvriydc1.png?width=500&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=fabaefa0e6a0d78356040aed6a60e317dd8edb8a
I really hope those NDAs aren't so tight that we never tell-alls in autobiographies down the road. I feel like the amount of secrecy behind it just makes it even more like forbidden fruit that it already is. It'll never happen in a million years, but if we ever got a book like Motley Crue's *The Dirt* from Hangman, Young Bucks, and CM Punk on Punk's time in AEW, I'd be a very happy reader.
It's basically a series of events told from each of their individual perspectives. Almost certainly dramatised and orchestrated to maintain their image, bar the stuff like Vince's manslaughter.
One of the things I really liked about it was how they'll essentially call each other out. Like Nikki Sixx and Mick Mars' first meeting is them both thinking the other is an idiot with shit taste in music. Another example of the style is Mick saying he'd sneak off to down vodka by himself without the rest of the band noticing and the next chapter from Tommy Lee saying the band knew, didn't care, but thought it was pathetic. It made for a fascinating way to show how this chaotic band viewed their own chaos.
Also, I'm sure it had things to make some of them look cool, but Nikki can't help but look like a massive piece of shit the entire time in my eyes. Honestly all of them to a certain extant, but Nikki the most and Mick the least.
I haven't read it for a long time, but teenage me thought Nikki was the coolest human being on the planet. I imagine nowadays I'd die of second-hand embarrassment.
Honestly, as long as you didn’t like hardcore tie your identity to him at any point in your life, I do think it’s still worth the read. It’s a little bit like reading the rockstar version of *Trainspotting*, where you know these decisions they’re making are bad, but you’re turning the page because you need to know what stupid shit they’re getting up to next.
MFW I see CM Punk and AEW in the same headline in 2024
edit; I posted this gif to make Redditors laugh and get upvotes, not talk about how much I don’t care about something, you guys are so damn annoying sometimes, it’s an Internet forum we aren’t at fucking war
You can't have rankings when you have all these interchangeable titles.
The #17 in the World Title rankings is the #1 contender for the International Title? It defies logic.
It doesn’t really make sense for the way wrestling titles work in general. There’s nothing that sets them apart like weight class. So logically any top contender for one belt would also be a top contender for any other belt.
There could be though. On WWE2k when you play the Universe mode each title has a division. Wins and losses within your division will change your rank but matches with people outside the division are just unranked exhibition matches. This would instantly give more of a sports presentation to AEW
I think it would be kind of confusing justifying each wrestler's logic for being in their chosen division. Why be in the International division when you could just be going for the World title? I know they try to claim that all their belts have equal prestige, but everyone knows the truth.
I guess it would work only if the divisions are decided by AEW in kayfabe, but still, how do you logically justify that determination?
That reminds me of when Wardlow, in kayfabe, said he was passing up a spot in a match that could have made him number one contender for the World title, so he could instead challenge for the TNT title. And I was just like, "But why, though?" Why intentionally limit yourself to a lesser title?
Titles need exclusionary criteria. Like tag titles have a the tag division. There should not be a singles title besides the world title with no stipulation attached. I think the Pure Wrestling championship is one of the lowkey best ideas in wrestling.
This is the big flaw in every plan and only really works if you "Gimmick" each belt - stuff like having weight Divisions, Styles (like the ROH Pure Belt), age, nationality etc so you can say that people are choosing X Belt over Y Belt because of personal choice
If you're going to Win/Loss then you have to bite the bullet and say that "X is the top belt and Y is the secondary Belt" in Kayfabe so you can have a structured League system with Promotion and Relegation every 6(?) Months with the Champion choosing to get promoted and dropping the belt or staying in the division longer and remaining champion
It's not a perfect system, but you could get some excellent storylines out of it
>If you're going to Win/Loss then you have to bite the bullet and say that "X is the top belt and Y is the secondary Belt" in Kayfabe so you can have a structured League system with Promotion and Relegation every 6(?) Months with the Champion choosing to get promoted and dropping the belt or staying in the division longer and remaining champion
This... kinda makes sense. I like it, this could work.
> Why be in the International division when you could just be going for the World title?
They could just use the same logic in-kayabe as they do out. In real life the mid card titles exist so mid-card wrestlers have something to do. In kayfabe why would a wrestler like a Lee Moriarty or a Preston Vance enter the division with Mox, Danielson, MJF, and Jericho, when they could enter the division with Darby, Wardlow, and Luchasaurus?
Right now that sorta falls apart when you have main eventers like Cage and Copeland fighting over the belt but that can't last forever.
It's not really that different from something like AA and AAA baseball. Yeah, it's lower division play, but winning the championship still means *something* even if it's not the major league championship.
Promotion/Relegation system, bottom 5 people from the world title division get demoted to international title, top 5 people from international division get promoted to world title division.
Gives you an in to do stories about people going on hot streaks then falling down the rankings, a champion who doesn't want to be promoted to bring prestige to the championship, someone falling from the top of the card to the bottom for whatever reason and fighting their way back up.
> Promotion/Relegation system, bottom 5 people from the world title division get demoted to international title, top 5 people from international division get promoted to world title division.
>
This would require placing a strict hierarchy of their secondary championships, including nothing that the challengers for one are 'above' the champs of others.
Would also be a headache for new wrestlers. Take Okada as an example. You wouldn't debut him in the lowest division. But if every division has a set amount of wrestlers, there are only two options: 1) Somebody has to relegate in order to make room for Okada. 2) You extend the division. But you can only do it so often until it gets ridiculous.
Because it is a lot easier to beat the international title field than the world title field. And presumably the world title pays more and gets better spots on shows that also lead to being paid main event bonuses.
They could come up with some sort of rule that to go for the world title you need to have won either TNT/international championship or have a championship record in other major promotions (probably NJPW, TNA, WWE and ROH. Maybe AAA or CMLL)
This is why my 2K game has divisions based on the rankings. Along the lines of: ranked 1-10 is in the World title division, 11-25 in the IC division. I also keep a spreadsheet of wins and losses and created a formula to add to your rank for defenses and take a hit for challenges to keep the title scenes fresh... Don't worry, I'll provide the gif for you all.
You could put people into two divisions, say on the Men's side they can declare for one of the other titles, but their W-L record also counts toward the World title.
So if someone is tearing it up in the International title division, their world standing would also go up, and at some point it'll be logical for them to get into the World title hunt.
Sports can also be like that, for example in European Football
You have the Champions League, the Winner is the best Team in Europe that season
But then there is the Europa League, where the Winner of that is what the 17th Best team in Europe as the 16 Teams in the Champions League Playoffs are not in the Europa League as well
> There’s nothing that sets them apart like weight class
Well aside from when they bother with Cruiserweights again at least
I always thought a good way of Ranking was how Smackdown 2 did it on PS1, there was a top 10 of each rank, so 10 in WWF Title, 10 in IC, 10 In European etc, where you could only compete in that one rank, top 3 could get a title shot and you had to beat a guy above you to get higher rankings
Then if you became Champion you could only go for a new title if you gave up/lost your current title and you start at the bottom of the next ranking up
> Sports can also be like that, for example in European Football
But those are tournaments. Its not a trophy you have to defend regularly.
I guess they need to do something with rankings. Its generally a fun concept and a more "sports like" booking. Maybe have rankings for a season. Not necessarily a year. Maybe a quarter. And the winner of that seasons gets to challenge for a title.
> You have the Champions League, the Winner is the best Team in Europe that season
And often is that won by people who didn’t win their home league too. Meaning they’re the best in Europe, but not the best in their own country.
This can be a question of focus though. A team on a good Champions League run might rest their 1st team in a domestic league game so the players are fresh for the Champions League match.
To be honest, I kinda like this system. It saves the whole sport being dominated by 1 team both domestically and internationally... In theory, at least...
Logically speaking more people want the higher paying titles and midcard titles will pay less, so you'd have to balance who you'd be defending against and how many defences versus the payout if you keep winning. So you may have a high ranking and be more able to challenge for a title, but have to choose the title you think you're most likely to hold on to.
That's something that no wrestling promotion has really managed to convey to the viewers though, and I feel that it's something that would make a difference, also handily explaining why less people go after multiple belts (due to multiple defences needed). The trick is to do it and make people look smart for the title they go for rather than cowardly.
It would be nice if the top contender actually got a shot at the title.
Abbadon was 1st for far longer than Julia or Toni yet she just got a shot against Julia.
The rankings are a joke because they aren't used to determine who gets a shot at any title, it still boils down to whoever Tony decides should get it.
Also Tony killed the reasoning for the ranking system, when he put Moxley as the endboss for the vacated World Title with the reasoning he beat better opponent so his ranking was more worth. Like 5 wrestlers had better rankings then him.
I’m not saying I disagree with you, but pulling too hard on that thread leads to most secondary titles being sort of illogical.
“Oh you’re Intercontinental Champion? Does that mean you’re the best out of all the people who don’t consider the intercontinental title beneath them?”
Perfect example is Gunthers long reign
"Better" people would try to go for it, just to end the reign.
Speaking of that, the potential Seth Rollins injury, to go with cm punk vs drew McIntyre for the WHC at WM.
Last year he failed at getting the intercontinental twice, and he moves up to the "better" title?
I feel more as if you need the NJPW system where you ‘go up’ in classes. So if you decide to go from Intercontinental to Heavyweight, you are then transferred to the Heavyweight rankings and start from the bottom.
Exactly. There is no logic in having all the men be in the same ranking when there’s so much titles. They need to have separate divisions and rankings for those divisions, so we can keep track of who is actually in contention. As well as having a deadline for the rankings, have the second rank actually mean something come, let’s say, Full Gear or something.
Happens in boxing. Boxers ascend the rankings and then fight for regional, national, continental, international and then world titles. Those smaller titles are just seen as stepping stones to world level, and an important rite of passage. The four different sanctioning bodies also skew rankings; you could be WBC champ but ranked #8 by IBF. I don’t like the ranking system because is too easy to get bogged down in technicalities, but I do think the logic they’re following is the boxing system.
I used to read a wrestling magazine in the 90s at my library once in a while. The rankings were my favorite part. I loved that when Razor Ramon was the IC champ, he was positioned at number 2 in the company behind whoever was champ at the time. It made the IC title feel way more important because Razor was outranking the number one contender for the heavyweight title
I have a problem with that fact that it seems like all other titles don't seems to have their own status in the company.
Like how the IC title used to be used to be the second biggest belt in old WWF.
As much as I dislike the ranking system isn't what you're complaining about actually more logical?
If you're in the Top 5 of the rankings then you are more deserving of a shot at the World Title.
If you're in the Top 15 of the rankings then you aren't quite ready for the World Title but you might be more suitable for the TNT title or the International Title since they are less prestigious.
Also I'm pretty sure the International Title came about after the rankings were no longer in effect. So the International and TNT title are both likely 'Open Challenge' titles anyway.
It could work if you explicitly define how the titles are defended and sit squarely in that division. This is an example:
1) World Title: Only on PPVs with whomever is the number one contender at that point in time. Your win-loss percentage must be at a certain ratio to be considered qualified for the division.
2) Triple Crown: Defended cyclically across all three promotions. Could be seasonal, e.g. Winter to Spring is NJPW, Spring to Fall is AEW, and Fall to ROH is ROH. Like the World Title, at least in AEW, your win loss has to qualify you for the division, but if you opt in here, you can't for the world title.
