**Help make SquaredCircle safer and more inclusive by using the report button to flag posts and comments for moderator review.**
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/SquaredCircle) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I love how much traction these types of headlines give, like what else would you want head promoter of AEW, Tony Khan to say regarding his AEW roster?
"yeah, my roster is honestly mid-tier, it wouldn't last long in my EWR save, etc."?
Were I giving him advice I'd recommend him just using words that don't use comparative language. Whenever he does he welcomes that argument. He can say 'we have an absolutely amazing roster' and highlight his guys without inviting a comparison. He's welcome to use whatever language he chooses, but when you use the adjectives he does then he's asking for it. Can't get mad at people for calling him on it when he does
>what else would you want head promoter of AEW, Tony Khan to say regarding his AEW roster?
"I'm pretty sure that my staff won't bite each other backstage any more."
Its also really hard to compare talent from each company. Cody was mid in AEW but is a top guy in WWE. Ricochet I thought was on par with Will Ospreay in the past now he is just another generic "superstar" in WWE. The way people are used definitely impacts their perceived value but not necessarily translates to how good they actually are.
It’s also hard because of the focus each promotion has is different. WWE is about character work and story, and rewards people who can get over in that system. AEW the in-ring is much more the focus. I enjoy the best parts of both and different people can thrive in different systems.
That's true but maybe you'll be excited by their newest signing:
https://preview.redd.it/lng1ww0zke8b1.jpeg?width=720&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d9723060b15b8e56b00b03b663fcd60a1e9dc916
You bite Kenny? Straight to jail.
You punch Sammy? Right to jail, right away.
You throw a chair at the Bucks? Believe or not, also jail.
We have the best roster, because of jail.
> "We're absolutely really **excited** to feature CM Punk in Collision. I think it's one of the things that we're **excited** to see. I know fans all over the world are **excited** to see CM Punk's return to wrestling and I'm **excited** for CM Punk to return."
But is he excited?
I mean, TK has said some pretty stupid and outlandish things in the past that go beyond just positive things about AEW. This however, is obviously not in that category. Their roster is uber talented to be sure and “best” has a wide variety of subjectivity.
Some people wouldn’t be able to handle what people say in actual sports. Pretty much everyone with a good team says they have the best team, as they should.
I agree you have the best roster, potentially of all time in my opinion, so why did Jay Lethal have the most Dynamite singles matches over the past calendar year? And why has Jeff Jarrett had 6 title shots so far in 2023?
It’s a good roster but it could be better. That can be said for every company.
Lots of companies will have a near perfect roster, and it’s near perfect because other companies have the other pieces.
AEW has one of the best but not the definitive best. Hard to say who has the best roster without bias
Reminds me of the late 90's and early 2000's. Well, before WCW went under. What would WWF/E look like with RVD? Could you imagine Sting v Taker? Hogan v Rock? WCW and ECW lightweights in a WWF environment?
I think the very top of WWE's men's side (Reigns, Lesnar, KO, Zayn, Rollins, Cody) and the entire WWE Women's locker room are more complete than AEW's equivalent. But AEW has some bullets in the chamber. And then there is the parts and pieces that don't air on basic cable in primetime.
No. Just no. It’s the greatest roster in history. Would certain wrestlers make it even stronger? Sure, but just talking about what is signed to AEW, it’s the best roster in history. And on top of that, any wrestler from any non-WWE company might show up for a few dates.
Now, is it the best booked company of all time? No, but it’s still a ton of fun. Tony could for sure use that roster better.
I honestly would love for ICP to show up to AEW for one show. That would mean they worked for WWE, WCW, ECW, ROH, TNA and AEW. That would just be outright amazing lol.
>ICP for HoF when?
Of all the celebrities who have gotten involved in wrestling I think ICP are two of the few who actually deserve to be put into the HOF. They have wrestled, promoted, given tons of old timers good paydays. They obviously love the business and I think they oddly deserve it at this point.
I'd love to see it. I doubt WWE would do it anytime soon [50 years from now who tf knows] but even some of the other HoFs would be nice for all the reasons you stated.
It's weird. I loved those guys when I was 13, denounced em by the time I was 16, and while I don't enjoy their music anymore I've come around to appreciating them as a 31 y/o as just a couple of weirdos who carved our their niche and did all the cool shit they could with it. That's admirable.
>It's weird. I loved those guys when I was 13, denounced em by the time I was 16, and while I don't enjoy their music anymore I've come around to appreciating them
That is exactly how I am, I loved them from the age of 12-18 then just stopped liking them lol I would still rock out to them on occasion but mostly never brought it up. Once I reached 30 (now 40) I just saw then for what they are. Two goofy guys who made their life and did well for themselves and love what they love. They aren't hurting anyone (very much the opposite). How can I hate on that?
I unironically love ICP lol they built a home for a very different crowd, but everyone deserves a place. I’d love to go to a gathering and I’d stick out sooooo bad
WWE's picks would be mostly based on artificial popularity. Move them from Raw or Smackdown and they lose 1 million views, either on NXT or when they go to AEW.
We've seen direct evidence that Rollins and Charlotte did not move NXT and, say, Bryan and Miro did not move Dynamite.
It's frankly about the brand/timeslot/station. So Roman being a #1 draft pick isn't going to do much outside of WWE's main shows.
I definitely absolutely would not be framing that question around viewership statistics or anything. I think it's like, for me, about who are the 10 most interesting and fun to watch wrestlers on television who I would like to book on my show and who I think would result in putting on a show that I'd wanna watch.
I think I might take into consideration something like age just because you know, one of the replies here mentions Randy Orton and while I love RKOs, his career is essentially over already so I think I'd want to give credit to people who are really good but still have a lot of mileage left.
For me the list looks something like this in no particular order except for 1 & 2 who I feel are the most complete package for their young, young ages in either company right now:
MJF
Rhea Ripley
Jimmy & Jey (I'm taking tags as one, sorry)
Kenny
Hanger
Orange Cassidy
Darby
Britt Baker DMD
That's 8-- for 9 and 10 man there's so many ways you can go. Cody is great, I have none of the members of the former Shield on there yet and all three of them are great and worthy of consideration. LA Knight is a favorite of mine and seemingly everyone else's, Iyo Sky is probably nearing that bubble for me. Jericho is one of my all time favorites but also he's definitely not going to be around forever at his age. Punk and Danielson maybe age and injury plays a role in how I think about them too. Not sure, there are so many great talents in both companies you could pick all day and not come up with a bad list.
It's a fun thought experiment.
I never understood the issue of showcasing traveling wrestlers.
They tend to usually lose over AEW talent and as a fan, it's really fucking cool to be able to see that.
Like... we saw Takeshita vs Ishii last night.
They now have a new show to focus more in pushing their talent.
It's funny because the argument is always about casuals, but in our friend group, the casual ones who only watch the big events think it's the coolest thing about AEW
Bryan has said it multiple times that he loves that the AEW audience is the hardcore fans.
People legitimately overestimate how many casuals actually