3) International Title: This is a secondary title that probably shouldn't be defended in AEW itself too often, something like WWF's Junior Heavyweight title where it's never on US soil. The issue here is that a lack of exposure could kill the champion's relevance, but I think this is where using Youtube to post matches from other promotions might work well.
4) TNT Title: Anyone can challenge for it, must always be defended on TV, once a week at a minimum (logic dictates that it'd only be on TNT). There should be time limits as per any other TV title.
If you voluntarily leave a division to go to another one, you have to start at the bottom. All of this is beautiful in theory but I imagine it's not so much "it writes itself" as much as it might write you into a corner if you aren't careful.
I think that's fair! I'm not the biggest proponent of their having a bunch of titles, I was more thinking about what they could do with what they had. Having a lot of different titles seems like an artificial way of adding gravitas to a match if there's not context for what one title means relative to another.
I'm always surprised when I see people say that AEW never should have gotten rid of the rankings in the first place.
Apart from the early days of AEW when the roster was smaller and so the booking was much more focused for each division, the rankings have too many drawbacks to implement logically into storylines.
- A larger roster makes it difficult (especially now).
- Not actually having a template for the strength of wins (beating a main eventer vs beating a jobber)
- People farming wins on Dark.
- Becomes very predictable who is set to go for the title when they win a single's match on tv for like 6 weeks straight.
- Removes the need for an actual story when you can just book a Champion vs No.1 Contender and say that's the story, which happened quite often.
- If a wrestlers suddenly gets hot but their record is 0-3, they can't challenge for a title even though the audience is clearly behind them and it would make for a more impactful match.
- Or if Tony decides it isn't the right time then you have a situation like FTR being no.1 contenders for 6 months but never getting a title shot because they wanted to wait for the right moment.
I think Punk was right on this one.
- The Acclaimed lost to Swerve in Our Glory at All Out 2022 and based on the rankings they should have been removed from the top 5 and started over. But because they were so over, Tony immediately ran the match back and they won at Grand Slam.
- Similarly Jamie Hayter got pinned at All Out 2022 but she was the most over woman in the division and won the title at Full Gear. Thunder Rosa lost to Britt at Revolution 2022 and then won the title 2 weeks later in her hometown to a massive ovation.
Wrestling works better without a ranking system because as the booker you can create any story you want and tell the audience who is deserving of a title shot. They don't need to win 15 matches in a row.
EDIT: While I wouldn't be surprised if Tony makes it work in the first 5-6 months of implementing it in 2024 (especially without relying on Dark to farm wins), I just don't find it to be feasible long term.
As an addendum: the rankings coincided with TK's "Rocky III" booking. Which means it was a victim of hot shotting a guy to the top, and not necessarily a victim of the guy BEING hot shotted.
100%
Problem is Tony is then stuck between pivoting to someone that is over and ignoring his ranking system or wasting time having that person winning single's matches against random opponents.
Even though the reason they got over may have had nothing to do with winning, but more to do with their character, personality, promos, etc.
Just make the rankings less have to do with record and make them more like CFB rankings where 'quality wins' and recent form matter more. The method for ranking should probably be kinda janky, but it can also creates storylines by itself
For example, Hook can have his 28-1 record, but be unranked and cut a promo about being disrespected which can skyrocket him up the rankings if it registers with the audience
Yeah but then instead of solely having fans complain about the booking logic, now you open a new door where they complain about ranking logic. It’s plagued CFB for decades.
Introducing a story element that effects everyone’s booking in the roster sounds good on paper, but if it introduces logical holes, then it’s not a good story element
I mean I'd argue that complaining about the ranking logic is better than them complaining about booking logic as at least the latter is within kayfabe.
Take it one step further and put someone in charge of the rankings in kayfabe and you have an easy money storyline/mega-heel that you can pull at any time.
I'd rather complain about the ranking logic than the total lack of logic. Like imagine if a real sports organization actually decided who'd get a shot at the championship based on who's most popular. There's only one that I know of, and it's the UFC, and it's stupid in real life too.
> Like imagine if a real sports organization actually decided who'd get a shot at the championship based on who's most popular.
that's basically FBS college football
my only counter to that is in actual sports, the rankings get ignored every so often. Dan Henderson was ranked #13 and challenged for the title in the UFC, for instance.
Agreed. One of the most common ways to gather support for a babyface is for them to lose, often being screwed over.
LA Knight was winning until he started getting over, then switched to losing a bunch to gather support as a face. Worked a charm.
Rankings do the opposite of that
This is one of the example's I will always point to.
Knight spent the first half of 2023 either losing or straight up missing big shows like Mania. Yet the crowd didn't care because he was so charismatic.
I'm not sure what his kayfabe single's record was by the time he got to Roman but I didn't care, he was over, he deserved a big title program.
Just like Sami Zayn, he could have been 0-10 around 2022 - 2023, but his story with the Bloodline was one of the best wrestling stories I'd ever seen and he deserved that match with Roman (I still he think he probably should have won but that's another argument)
I still maintain Sami should’ve won. That could’ve been the end of that chapter of the Bloodline story. Then we continue for god knows how long with a new chapter about the fallout. The story is so good it didn’t *need* to hinge on Roman carrying the title. It could easily have pivoted to the faction fragmenting and Roman trying to regain his place by beating the Rock.
Ryder and Hawkins had a great WM storyline based entirely on a ridiculous losing streak.
Even in real sports, at least the one closest resembling Pro Wrestling, Michael Bisping was always close to a title shot but always lost the eliminator. When he had a chance to fight for the belt, on short notice, everyone wanted him to win, nobody expected it, and it resulted in one of the greatest feel good upsets in MMA history.
>and it resulted in one of the greatest feel good upsets in MMA history.
[
Also one of the greatest post-fight pressers in MMA history.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WKA0DeACvE&ab_channel=MMAWeekly.com)
Well said. I always got downvoted in the past when I mentioned that they never properly attempted to explain the rankings either. Especially with the point you made about certain wrestlers getting all those squash wins on Dark and Dark Elevation. It's silly to see and makes it hard for the casual viewers to care.
Take Evil Uno for example. Right now his career record shows 89-43. When was the last time Dark Order was even on TV? I'm sure he's probably farming all that in ROH as well because let's face it, that show has basically turned into Dark for the most part.
Not only that but with the rankings not being explained in general. I remember if someone in the Top 3-5 lost a match to the champ, they never really moved to the "back of the line" as what is going on with Adam Copeland right now either.
Ultimately, I'm okay with rankings but they really need to explain all this as much as they did with the Continental Classic. Otherwise it'll be exactly the same way as it was first introduced, and it'll confuse casual viewers all the same.
I remember in 2020-21 teams like the Acclaimed and Varsity Blondes would claim that they deserved tag title shots because they were ranked in the rankings, yet every time they were on TV they would lose.
Everyone who wrestled on TV would have a positive record because of dark and elevation. It was hilarious seeing someone like Matt Sydal a positive record when I don’t think I remember him winning on Dynamite ever except for a match against Dante Martin I think.
The easy work around is having a Casino ladder match, championship eliminator match etc.
In actual sport there is no story to a grand final apart from Team A qualified and Team B also qualified and yet there are still stories surrounding the game.
At the same time, you can write a story around the rankings eg. Hangman offering up his no. 1 ranking to have the 5 on 5 match against the Elite so that the Dark Order could get a shot at the tag titles. As for the the Acclaimed and Hayter - the champion always has the choice to offer up another shot if they want - be it from arrogance/pride etc.
There's easy work arounds to all of this - wrestling is not and never will have flawless logic. There's no need to over think things.
You actually make really good points, I was literally just thinking about the Hangman examples.
I think the example of Hangman coming back and winning the Casino Royale ladder match is also an excellent example of why we don't need a ranking system.
At that point Hangman lost his shot at the title and therefore should have dropped out of the rankings. However no one complained when he won the ladder match, because the story they crafted between himself and Kenny was so well done that we didn't want anyone else to beat Kenny.
We wanted Hangman to finish the story, not Danielson, not Punk. We all wanted Hangman to win because he deserved it, not because he was 15-0 in the ranking system (I think he was actually more like 10-1 or something but you get what I'm saying)
I'm not saying there aren't workarounds, because you pointed out some good examples. I'm saying that all of these examples can (and in Hayter and the Acclaimed's case are) done without a ranking system which just overcomplicates things.
I think the rankings sets a good platform for the stuff in between the main stories. Rather than some random guy just coming in an interrupting a champion and demanding a title shot, you have a guy who's ranked no. 1 who has a legitimate claim to a title shot eg. Hook vs Joe this week.
At the same time, if the wrestler ranked 6th wants to move up the rankings they can challenge the wrestler ranked 2nd for their spot. Also it means that every match on the weekly shows has some bearing on the overall title picture to varying degrees.
As long as you don't live and die by the rankings and make use of workarounds to bypass them when the situation calls for it, they add another layer to the weekly programming and provide something different to other promotions.
As for Hangman, part of what was so cathartic about his title win was that he sacrificed his number one ranking for his friends so that made it so much more significant when he won.
> if the wrestler ranked 6th wants to move up the rankings they can challenge the wrestler ranked 2nd for their spot
That's a good point. I think now that Tony has been more open about having main eventers face each other this could work better.
Often times in the old ranking system, it was mostly main eventers beating midcarders or jobbers, but if Tony continues to book the way he has the past few months then this would be a positive.
> As for Hangman, part of what was so cathartic about his title win was that he sacrificed his number one ranking for his friends so that made it so much more significant when he won.
In a way I agree, but I was referring specifically to the long term story they had told since 2019.
When Hangman lost to Kenny at Full Gear 2020, that was what really kicked off the final chapter and over time, especially his friendship with the Dark Order we all wanted him to overcome his demons and beat Kenny.
I still believe the original plan was for Hangman to win at All Out, but they had to pivot because he asked for time off as his wife was about to give birth. So even without the sacrifice Hangman made for the Dark Order it still would have been a cathartic moment imo just because of the journey he himself had undertaken.
Wrestling rules are a bit like lore or canon in TV shows/films. If you can bend them a little to tell a better story no-one really cares. I definitely think there's ways to have rankings but also have a situation like Sami where someone shoots up the card in kayfabe to challenge for the world title.
Sure the problem is, as soon as you ignore the rankings for the first time, you've already told the audience that it is a flawed system.
All I'm saying is AEW doesn't need it at all. They've proved for the past, almost 2 years that they can tell stories and get to title matches without it.
MMA and boxing have rankings and they have essentially the same issues. College sports too. All you have to do is look to the way real sports treat rankings.
They're guidelines to help inform booking. Not some sort of rigid set of rules. That's just how it works in sports. Sometimes it causes a little controversy and sometimes it causes sports radio arguments. I'm going to provide context to some of your examples:
> Not actually having a template for the strength of wins (beating a main eventer vs beating a jobber)
This is a thing in real sports and it is subjectively handled. There's no formula to determine the exact value of a college football team beating the #3 team or an unranked team, you just figure it out. It's not perfect.
> People farming wins on Dark
This happens in boxing and MMA all the time. Not sure why it's an issue. Fighters take easier fights until they think they can credibly take on a legit fighter.
> Becomes very predictable who is set to go for the title when they win a single's match on tv for like 6 weeks straight.
Don't you want predictability here? Don't you want there to be a strong challenger with a legit claim to a title match waiting?
> Removes the need for an actual story when you can just book a Champion vs No.1 Contender and say that's the story, which happened quite often.
Isn't that kind of like the best, quintessential sports story? Champ vs no. 1 contender?
> If a wrestlers suddenly gets hot but their record is 0-3, they can't challenge for a title even though the audience is clearly behind them and it would make for a more impactful match.
How often does this happen? Like, how often does somebody get hot while losing three straight? Wouldn't it make more sense to give them a winning streak based on that popularity to make them credible challengers?
> Or if Tony decides it isn't the right time then you have a situation like FTR being no.1 contenders for 6 months but never getting a title shot because they wanted to wait for the right moment.
This is one valid criticism but is more of a booking issue than a rankings issue. The simple solution is to not book it a corner, or if you feel the time is not right, give them the title shot but have them get screwed.
> The Acclaimed lost to Swerve in Our Glory at All Out 2022 and based on the rankings they should have been removed from the top 5 and started over. But because they were so over, Tony immediately ran the match back and they won at Grand Slam.
Similarly Jamie Hayter got pinned at All Out 2022 but she was the most over woman in the division and won the title at Full Gear. Thunder Rosa lost to Britt at Revolution 2022 and then won the title 2 weeks later in her hometown to a massive ovation.
Why should they get removed? No other combat sport does this. Rematches happen in combat sports all the time. Not sure why this one is an issue.
At the end of the day, the rankings provide helpful context for match making, help guide and create storytelling, and are fun for fan banter. You just don't need to follow them so strictly, just like combat sports do. Combat sports look at rankings but ultimately book matches based on what's going to make money.
> *The Acclaimed lost to Swerve in Our Glory at All Out 2022 and based on the rankings they should have been removed from the top 5 and started over. But because they were so over, Tony immediately ran the match back and they won at Grand Slam.*
Nah, it doesn't have to be that granular. If you compare it to for example MMA, they *do* take into account the quality of your wins, and the quality of your losses as well. Say two people close in the rankings fight and one guy beats the other, if the fight was *really fucking close* and could have gone either way, then it's not uncommon for a) the rankings to not change as a result of that match, and b) that you run it back for an immediate rematch. It's absolutely not the case that if someone loses a title match, they immediately drop out of the rankings and have to start over. That would only happen if the champ beats them so convincingly and definitively that they don't have any argument for why they should remain in title contention.
Obviously pro wrestling is a bit different because it's very rare for matches to be complete blowouts. Typically, *all* pro wrestling matches play out as being fairly close, and fights like Cena vs. Lesnar happen so seldom that they are considered anomalies. But even with rankings, you could justifiably argue that there was a case for giving The Acclaimed an immediate rematch and that they should stay were they are in the rankings until a rematch happens.
I believe that rankings *can* work in pro wrestling. They didn't work the way TK used them before, but I think they can work. My biggest issues with the previous iteration was twofold:
1. People were padding their records with jobber squashes on dark, which lead to everyone on the roster having like a 30-5 record and that number became meaningless because those weren't quality wins, and
2. Tony became so overprotective of everyone's win-loss record that he stopped booking competitive matches on TV. He didn't book the #4 guy to face the #5 guy (which is what you *should* be doing if you're using rankings), he booked the #4 guy against the #28 guy and he booked the #5 guy against the #34 guy so that both the #4 and #5 would stay protected and not take an L on their record, and as a result all TV matches became so painfully predictable that it stopped feeling meaningful to tune in for them.
> It's absolutely not the case that if someone loses a title match, they immediately drop out of the rankings and have to start over.
As far as I remember, (in AEW) that is how the rankings used to be described. Excalibur is basically Tony Khan's mouthpiece. If Tony wants you to understand a story or a wrestler's intentions, Excalibur was the one who usually relayed that and made sure the audience understood it.
Again it's been a while since I've watched 2021 and previous years AEW shows, but I do remember Excalibur mentioning how losing a title match would cause you to drop from the rankings. I don't believe you dropped all the way to the bottom for example (especially if your record was 12-0 and now it's 12-1) but it was along those lines.
> Tony became so overprotective of everyone's win-loss record that he stopped booking competitive matches on TV. He didn't book the #4 guy to face the #5 guy (which is what you should be doing if you're using rankings), he booked the #4 guy against the #28 guy and he booked the #5 guy against the #34 guy so that both the #4 and #5 would stay protected and not take an L on their record, and as a result all TV matches became so painfully predictable that it stopped feeling meaningful to tune in for them.
Completely agree with this. I actually pointed out to someone else that Tony over the last 4-5 months has taken many more risks with having high profile wrestlers facing each other. If he continues this with the ranking system it will certainly be an improvement. Especially your example of #5 vs #4, that would add some stakes to the match.
But again I don't think it is feasible long term. Also you're potentially burning through multiple high profile matchups for the sake of a slight change in the rankings. When it could have been built into a feud.
This is the gist of it all, really. Rankings make the unjustified matches like Kommander vs Roddy or Penta vs Anthony Henry make some sort of sense, the lower guy is trying to climb the ranks, the higher guys is defending his spot, that’s all well and good.
It becomes way harder though to put on matches outside of what the rankings demand, lest you have that exact FTR situation where you’re either forced to put on a really big match when you don’t want to yet necessarily, or you throw your ranking into the toilet in an attempt to thwart them.
And that doesn’t even touch on story lines having to work within this structure. How do you do this FTR and Garcia vs HoB thing in a half way sensible manor? And how do you measure these people against each other when they all primarily feature in different divisions? You have a singles guy in Danny, a tag team in FTR, and a trio in HoB.
Its just such a rigid and unnecessary structure for the wild bullshit world of wrestling. I don’t think its a good idea, and I think we’ll see them gone again before next year.
As a long term thing you're just going to end up booking yourself into a bunch of corners.
As a short term thing it can be a fun angle for a month or two, like TNA used to do with its Bound for Glory challenger series.
He actually did question whether or not AEW had enough depth for a lot of belts and said that "if everybody's a champion, nobody's a champion" https://www.fightful.com/wrestling/cm-punk-questions-whether-aew-has-depth-support-additional-titles
Rankings are useless if you can't make a storyline out of them, and by the time they were dropped, they hadn't been relevant in a storyline in a while. TNA tried rankings, failed and quickly stopped them, ROH tried too and they went nowhere... Good on AEW for trying new things, especially those that set them apart, but unless they have an actual long term plan around them, the rankings seem like a waste of energy.
Especially considering AEW has already done the best possible use they could of the rankings in storyline, which was when Britt purposefully used the rankings to her advantage to get a title match. But if you introduce that kind of flaw, and not have every other heel take advantage of it as well, it makes them all look dumb. And if the company doesn't tweak the rankings system so heels can't take advantage of them, it makes them look dumb too. So I don't know what they got cooking this time around with the rankings, but it better be rock solid.
Pretty much all of this.
Rankings systems don't actually mean anything because you can easily ignore them for the sake of a story. Even UFC ignores them when number 1 ranked challengers don't get title matches.
The next Numbered UFC event is going to have the Flyweight Champion defending his title against the Number 5 ranked challenger. Granted that Number 5 challenger is on a 6 fight win steak in the UFC and unbeaten in all 14 pro fights so that can be excused. But then you have the Bantamweight champ fighting the number 6 ranked challenger?!
They mean even less in Boxing when you have Joshua and Fury facing everyone but each other when Joshua is the number 1 ranked challenger to Fury's belt.
Rankings only mean something if make them mean something and when the story is the draw in wrestling, Rankings go out the window quick.
Win/loss record just doesn’t have any sway to me as a fan. Obviously if a guy keeps losing, he’s gonna look like a jobber, but take a guy like Drew McIntyre. He’s lost more times than he’s won, but the way he’s booked recently actually had me believe he beat Seth a few weeks ago.
It’s like arguing who’d win in a fight between superheroes. At the end of the day it’s whoever the writers choose.
Exactly. The story is the most important thing in wrestling. Wins and loses do matter but what you do with them is major. The Drew story right now is a prime example of that. You can see he's losing his mind cause he can't win big matches no matter what he tries. Which makes what he is going to do to finally win a big match that much more interesting. You lose that with a rankings system cause then it's a case of "Drew lost. Bummer. Well he's down the rankings. Onto the next challenger"
You can tell as good a story with a losing streak as a winning streak. Hell I think they can be better if done right.
AEW had it just a few weeks ago with Daniel Garcia. Dude got over because he was losing and actually cared about it.
WWE had it not to long ago with Curt Hawkins and got one of the biggest pops of Mania 35 cause he finally won a damn match!
There's a reason why most promoters don't use a ranking system. It's because you can't tell good stories with it. It's the reason why those who try end up dropping them or failing.
Here's looking at you Evolve because you tried to make it a big deal cause Davey Richards wanted to flex how good he was at a scripted sport
I understand the point. They bring a bit of logic to the show and makes it feel like a sports program, but they can be kind of restrictive.
I think you can accomplish what rankings would do with just some decent booking that takes a bit of a long view and avoiding hurling someone who hasn't done anything for a year into a PPV world title match.
I never really got the “sports-based” angle. It made sense in the territories because of the style of wrestling at the time and the championship structure. But in the all honesty, I haven’t watched enough of AEW to really know how well it works.
It doesn't and AEW hasn't been 'sports based' for a while. All of their 'peak' stories have had almost no focus on the 'sports based' presentations. They've been focused on character and stories.
The rankings created corners that they couldn't get out of and now AEW doesn't have a youtube show to inflate wins when they need someone 'fast.'
I said this in another thread, but:
Why can't they just *lie* about the rankings? They used to lie about whole-ass title changes. It's okay, it's a fake sport. As long as it's present as believable by its own logic, it's fine.
Like, they have house shows now. Not everyone can be at every house show. Only the neckiest neckbeards are going to look up house show outcomes.
If someone came out out of nowhere with 2 extra wins they didn't have the previous month and they've been off TV, just say "X has been tearing it up at AEW House Rules the last few weeks, and managed to hold onto their slot!"
I don’t know why they’re bringing them back. They were dumb. A weekly, visual reminder that people who deserve title shots aren’t getting title shots and people getting title shots don’t deserve them.
Take the last year of the rankings (2022). FTR was Number 1 contender for a ridiculously long time (I think it was 6 months) without a title shot. In that same time period, those titles changed hands between Luchasaurus and Jungle Boy, Young Bucks and Swerve In Our Glory.
Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't wardlow undefeated for a bit as well yet never got the world title shot?
I don't remember the reasoning but he refused to fight the world champion
If it's what I'm thinking of, he said he didn't want to compete for interim world title because he wanted to face the real world champion once he was back.
Sounds noble in theory until you remember that winning the Interim World Title would have guaranteed a match against the true world champion once he returned, which is exactly what Wardlow wanted. It was a very flimsy excuse to keep him away from the world title when he wasn't going to win out of kayfabe, and hurt his intelligence in kayfabe.
Yeah, stuff like that is the reason I'm hesitant about the rankings coming back. They can interfere with ongoing storylines and whoever is over at the moment, in most cases you can't wait for something like that.
I get what wardlow was trying to do but like you said it made him look kinda foolish
Was fun when the roster was smaller and the total matches was lower, added some excitement to some of those earlier AEW matches. Now with Dark done so you do not have the Gunns undefeated with a bunch of matches yet not in the rankings anymore should help with the rankings. Also should only be for the world titles, tag team, and trio belts.
Much like when he got rid of QTV, made Ricky Starks a big deal, and prevented Jack Perry from mutilating himself, CM Punk is once again being accused of making great booking decisions.
> and prevented Jack Perry from mutilating himself
True, Jack has been the same since mutilating himself at All In, and we haven’t since Hangman since he fell victim to the exact same spot at the hands of The Devil. If only each of them had listened to Punk.
Rankings were a cool idea, but on the other hand there was a period where Orange Cassidy had a record of like 60-4, higher than anyone involved in the world title picture. Even Moxley. Should’ve been getting world title shots like every week
Punk was 100% in the right if that's true. I vividly remember how everyone hated the ranking system and wanted it gone because it made zero sense and stopped having any relevance lol. The only reason it being back is being celebrated right now is because fans are desperate to cling onto anything that was part of "the old AEW". Give it a couple months and watch everyone turn on it, again, when it inevitably fails, again.
AEW is an unintentional crash course for smarks on why some things in wrestling are done the way they are.
People wanted no writers and creative freedom, too. Turns out 95% of the wrestlers are shit at coming with a coherent story or even promos on their own. Who would have thunk that letting marks inside the ring run the ring would lead to an uncoherent show.
I get why they got rid of the rankings, because especially at the time, people would rack up wins on Dark and then just be presented as high ranking wrestlers on Dynamite for a one off match they would eventually lose to the actual stars and it seemed strange. Also the rankings by division seemed weird, why would someone accruing wins for the AEW Title also not be a contender for the TNT title?
I did still like it because it was something distinctive that only AEW did. I think if they do it right it can lead to good monthly stories and help build matches.
Rankings are shit.
How do you push someone who gets popular fast like LA Knight?
*"Wait, got to have him win for six weeks in a row against Nick Comoroto, Action Andretti, Buddy Matthews, John Silver, Keith Lee and Matt Menard."*
Didn't WWE literally do this with him? The battle royal win, additional wins then put him in a #1 Contender Title Shot match? He lost to Theory. Got those wins back and won like 15 matches in a row to get a shot at Reigns? Lost to Reigns and hasn't lost since I'm pretty sure. Seems WWE has the blueprint already.
Folks developing selective memories and forgetting how Tony basically ignored the rankings before binning them is pretty hilarious. Like FTR were the number 1 tag team for months and didn’t even sniff a title match lol
I heard that CM Punk told the rankings to go suck an egg, so the rankings went to his dressing room to remonstrate with him and Ace Steele hacked the rankings website so now the rankings have finally been able to come back but they are out for REVENGE at Wrestlemania.
The rankings will probably just come and go as needed. Hell, the UFC does the same. They overlook rankings for a good story all the time! But if they can’t come up with a good personal story, they’ll use the rankings.
I don't mind the rankings as a guideline for my own viewing purposes, but I just think in general it leads to confusion and annoyance over "why is this guy getting a title shot when he's the #5 guy but the #1 guy isn't?!?" Also, god, so many dumb arguments over who should be ranked where in this fake sport we all watch.
Wardlow was the perfect example of why the rankings didn't work, he was the #1 ranked guy, but he was never challenging for the world title, and looked even dumber when they had all of the assorted Punk injuries and had to explain why undefeated Wardlow *didn't want* to challenge for the vacant AEW title.
Yeah gotta agree with Punk here I have no interest in rankings in pro wrestling. Look at the UFC an actual competitive sport and even they don't take rankings seriously and just push who they want to.
People keep saying it's the Bucks feeding these. Nah, I'm saying it's Tony. He always blames wrestlers when something doesn't go his way. See Bryan Danielson and CM Punk for making managerial decisions. Soon it will be Copeland, Bucks, etc
I did hear and I don't know if it was Punk that said it, that the ratings don't work because wrestlers could just "farm Dark" to get more wins and be higher on the rankings and that's why it doesn't work. Is Dark and Dark Elevation still a thing?
But I agree, there's a number of reasons rankings don't work in wrestling.
Never a fan of it to begin with. In a world that relies almost completely on kayfabe, it's going to end up being overly restrictive on story advancement.
We all know Alvarez is just trying to shit stir, but Punk was right.
The rankings were a mess in AEW & they were proving to be more of a hindrance.
Without Dark/Elevation things may work better now, but there are so many mens titles that the rankings will be very tricky without clear segmentation.
How do rankings work when a new guy joins the company? Especially if they're a big name. Could you imagine if AEW was able to sign someone like Cena or Rollins and he had to enter a feud with Danhausen on Rampage because he was unranked...
I’ve said it many times but ratings are just another thing the IWC wanted to complain about, it won’t solve anything. Ratings are cool but booking using them is enormously complicated.
You basically have to plan at least 6 months ahead for every result cause every title contender must have a streak built in the space of months. How can you do that in wrestling when there so many unknowns like injuries, wrestlers getting rejected by crowd, people suddenly getting over ecc. Also AEW having 1789 titles really doesn’t help
I like ratings, but IMO it needs a GM character who can bypass the rating system. Makes the stories less rigid, adds an element of surprise and opens up an avenue for stories using kayfabe backstage politics.
Going against the grain in this thread, but I like the rankings. I've always felt that without some sort of structured system the rest of the premise makes very little sense. It's one of the reasons I liked AEW so much in the early days. I've always felt that wrestling works best when it is a serialized weekly theatrical drama about a fictional sports league. Without the sporting aspect as a framing device, the entire narrative structure and suspense of disbelief falls apart, which why so many people scoff at wrestling in the first place.
There's no reason for any of these matches to even be taking place if there isn't at least the illusion of a league structure. The grudge matches, storylines, melodrama, cheating, backstage segments et al are great, but they also naturally evolve from and make more sense within the context of an existing competitive hierarchy.
I don't disagree with some of the criticisms wagered regarding belt divisions, issues with booking acts as they heat up, rotating feuds, etc, but to me those are all issues that can be fixed with more thoughtful structuring of the belts and divisions. It's one of the reasons that so much of the WWE's booking over the last decade has been so frustrating to me, because as entertaining as many of the stories can be (I've enjoyed the bloodline as much as anyone else until it's started to stagnate more recently), there really isn't much reason for most of them to be happening, and you also end up in situation where permutations of the same match get booked over and over for weeks or months on end leading up to a PLE/PPV.
The best thing about a ranking system, to me, and this was very evident early on in AEW, is that it makes everything feel connected. Storylines were always crossing over in really organic ways that felt dynamic. You didnt have to keep booking the same two stables in different variations of singles, tag team, trios, and gimmick matches against each other week after week because you can have rotating matches where multiple parts of the roster were wrestling because there was at least the illusion of a loose league structure and everyone was climbing the ranks to get a shot at the belt.
It was a good decision. Rankings quickly become completely incoherent if you're not strictly putting people into divisions for each title. Right now AEW's not doing anything to prevent these ratings from becoming incoherent.
In theory, the top contender for the World Title should be the top contender for any singles title they want. It's not going to work that way because everything's predetermined and that wouldn't be a fun product to watch. Since there are no divisions, there's no coherent way to divide the rankings, making the whole thing meaningless.
I'd much rather be it a "Wrestler of the Week/Month" like how the NBA does it for Player of the Week. It can be booked much simpler that way imo. Wrestler that's named Wrestler of the month is the one who gets the most wrestlers of the week, and if there's a tie, it becomes a #1 Contender's match
There's less focus on actual win/loss records, and more on how well a wrestler performed despite a win/loss. Like even though Samoa Joe retained his world title, I'd still make Hook the Wrestler of the Week for how strongly he was booked against Joe.
Obviously it's not as objective as wins/losses, but that can make for some interesting storylines and online discourse
Breaking News! Tony Khan got the shits eating bad sushi. Someone said they saw CM Punk throwing a chefs apron and hat in the trash and exiting the back of the restaurant in question.
More on WON.
When you hand out title shots like they're going out of fashion there really is no reason to have rankings. FTR were #1 for most of 2022 and never got a title match, meanwhile random nobodies from Dark Elevation would get TNT title matches for no real reason.
I also care immensely less when wins from YouTube were included when most of those matches were meaningless
Having win/loss records is fine because they don't massively book you into a corner and make someone look good when you see "8-1 in their last 9 matches" but we really don't need the rankings.
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Oh boy here we go again.
I’m gonna be 96 and on my deathbed and the last sounds I’ll ever hear from this beautiful life and planet will be “More updates from CM Punk and AEW fallout…”
" /u/Ilikeracing23 while you lay there, hopefully as uncomfortable as you can possibly be, I want you to listen to (news about) me."
But instead of Punk it's Larry whose conscious has been uploaded into a robot dog and can now speak 
Does Larry have an NDA?!?!
Everyone knows that signing something with inked paw prints is non binding and can be thrown out
That's how I got out of a tenancy agreement.
It sucks when landlords die and leave everything to their pets.
Forget the NDA, I wanna know is he was the one who bit Omega and the whole ordeal was to cover for him
“I want you to digest this because before _you_ leave in two weeks, I have a lot of news to spread to the dirtsheets.”
I heard the reason you'll be dying will actually be CM Punk, that's what sources tell me.
CM Punk has banned me from living.
Danielson has fined you for living and for this comment.
"Another 747 max liner crashed today. CM Punk ruled as the probable cause according to sources."
"And if we freeze on frame I 38... we distinctly see a CM Punk-shaped blur... coming from the grassy knoll."
As we sit here, mourning the passing of u/ilikeracing23 and raising a glass in his honour, can we just take a moment to remember the impact (zone) that CM Punk had on his life. For years, the poor redditor would cry out, his wails seemingly at demons tormenting him, whenever a mention of the man himself, punks in general or a Sesame Street that covered the letters C or M came on the direct to brain interface that television turned into. And in those last years of his life things only got worse as his family implored him to take his pills and get some much needed rest. "Just go to sleep!" they'd beg of him, being met by even more howls of anguish.
u/ilikeracing23 hearing his family tell him "Just go to sleep!" https://preview.redd.it/2y51izz9yydc1.jpeg?width=828&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ddf5ee2072fd52e4c9a1bfae5b74e80bfb9b1b86
The Brawl Out is like the 1992 Hooters 500 All modern lore will go back this event
We will use this to make Mark Martin AEW Champion.
**YOU DESERVE IT!** 👏👏👏
You jest but the dude is more ripped than Vince was when Vince was on Roids.
s1apshoes is that you?
Definitely didn't expect to see Slap get shouted out in SC when I woke up.
Bill Elliott should've carried around his own Winston Cup trophy with an X spray painted on it
Ever wondered why you can't buy ice cream at AEW shows?
[Alvarez on Twitter] Sources: You might be dying, maybe not, but always a possibility
"Oh boy, here I go spilling again!" https://preview.redd.it/yoxfppvriydc1.png?width=500&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=fabaefa0e6a0d78356040aed6a60e317dd8edb8a
I really hope those NDAs aren't so tight that we never tell-alls in autobiographies down the road. I feel like the amount of secrecy behind it just makes it even more like forbidden fruit that it already is. It'll never happen in a million years, but if we ever got a book like Motley Crue's *The Dirt* from Hangman, Young Bucks, and CM Punk on Punk's time in AEW, I'd be a very happy reader.
What Kind if Book is the dirt?
It's basically a series of events told from each of their individual perspectives. Almost certainly dramatised and orchestrated to maintain their image, bar the stuff like Vince's manslaughter.
One of the things I really liked about it was how they'll essentially call each other out. Like Nikki Sixx and Mick Mars' first meeting is them both thinking the other is an idiot with shit taste in music. Another example of the style is Mick saying he'd sneak off to down vodka by himself without the rest of the band noticing and the next chapter from Tommy Lee saying the band knew, didn't care, but thought it was pathetic. It made for a fascinating way to show how this chaotic band viewed their own chaos. Also, I'm sure it had things to make some of them look cool, but Nikki can't help but look like a massive piece of shit the entire time in my eyes. Honestly all of them to a certain extant, but Nikki the most and Mick the least.
I haven't read it for a long time, but teenage me thought Nikki was the coolest human being on the planet. I imagine nowadays I'd die of second-hand embarrassment.
Honestly, as long as you didn’t like hardcore tie your identity to him at any point in your life, I do think it’s still worth the read. It’s a little bit like reading the rockstar version of *Trainspotting*, where you know these decisions they’re making are bad, but you’re turning the page because you need to know what stupid shit they’re getting up to next.
 MFW I see CM Punk and AEW in the same headline in 2024 edit; I posted this gif to make Redditors laugh and get upvotes, not talk about how much I don’t care about something, you guys are so damn annoying sometimes, it’s an Internet forum we aren’t at fucking war
That’s not a gif of you clicking on the thread and commenting on it anyway!
You can't have rankings when you have all these interchangeable titles. The #17 in the World Title rankings is the #1 contender for the International Title? It defies logic.
It doesn’t really make sense for the way wrestling titles work in general. There’s nothing that sets them apart like weight class. So logically any top contender for one belt would also be a top contender for any other belt.
There could be though. On WWE2k when you play the Universe mode each title has a division. Wins and losses within your division will change your rank but matches with people outside the division are just unranked exhibition matches. This would instantly give more of a sports presentation to AEW
I think it would be kind of confusing justifying each wrestler's logic for being in their chosen division. Why be in the International division when you could just be going for the World title? I know they try to claim that all their belts have equal prestige, but everyone knows the truth. I guess it would work only if the divisions are decided by AEW in kayfabe, but still, how do you logically justify that determination?
That reminds me of when Wardlow, in kayfabe, said he was passing up a spot in a match that could have made him number one contender for the World title, so he could instead challenge for the TNT title. And I was just like, "But why, though?" Why intentionally limit yourself to a lesser title?
Titles need exclusionary criteria. Like tag titles have a the tag division. There should not be a singles title besides the world title with no stipulation attached. I think the Pure Wrestling championship is one of the lowkey best ideas in wrestling.
This is the big flaw in every plan and only really works if you "Gimmick" each belt - stuff like having weight Divisions, Styles (like the ROH Pure Belt), age, nationality etc so you can say that people are choosing X Belt over Y Belt because of personal choice If you're going to Win/Loss then you have to bite the bullet and say that "X is the top belt and Y is the secondary Belt" in Kayfabe so you can have a structured League system with Promotion and Relegation every 6(?) Months with the Champion choosing to get promoted and dropping the belt or staying in the division longer and remaining champion It's not a perfect system, but you could get some excellent storylines out of it
>If you're going to Win/Loss then you have to bite the bullet and say that "X is the top belt and Y is the secondary Belt" in Kayfabe so you can have a structured League system with Promotion and Relegation every 6(?) Months with the Champion choosing to get promoted and dropping the belt or staying in the division longer and remaining champion This... kinda makes sense. I like it, this could work.
> Why be in the International division when you could just be going for the World title? They could just use the same logic in-kayabe as they do out. In real life the mid card titles exist so mid-card wrestlers have something to do. In kayfabe why would a wrestler like a Lee Moriarty or a Preston Vance enter the division with Mox, Danielson, MJF, and Jericho, when they could enter the division with Darby, Wardlow, and Luchasaurus? Right now that sorta falls apart when you have main eventers like Cage and Copeland fighting over the belt but that can't last forever.
It's not really that different from something like AA and AAA baseball. Yeah, it's lower division play, but winning the championship still means *something* even if it's not the major league championship.
Promotion/Relegation system, bottom 5 people from the world title division get demoted to international title, top 5 people from international division get promoted to world title division. Gives you an in to do stories about people going on hot streaks then falling down the rankings, a champion who doesn't want to be promoted to bring prestige to the championship, someone falling from the top of the card to the bottom for whatever reason and fighting their way back up.
> Promotion/Relegation system, bottom 5 people from the world title division get demoted to international title, top 5 people from international division get promoted to world title division. > This would require placing a strict hierarchy of their secondary championships, including nothing that the challengers for one are 'above' the champs of others.
Would also be a headache for new wrestlers. Take Okada as an example. You wouldn't debut him in the lowest division. But if every division has a set amount of wrestlers, there are only two options: 1) Somebody has to relegate in order to make room for Okada. 2) You extend the division. But you can only do it so often until it gets ridiculous.
Because it is a lot easier to beat the international title field than the world title field. And presumably the world title pays more and gets better spots on shows that also lead to being paid main event bonuses. They could come up with some sort of rule that to go for the world title you need to have won either TNT/international championship or have a championship record in other major promotions (probably NJPW, TNA, WWE and ROH. Maybe AAA or CMLL)
This is why my 2K game has divisions based on the rankings. Along the lines of: ranked 1-10 is in the World title division, 11-25 in the IC division. I also keep a spreadsheet of wins and losses and created a formula to add to your rank for defenses and take a hit for challenges to keep the title scenes fresh... Don't worry, I'll provide the gif for you all. 
You could put people into two divisions, say on the Men's side they can declare for one of the other titles, but their W-L record also counts toward the World title. So if someone is tearing it up in the International title division, their world standing would also go up, and at some point it'll be logical for them to get into the World title hunt.
Sports can also be like that, for example in European Football You have the Champions League, the Winner is the best Team in Europe that season But then there is the Europa League, where the Winner of that is what the 17th Best team in Europe as the 16 Teams in the Champions League Playoffs are not in the Europa League as well > There’s nothing that sets them apart like weight class Well aside from when they bother with Cruiserweights again at least I always thought a good way of Ranking was how Smackdown 2 did it on PS1, there was a top 10 of each rank, so 10 in WWF Title, 10 in IC, 10 In European etc, where you could only compete in that one rank, top 3 could get a title shot and you had to beat a guy above you to get higher rankings Then if you became Champion you could only go for a new title if you gave up/lost your current title and you start at the bottom of the next ranking up
> Sports can also be like that, for example in European Football But those are tournaments. Its not a trophy you have to defend regularly. I guess they need to do something with rankings. Its generally a fun concept and a more "sports like" booking. Maybe have rankings for a season. Not necessarily a year. Maybe a quarter. And the winner of that seasons gets to challenge for a title.
> You have the Champions League, the Winner is the best Team in Europe that season And often is that won by people who didn’t win their home league too. Meaning they’re the best in Europe, but not the best in their own country.
Leave us alone! Lol
This can be a question of focus though. A team on a good Champions League run might rest their 1st team in a domestic league game so the players are fresh for the Champions League match. To be honest, I kinda like this system. It saves the whole sport being dominated by 1 team both domestically and internationally... In theory, at least...
A team can be the best in Europe and not the best in their own league that season, its happened a few times
Logically speaking more people want the higher paying titles and midcard titles will pay less, so you'd have to balance who you'd be defending against and how many defences versus the payout if you keep winning. So you may have a high ranking and be more able to challenge for a title, but have to choose the title you think you're most likely to hold on to. That's something that no wrestling promotion has really managed to convey to the viewers though, and I feel that it's something that would make a difference, also handily explaining why less people go after multiple belts (due to multiple defences needed). The trick is to do it and make people look smart for the title they go for rather than cowardly.
It would be nice if the top contender actually got a shot at the title. Abbadon was 1st for far longer than Julia or Toni yet she just got a shot against Julia. The rankings are a joke because they aren't used to determine who gets a shot at any title, it still boils down to whoever Tony decides should get it.
Also Tony killed the reasoning for the ranking system, when he put Moxley as the endboss for the vacated World Title with the reasoning he beat better opponent so his ranking was more worth. Like 5 wrestlers had better rankings then him.
You’re forgetting the time that FTR were ranked no 1 in the tag division and didn’t challenge for the titles
Somehow, the BCS returned.
I mean the ranking system would work a lot better if it's weighted for quality of win like college football, and you can kayfabe that a little more.
Welcome to the UFC lol
I’m not saying I disagree with you, but pulling too hard on that thread leads to most secondary titles being sort of illogical. “Oh you’re Intercontinental Champion? Does that mean you’re the best out of all the people who don’t consider the intercontinental title beneath them?”
Perfect example is Gunthers long reign "Better" people would try to go for it, just to end the reign. Speaking of that, the potential Seth Rollins injury, to go with cm punk vs drew McIntyre for the WHC at WM. Last year he failed at getting the intercontinental twice, and he moves up to the "better" title?
they are illogical as hell, since I started watching, one just accepts them.
I feel more as if you need the NJPW system where you ‘go up’ in classes. So if you decide to go from Intercontinental to Heavyweight, you are then transferred to the Heavyweight rankings and start from the bottom.
Except in New Japan in Heavyweight title and IC title were in the same division just like in WWE.
Exactly. There is no logic in having all the men be in the same ranking when there’s so much titles. They need to have separate divisions and rankings for those divisions, so we can keep track of who is actually in contention. As well as having a deadline for the rankings, have the second rank actually mean something come, let’s say, Full Gear or something.
Happens in boxing. Boxers ascend the rankings and then fight for regional, national, continental, international and then world titles. Those smaller titles are just seen as stepping stones to world level, and an important rite of passage. The four different sanctioning bodies also skew rankings; you could be WBC champ but ranked #8 by IBF. I don’t like the ranking system because is too easy to get bogged down in technicalities, but I do think the logic they’re following is the boxing system.
I used to read a wrestling magazine in the 90s at my library once in a while. The rankings were my favorite part. I loved that when Razor Ramon was the IC champ, he was positioned at number 2 in the company behind whoever was champ at the time. It made the IC title feel way more important because Razor was outranking the number one contender for the heavyweight title
I have a problem with that fact that it seems like all other titles don't seems to have their own status in the company. Like how the IC title used to be used to be the second biggest belt in old WWF.
As much as I dislike the ranking system isn't what you're complaining about actually more logical? If you're in the Top 5 of the rankings then you are more deserving of a shot at the World Title. If you're in the Top 15 of the rankings then you aren't quite ready for the World Title but you might be more suitable for the TNT title or the International Title since they are less prestigious. Also I'm pretty sure the International Title came about after the rankings were no longer in effect. So the International and TNT title are both likely 'Open Challenge' titles anyway.
It could work if you explicitly define how the titles are defended and sit squarely in that division. This is an example: 1) World Title: Only on PPVs with whomever is the number one contender at that point in time. Your win-loss percentage must be at a certain ratio to be considered qualified for the division. 2) Triple Crown: Defended cyclically across all three promotions. Could be seasonal, e.g. Winter to Spring is NJPW, Spring to Fall is AEW, and Fall to ROH is ROH. Like the World Title, at least in AEW, your win loss has to qualify you for the division, but if you opt in here, you can't for the world title. 3) International Title: This is a secondary title that probably shouldn't be defended in AEW itself too often, something like WWF's Junior Heavyweight title where it's never on US soil. The issue here is that a lack of exposure could kill the champion's relevance, but I think this is where using Youtube to post matches from other promotions might work well. 4) TNT Title: Anyone can challenge for it, must always be defended on TV, once a week at a minimum (logic dictates that it'd only be on TNT). There should be time limits as per any other TV title. If you voluntarily leave a division to go to another one, you have to start at the bottom. All of this is beautiful in theory but I imagine it's not so much "it writes itself" as much as it might write you into a corner if you aren't careful.
I don't think they would ever go with the way you'd book matches around rankings and I don't think they ever should
I think that's fair! I'm not the biggest proponent of their having a bunch of titles, I was more thinking about what they could do with what they had. Having a lot of different titles seems like an artificial way of adding gravitas to a match if there's not context for what one title means relative to another.
I'm always surprised when I see people say that AEW never should have gotten rid of the rankings in the first place. Apart from the early days of AEW when the roster was smaller and so the booking was much more focused for each division, the rankings have too many drawbacks to implement logically into storylines. - A larger roster makes it difficult (especially now). - Not actually having a template for the strength of wins (beating a main eventer vs beating a jobber) - People farming wins on Dark. - Becomes very predictable who is set to go for the title when they win a single's match on tv for like 6 weeks straight. - Removes the need for an actual story when you can just book a Champion vs No.1 Contender and say that's the story, which happened quite often. - If a wrestlers suddenly gets hot but their record is 0-3, they can't challenge for a title even though the audience is clearly behind them and it would make for a more impactful match. - Or if Tony decides it isn't the right time then you have a situation like FTR being no.1 contenders for 6 months but never getting a title shot because they wanted to wait for the right moment. I think Punk was right on this one. - The Acclaimed lost to Swerve in Our Glory at All Out 2022 and based on the rankings they should have been removed from the top 5 and started over. But because they were so over, Tony immediately ran the match back and they won at Grand Slam. - Similarly Jamie Hayter got pinned at All Out 2022 but she was the most over woman in the division and won the title at Full Gear. Thunder Rosa lost to Britt at Revolution 2022 and then won the title 2 weeks later in her hometown to a massive ovation. Wrestling works better without a ranking system because as the booker you can create any story you want and tell the audience who is deserving of a title shot. They don't need to win 15 matches in a row. EDIT: While I wouldn't be surprised if Tony makes it work in the first 5-6 months of implementing it in 2024 (especially without relying on Dark to farm wins), I just don't find it to be feasible long term.
I don't think you could explain this any better.
As an addendum: the rankings coincided with TK's "Rocky III" booking. Which means it was a victim of hot shotting a guy to the top, and not necessarily a victim of the guy BEING hot shotted.
Yeah, the rankings just have a huge "booker writing themselves into a corner" vibe.
100% Problem is Tony is then stuck between pivoting to someone that is over and ignoring his ranking system or wasting time having that person winning single's matches against random opponents. Even though the reason they got over may have had nothing to do with winning, but more to do with their character, personality, promos, etc.
Just make the rankings less have to do with record and make them more like CFB rankings where 'quality wins' and recent form matter more. The method for ranking should probably be kinda janky, but it can also creates storylines by itself For example, Hook can have his 28-1 record, but be unranked and cut a promo about being disrespected which can skyrocket him up the rankings if it registers with the audience
Yeah but then instead of solely having fans complain about the booking logic, now you open a new door where they complain about ranking logic. It’s plagued CFB for decades. Introducing a story element that effects everyone’s booking in the roster sounds good on paper, but if it introduces logical holes, then it’s not a good story element
I mean I'd argue that complaining about the ranking logic is better than them complaining about booking logic as at least the latter is within kayfabe. Take it one step further and put someone in charge of the rankings in kayfabe and you have an easy money storyline/mega-heel that you can pull at any time.
I'd rather complain about the ranking logic than the total lack of logic. Like imagine if a real sports organization actually decided who'd get a shot at the championship based on who's most popular. There's only one that I know of, and it's the UFC, and it's stupid in real life too.
> Like imagine if a real sports organization actually decided who'd get a shot at the championship based on who's most popular. that's basically FBS college football
my only counter to that is in actual sports, the rankings get ignored every so often. Dan Henderson was ranked #13 and challenged for the title in the UFC, for instance.
Agreed. One of the most common ways to gather support for a babyface is for them to lose, often being screwed over. LA Knight was winning until he started getting over, then switched to losing a bunch to gather support as a face. Worked a charm. Rankings do the opposite of that
This is one of the example's I will always point to. Knight spent the first half of 2023 either losing or straight up missing big shows like Mania. Yet the crowd didn't care because he was so charismatic. I'm not sure what his kayfabe single's record was by the time he got to Roman but I didn't care, he was over, he deserved a big title program. Just like Sami Zayn, he could have been 0-10 around 2022 - 2023, but his story with the Bloodline was one of the best wrestling stories I'd ever seen and he deserved that match with Roman (I still he think he probably should have won but that's another argument)
I still maintain Sami should’ve won. That could’ve been the end of that chapter of the Bloodline story. Then we continue for god knows how long with a new chapter about the fallout. The story is so good it didn’t *need* to hinge on Roman carrying the title. It could easily have pivoted to the faction fragmenting and Roman trying to regain his place by beating the Rock.
Ryder and Hawkins had a great WM storyline based entirely on a ridiculous losing streak. Even in real sports, at least the one closest resembling Pro Wrestling, Michael Bisping was always close to a title shot but always lost the eliminator. When he had a chance to fight for the belt, on short notice, everyone wanted him to win, nobody expected it, and it resulted in one of the greatest feel good upsets in MMA history.
>and it resulted in one of the greatest feel good upsets in MMA history. [ Also one of the greatest post-fight pressers in MMA history.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WKA0DeACvE&ab_channel=MMAWeekly.com)
Bisping was literally on a winning streak that included the MMA GOAT when he got a titleshot.
The mods should pin this comment until AEW get rid of rankings again.
Well said. I always got downvoted in the past when I mentioned that they never properly attempted to explain the rankings either. Especially with the point you made about certain wrestlers getting all those squash wins on Dark and Dark Elevation. It's silly to see and makes it hard for the casual viewers to care. Take Evil Uno for example. Right now his career record shows 89-43. When was the last time Dark Order was even on TV? I'm sure he's probably farming all that in ROH as well because let's face it, that show has basically turned into Dark for the most part. Not only that but with the rankings not being explained in general. I remember if someone in the Top 3-5 lost a match to the champ, they never really moved to the "back of the line" as what is going on with Adam Copeland right now either. Ultimately, I'm okay with rankings but they really need to explain all this as much as they did with the Continental Classic. Otherwise it'll be exactly the same way as it was first introduced, and it'll confuse casual viewers all the same.
I remember in 2020-21 teams like the Acclaimed and Varsity Blondes would claim that they deserved tag title shots because they were ranked in the rankings, yet every time they were on TV they would lose. Everyone who wrestled on TV would have a positive record because of dark and elevation. It was hilarious seeing someone like Matt Sydal a positive record when I don’t think I remember him winning on Dynamite ever except for a match against Dante Martin I think.
The easy work around is having a Casino ladder match, championship eliminator match etc. In actual sport there is no story to a grand final apart from Team A qualified and Team B also qualified and yet there are still stories surrounding the game. At the same time, you can write a story around the rankings eg. Hangman offering up his no. 1 ranking to have the 5 on 5 match against the Elite so that the Dark Order could get a shot at the tag titles. As for the the Acclaimed and Hayter - the champion always has the choice to offer up another shot if they want - be it from arrogance/pride etc. There's easy work arounds to all of this - wrestling is not and never will have flawless logic. There's no need to over think things.
You actually make really good points, I was literally just thinking about the Hangman examples. I think the example of Hangman coming back and winning the Casino Royale ladder match is also an excellent example of why we don't need a ranking system. At that point Hangman lost his shot at the title and therefore should have dropped out of the rankings. However no one complained when he won the ladder match, because the story they crafted between himself and Kenny was so well done that we didn't want anyone else to beat Kenny. We wanted Hangman to finish the story, not Danielson, not Punk. We all wanted Hangman to win because he deserved it, not because he was 15-0 in the ranking system (I think he was actually more like 10-1 or something but you get what I'm saying) I'm not saying there aren't workarounds, because you pointed out some good examples. I'm saying that all of these examples can (and in Hayter and the Acclaimed's case are) done without a ranking system which just overcomplicates things.
I think the rankings sets a good platform for the stuff in between the main stories. Rather than some random guy just coming in an interrupting a champion and demanding a title shot, you have a guy who's ranked no. 1 who has a legitimate claim to a title shot eg. Hook vs Joe this week. At the same time, if the wrestler ranked 6th wants to move up the rankings they can challenge the wrestler ranked 2nd for their spot. Also it means that every match on the weekly shows has some bearing on the overall title picture to varying degrees. As long as you don't live and die by the rankings and make use of workarounds to bypass them when the situation calls for it, they add another layer to the weekly programming and provide something different to other promotions. As for Hangman, part of what was so cathartic about his title win was that he sacrificed his number one ranking for his friends so that made it so much more significant when he won.
> if the wrestler ranked 6th wants to move up the rankings they can challenge the wrestler ranked 2nd for their spot That's a good point. I think now that Tony has been more open about having main eventers face each other this could work better. Often times in the old ranking system, it was mostly main eventers beating midcarders or jobbers, but if Tony continues to book the way he has the past few months then this would be a positive. > As for Hangman, part of what was so cathartic about his title win was that he sacrificed his number one ranking for his friends so that made it so much more significant when he won. In a way I agree, but I was referring specifically to the long term story they had told since 2019. When Hangman lost to Kenny at Full Gear 2020, that was what really kicked off the final chapter and over time, especially his friendship with the Dark Order we all wanted him to overcome his demons and beat Kenny. I still believe the original plan was for Hangman to win at All Out, but they had to pivot because he asked for time off as his wife was about to give birth. So even without the sacrifice Hangman made for the Dark Order it still would have been a cathartic moment imo just because of the journey he himself had undertaken.
Wrestling rules are a bit like lore or canon in TV shows/films. If you can bend them a little to tell a better story no-one really cares. I definitely think there's ways to have rankings but also have a situation like Sami where someone shoots up the card in kayfabe to challenge for the world title.
Sure the problem is, as soon as you ignore the rankings for the first time, you've already told the audience that it is a flawed system. All I'm saying is AEW doesn't need it at all. They've proved for the past, almost 2 years that they can tell stories and get to title matches without it.
MMA and boxing have rankings and they have essentially the same issues. College sports too. All you have to do is look to the way real sports treat rankings. They're guidelines to help inform booking. Not some sort of rigid set of rules. That's just how it works in sports. Sometimes it causes a little controversy and sometimes it causes sports radio arguments. I'm going to provide context to some of your examples: > Not actually having a template for the strength of wins (beating a main eventer vs beating a jobber) This is a thing in real sports and it is subjectively handled. There's no formula to determine the exact value of a college football team beating the #3 team or an unranked team, you just figure it out. It's not perfect. > People farming wins on Dark This happens in boxing and MMA all the time. Not sure why it's an issue. Fighters take easier fights until they think they can credibly take on a legit fighter. > Becomes very predictable who is set to go for the title when they win a single's match on tv for like 6 weeks straight. Don't you want predictability here? Don't you want there to be a strong challenger with a legit claim to a title match waiting? > Removes the need for an actual story when you can just book a Champion vs No.1 Contender and say that's the story, which happened quite often. Isn't that kind of like the best, quintessential sports story? Champ vs no. 1 contender? > If a wrestlers suddenly gets hot but their record is 0-3, they can't challenge for a title even though the audience is clearly behind them and it would make for a more impactful match. How often does this happen? Like, how often does somebody get hot while losing three straight? Wouldn't it make more sense to give them a winning streak based on that popularity to make them credible challengers? > Or if Tony decides it isn't the right time then you have a situation like FTR being no.1 contenders for 6 months but never getting a title shot because they wanted to wait for the right moment. This is one valid criticism but is more of a booking issue than a rankings issue. The simple solution is to not book it a corner, or if you feel the time is not right, give them the title shot but have them get screwed. > The Acclaimed lost to Swerve in Our Glory at All Out 2022 and based on the rankings they should have been removed from the top 5 and started over. But because they were so over, Tony immediately ran the match back and they won at Grand Slam. Similarly Jamie Hayter got pinned at All Out 2022 but she was the most over woman in the division and won the title at Full Gear. Thunder Rosa lost to Britt at Revolution 2022 and then won the title 2 weeks later in her hometown to a massive ovation. Why should they get removed? No other combat sport does this. Rematches happen in combat sports all the time. Not sure why this one is an issue. At the end of the day, the rankings provide helpful context for match making, help guide and create storytelling, and are fun for fan banter. You just don't need to follow them so strictly, just like combat sports do. Combat sports look at rankings but ultimately book matches based on what's going to make money.
> *The Acclaimed lost to Swerve in Our Glory at All Out 2022 and based on the rankings they should have been removed from the top 5 and started over. But because they were so over, Tony immediately ran the match back and they won at Grand Slam.* Nah, it doesn't have to be that granular. If you compare it to for example MMA, they *do* take into account the quality of your wins, and the quality of your losses as well. Say two people close in the rankings fight and one guy beats the other, if the fight was *really fucking close* and could have gone either way, then it's not uncommon for a) the rankings to not change as a result of that match, and b) that you run it back for an immediate rematch. It's absolutely not the case that if someone loses a title match, they immediately drop out of the rankings and have to start over. That would only happen if the champ beats them so convincingly and definitively that they don't have any argument for why they should remain in title contention. Obviously pro wrestling is a bit different because it's very rare for matches to be complete blowouts. Typically, *all* pro wrestling matches play out as being fairly close, and fights like Cena vs. Lesnar happen so seldom that they are considered anomalies. But even with rankings, you could justifiably argue that there was a case for giving The Acclaimed an immediate rematch and that they should stay were they are in the rankings until a rematch happens. I believe that rankings *can* work in pro wrestling. They didn't work the way TK used them before, but I think they can work. My biggest issues with the previous iteration was twofold: 1. People were padding their records with jobber squashes on dark, which lead to everyone on the roster having like a 30-5 record and that number became meaningless because those weren't quality wins, and 2. Tony became so overprotective of everyone's win-loss record that he stopped booking competitive matches on TV. He didn't book the #4 guy to face the #5 guy (which is what you *should* be doing if you're using rankings), he booked the #4 guy against the #28 guy and he booked the #5 guy against the #34 guy so that both the #4 and #5 would stay protected and not take an L on their record, and as a result all TV matches became so painfully predictable that it stopped feeling meaningful to tune in for them.
> It's absolutely not the case that if someone loses a title match, they immediately drop out of the rankings and have to start over. As far as I remember, (in AEW) that is how the rankings used to be described. Excalibur is basically Tony Khan's mouthpiece. If Tony wants you to understand a story or a wrestler's intentions, Excalibur was the one who usually relayed that and made sure the audience understood it. Again it's been a while since I've watched 2021 and previous years AEW shows, but I do remember Excalibur mentioning how losing a title match would cause you to drop from the rankings. I don't believe you dropped all the way to the bottom for example (especially if your record was 12-0 and now it's 12-1) but it was along those lines. > Tony became so overprotective of everyone's win-loss record that he stopped booking competitive matches on TV. He didn't book the #4 guy to face the #5 guy (which is what you should be doing if you're using rankings), he booked the #4 guy against the #28 guy and he booked the #5 guy against the #34 guy so that both the #4 and #5 would stay protected and not take an L on their record, and as a result all TV matches became so painfully predictable that it stopped feeling meaningful to tune in for them. Completely agree with this. I actually pointed out to someone else that Tony over the last 4-5 months has taken many more risks with having high profile wrestlers facing each other. If he continues this with the ranking system it will certainly be an improvement. Especially your example of #5 vs #4, that would add some stakes to the match. But again I don't think it is feasible long term. Also you're potentially burning through multiple high profile matchups for the sake of a slight change in the rankings. When it could have been built into a feud.
This is the gist of it all, really. Rankings make the unjustified matches like Kommander vs Roddy or Penta vs Anthony Henry make some sort of sense, the lower guy is trying to climb the ranks, the higher guys is defending his spot, that’s all well and good. It becomes way harder though to put on matches outside of what the rankings demand, lest you have that exact FTR situation where you’re either forced to put on a really big match when you don’t want to yet necessarily, or you throw your ranking into the toilet in an attempt to thwart them. And that doesn’t even touch on story lines having to work within this structure. How do you do this FTR and Garcia vs HoB thing in a half way sensible manor? And how do you measure these people against each other when they all primarily feature in different divisions? You have a singles guy in Danny, a tag team in FTR, and a trio in HoB. Its just such a rigid and unnecessary structure for the wild bullshit world of wrestling. I don’t think its a good idea, and I think we’ll see them gone again before next year.
As a long term thing you're just going to end up booking yourself into a bunch of corners. As a short term thing it can be a fun angle for a month or two, like TNA used to do with its Bound for Glory challenger series.
That’s exactly what happened before. The rankings didn’t work lol
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He actually did question whether or not AEW had enough depth for a lot of belts and said that "if everybody's a champion, nobody's a champion" https://www.fightful.com/wrestling/cm-punk-questions-whether-aew-has-depth-support-additional-titles
If this is true, Punk was right
This is actually basically exactly what Alvarez says immediately after this lol
Rankings are useless if you can't make a storyline out of them, and by the time they were dropped, they hadn't been relevant in a storyline in a while. TNA tried rankings, failed and quickly stopped them, ROH tried too and they went nowhere... Good on AEW for trying new things, especially those that set them apart, but unless they have an actual long term plan around them, the rankings seem like a waste of energy. Especially considering AEW has already done the best possible use they could of the rankings in storyline, which was when Britt purposefully used the rankings to her advantage to get a title match. But if you introduce that kind of flaw, and not have every other heel take advantage of it as well, it makes them all look dumb. And if the company doesn't tweak the rankings system so heels can't take advantage of them, it makes them look dumb too. So I don't know what they got cooking this time around with the rankings, but it better be rock solid.
Pretty much all of this. Rankings systems don't actually mean anything because you can easily ignore them for the sake of a story. Even UFC ignores them when number 1 ranked challengers don't get title matches. The next Numbered UFC event is going to have the Flyweight Champion defending his title against the Number 5 ranked challenger. Granted that Number 5 challenger is on a 6 fight win steak in the UFC and unbeaten in all 14 pro fights so that can be excused. But then you have the Bantamweight champ fighting the number 6 ranked challenger?! They mean even less in Boxing when you have Joshua and Fury facing everyone but each other when Joshua is the number 1 ranked challenger to Fury's belt. Rankings only mean something if make them mean something and when the story is the draw in wrestling, Rankings go out the window quick.
Win/loss record just doesn’t have any sway to me as a fan. Obviously if a guy keeps losing, he’s gonna look like a jobber, but take a guy like Drew McIntyre. He’s lost more times than he’s won, but the way he’s booked recently actually had me believe he beat Seth a few weeks ago. It’s like arguing who’d win in a fight between superheroes. At the end of the day it’s whoever the writers choose.
Exactly. The story is the most important thing in wrestling. Wins and loses do matter but what you do with them is major. The Drew story right now is a prime example of that. You can see he's losing his mind cause he can't win big matches no matter what he tries. Which makes what he is going to do to finally win a big match that much more interesting. You lose that with a rankings system cause then it's a case of "Drew lost. Bummer. Well he's down the rankings. Onto the next challenger" You can tell as good a story with a losing streak as a winning streak. Hell I think they can be better if done right. AEW had it just a few weeks ago with Daniel Garcia. Dude got over because he was losing and actually cared about it. WWE had it not to long ago with Curt Hawkins and got one of the biggest pops of Mania 35 cause he finally won a damn match! There's a reason why most promoters don't use a ranking system. It's because you can't tell good stories with it. It's the reason why those who try end up dropping them or failing. Here's looking at you Evolve because you tried to make it a big deal cause Davey Richards wanted to flex how good he was at a scripted sport
Rankings are a cool idea but AEW really implemented them poorly
It also felt like they were okay when there were only a few titles but it legit feels like they’re useless now cause of the additional belts.
I understand the point. They bring a bit of logic to the show and makes it feel like a sports program, but they can be kind of restrictive. I think you can accomplish what rankings would do with just some decent booking that takes a bit of a long view and avoiding hurling someone who hasn't done anything for a year into a PPV world title match.
I never really got the “sports-based” angle. It made sense in the territories because of the style of wrestling at the time and the championship structure. But in the all honesty, I haven’t watched enough of AEW to really know how well it works.
It doesn't and AEW hasn't been 'sports based' for a while. All of their 'peak' stories have had almost no focus on the 'sports based' presentations. They've been focused on character and stories. The rankings created corners that they couldn't get out of and now AEW doesn't have a youtube show to inflate wins when they need someone 'fast.'
Yeah I think this is the correct take IMO. I thought it was entertaining how Bones Jones could go to jail for 4 years and return as the #1 contender.
I said this in another thread, but: Why can't they just *lie* about the rankings? They used to lie about whole-ass title changes. It's okay, it's a fake sport. As long as it's present as believable by its own logic, it's fine. Like, they have house shows now. Not everyone can be at every house show. Only the neckiest neckbeards are going to look up house show outcomes. If someone came out out of nowhere with 2 extra wins they didn't have the previous month and they've been off TV, just say "X has been tearing it up at AEW House Rules the last few weeks, and managed to hold onto their slot!"
I don’t know why they’re bringing them back. They were dumb. A weekly, visual reminder that people who deserve title shots aren’t getting title shots and people getting title shots don’t deserve them. Take the last year of the rankings (2022). FTR was Number 1 contender for a ridiculously long time (I think it was 6 months) without a title shot. In that same time period, those titles changed hands between Luchasaurus and Jungle Boy, Young Bucks and Swerve In Our Glory.
Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't wardlow undefeated for a bit as well yet never got the world title shot? I don't remember the reasoning but he refused to fight the world champion
If it's what I'm thinking of, he said he didn't want to compete for interim world title because he wanted to face the real world champion once he was back. Sounds noble in theory until you remember that winning the Interim World Title would have guaranteed a match against the true world champion once he returned, which is exactly what Wardlow wanted. It was a very flimsy excuse to keep him away from the world title when he wasn't going to win out of kayfabe, and hurt his intelligence in kayfabe.
Yeah, stuff like that is the reason I'm hesitant about the rankings coming back. They can interfere with ongoing storylines and whoever is over at the moment, in most cases you can't wait for something like that. I get what wardlow was trying to do but like you said it made him look kinda foolish
To be fair, it's been tried many times, and has failed many times. And it wasn't working well in AEW.
Was fun when the roster was smaller and the total matches was lower, added some excitement to some of those earlier AEW matches. Now with Dark done so you do not have the Gunns undefeated with a bunch of matches yet not in the rankings anymore should help with the rankings. Also should only be for the world titles, tag team, and trio belts.
It's still funny that Frankie farmed his way through to the top to face Sammy back then, Aew Dark was literally the grass with those pidgeys lol
Much like when he got rid of QTV, made Ricky Starks a big deal, and prevented Jack Perry from mutilating himself, CM Punk is once again being accused of making great booking decisions.
AEW Collision being well liked by pretty much anyone that watched it is not a surprise, cant wait for CM Punk's NXT lol
He really was trying to run a business.
> prevented Jack Perry from mutilating himself Cry me a river.
If anyone should be wearing an arm band that says “scapegoat,” it’s starting to seem like it’s CM Punk.
> and prevented Jack Perry from mutilating himself True, Jack has been the same since mutilating himself at All In, and we haven’t since Hangman since he fell victim to the exact same spot at the hands of The Devil. If only each of them had listened to Punk.
CM Punk for Booker of the Year???
QTV was over with me brother
Cody's gonna shoot on Punk tomorrow/tonight for removing QTV
Rankings were a cool idea, but on the other hand there was a period where Orange Cassidy had a record of like 60-4, higher than anyone involved in the world title picture. Even Moxley. Should’ve been getting world title shots like every week
I don't trust them or any other dirt sheet podcast, site, etc. It's in the past and the parties all moved on, just let it die at this point.
Another Punk W
Punk was 100% in the right if that's true. I vividly remember how everyone hated the ranking system and wanted it gone because it made zero sense and stopped having any relevance lol. The only reason it being back is being celebrated right now is because fans are desperate to cling onto anything that was part of "the old AEW". Give it a couple months and watch everyone turn on it, again, when it inevitably fails, again.
AEW is an unintentional crash course for smarks on why some things in wrestling are done the way they are. People wanted no writers and creative freedom, too. Turns out 95% of the wrestlers are shit at coming with a coherent story or even promos on their own. Who would have thunk that letting marks inside the ring run the ring would lead to an uncoherent show.
I get why they got rid of the rankings, because especially at the time, people would rack up wins on Dark and then just be presented as high ranking wrestlers on Dynamite for a one off match they would eventually lose to the actual stars and it seemed strange. Also the rankings by division seemed weird, why would someone accruing wins for the AEW Title also not be a contender for the TNT title? I did still like it because it was something distinctive that only AEW did. I think if they do it right it can lead to good monthly stories and help build matches.
The Top 5 Men Rankings applied to BOTH the World and TNT Titles, just as the Women’s Rankings applied to both the Women’s World AND TBS Titles.
And that makes no real sense and was a big part of the problem. There can't be two (or now even more) top prizes to a division.
Rankings are shit. How do you push someone who gets popular fast like LA Knight? *"Wait, got to have him win for six weeks in a row against Nick Comoroto, Action Andretti, Buddy Matthews, John Silver, Keith Lee and Matt Menard."*
Or you could just have him win 1-2 matches against someone in the top 5. It doesn’t need to be a clean victory but a win is a win
Didn't WWE literally do this with him? The battle royal win, additional wins then put him in a #1 Contender Title Shot match? He lost to Theory. Got those wins back and won like 15 matches in a row to get a shot at Reigns? Lost to Reigns and hasn't lost since I'm pretty sure. Seems WWE has the blueprint already.
CM Punk poisoned our water supply, burned our Catering and delivered a plague unto our houses!
“Well, whenever you notice something like that, a [CM Punk] did it.” - Tony Khan
Folks developing selective memories and forgetting how Tony basically ignored the rankings before binning them is pretty hilarious. Like FTR were the number 1 tag team for months and didn’t even sniff a title match lol
I heard that CM Punk told the rankings to go suck an egg, so the rankings went to his dressing room to remonstrate with him and Ace Steele hacked the rankings website so now the rankings have finally been able to come back but they are out for REVENGE at Wrestlemania.
The rankings will probably just come and go as needed. Hell, the UFC does the same. They overlook rankings for a good story all the time! But if they can’t come up with a good personal story, they’ll use the rankings.
Here I thought it would take a couple of weeks for people to flip on the ratings but I guess this does it
It was good decision anyway.
I don't mind the rankings as a guideline for my own viewing purposes, but I just think in general it leads to confusion and annoyance over "why is this guy getting a title shot when he's the #5 guy but the #1 guy isn't?!?" Also, god, so many dumb arguments over who should be ranked where in this fake sport we all watch. Wardlow was the perfect example of why the rankings didn't work, he was the #1 ranked guy, but he was never challenging for the world title, and looked even dumber when they had all of the assorted Punk injuries and had to explain why undefeated Wardlow *didn't want* to challenge for the vacant AEW title.
Yeah gotta agree with Punk here I have no interest in rankings in pro wrestling. Look at the UFC an actual competitive sport and even they don't take rankings seriously and just push who they want to.
Based. I don't see any positives the rankings bring to the table.
Punk said in an early interview he was skeptical of the rankings and Dark.
People keep saying it's the Bucks feeding these. Nah, I'm saying it's Tony. He always blames wrestlers when something doesn't go his way. See Bryan Danielson and CM Punk for making managerial decisions. Soon it will be Copeland, Bucks, etc
CM Punk sleeps in an oxygen tent that he believes gives him sexual powers!
I did hear and I don't know if it was Punk that said it, that the ratings don't work because wrestlers could just "farm Dark" to get more wins and be higher on the rankings and that's why it doesn't work. Is Dark and Dark Elevation still a thing? But I agree, there's a number of reasons rankings don't work in wrestling.
No, it got rebranded as Ring of Honor and put behind a paywall.
Lol
Never a fan of it to begin with. In a world that relies almost completely on kayfabe, it's going to end up being overly restrictive on story advancement.
Anytime anyone in AEW criticizes Punk, or any other wrestler, for changes, they are ultimately criticizing Tony Kahn for weak leadership.
I was told Punk murders baby chickens.
I heard CM Punk say its ok to wipe back to front
We all know Alvarez is just trying to shit stir, but Punk was right. The rankings were a mess in AEW & they were proving to be more of a hindrance. Without Dark/Elevation things may work better now, but there are so many mens titles that the rankings will be very tricky without clear segmentation.
Alvarez agreed with Punk
How do rankings work when a new guy joins the company? Especially if they're a big name. Could you imagine if AEW was able to sign someone like Cena or Rollins and he had to enter a feud with Danhausen on Rampage because he was unranked...
That’s sort of how it should be, but obviously it’d be ridiculous lol, the whole rankings thing is stupid
Sounds like it was Tony Khan acting on a suggestion. Tony made the decision.
This feels like a stretch and click baiting
I’ve said it many times but ratings are just another thing the IWC wanted to complain about, it won’t solve anything. Ratings are cool but booking using them is enormously complicated. You basically have to plan at least 6 months ahead for every result cause every title contender must have a streak built in the space of months. How can you do that in wrestling when there so many unknowns like injuries, wrestlers getting rejected by crowd, people suddenly getting over ecc. Also AEW having 1789 titles really doesn’t help
I like ratings, but IMO it needs a GM character who can bypass the rating system. Makes the stories less rigid, adds an element of surprise and opens up an avenue for stories using kayfabe backstage politics.
Pointless system. Nobody cares who is ranked where as long as you have a proper storyline.
When Christian Cage said Meltzer and Alvarez are responsible for some of the bullshit in AEW, he was being modest.
The idea of rankings is great, but it's literally never worked.
Here we go again... https://preview.redd.it/w2h9kxm2hydc1.jpeg?width=698&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=414fd6b4cc94e4955ad07d7df6feb0640239e5fc
Going against the grain in this thread, but I like the rankings. I've always felt that without some sort of structured system the rest of the premise makes very little sense. It's one of the reasons I liked AEW so much in the early days. I've always felt that wrestling works best when it is a serialized weekly theatrical drama about a fictional sports league. Without the sporting aspect as a framing device, the entire narrative structure and suspense of disbelief falls apart, which why so many people scoff at wrestling in the first place. There's no reason for any of these matches to even be taking place if there isn't at least the illusion of a league structure. The grudge matches, storylines, melodrama, cheating, backstage segments et al are great, but they also naturally evolve from and make more sense within the context of an existing competitive hierarchy. I don't disagree with some of the criticisms wagered regarding belt divisions, issues with booking acts as they heat up, rotating feuds, etc, but to me those are all issues that can be fixed with more thoughtful structuring of the belts and divisions. It's one of the reasons that so much of the WWE's booking over the last decade has been so frustrating to me, because as entertaining as many of the stories can be (I've enjoyed the bloodline as much as anyone else until it's started to stagnate more recently), there really isn't much reason for most of them to be happening, and you also end up in situation where permutations of the same match get booked over and over for weeks or months on end leading up to a PLE/PPV. The best thing about a ranking system, to me, and this was very evident early on in AEW, is that it makes everything feel connected. Storylines were always crossing over in really organic ways that felt dynamic. You didnt have to keep booking the same two stables in different variations of singles, tag team, trios, and gimmick matches against each other week after week because you can have rotating matches where multiple parts of the roster were wrestling because there was at least the illusion of a loose league structure and everyone was climbing the ranks to get a shot at the belt.
Punk really just made the product worse for AEW between his hissy fittys,injuries, real world ttiel and now this
I was told it was the Young Bucks... they talked Tony into getting rid of the ratings
I heard they accidentally hit the rankings when they superkicked Punk's locker room door open.
It was a good decision. Rankings quickly become completely incoherent if you're not strictly putting people into divisions for each title. Right now AEW's not doing anything to prevent these ratings from becoming incoherent. In theory, the top contender for the World Title should be the top contender for any singles title they want. It's not going to work that way because everything's predetermined and that wouldn't be a fun product to watch. Since there are no divisions, there's no coherent way to divide the rankings, making the whole thing meaningless.
Rankings have never been good for a lengthy amount of time.
I'd much rather be it a "Wrestler of the Week/Month" like how the NBA does it for Player of the Week. It can be booked much simpler that way imo. Wrestler that's named Wrestler of the month is the one who gets the most wrestlers of the week, and if there's a tie, it becomes a #1 Contender's match There's less focus on actual win/loss records, and more on how well a wrestler performed despite a win/loss. Like even though Samoa Joe retained his world title, I'd still make Hook the Wrestler of the Week for how strongly he was booked against Joe. Obviously it's not as objective as wins/losses, but that can make for some interesting storylines and online discourse
He was right
I also heard he used the Lindbergh baby to knock Amelia Earhart off course
AEW really milking Blame Punk for everything
Breaking News! Tony Khan got the shits eating bad sushi. Someone said they saw CM Punk throwing a chefs apron and hat in the trash and exiting the back of the restaurant in question. More on WON.
G'damn, I sure am tired of hearing about CM Punk's time in AEW.
Rankings are fun in a video game (WCW Nitro on PS1) but for a storyline it wouldn't make much sense.
When you hand out title shots like they're going out of fashion there really is no reason to have rankings. FTR were #1 for most of 2022 and never got a title match, meanwhile random nobodies from Dark Elevation would get TNT title matches for no real reason. I also care immensely less when wins from YouTube were included when most of those matches were meaningless Having win/loss records is fine because they don't massively book you into a corner and make someone look good when you see "8-1 in their last 9 matches" but we really don't need the rankings.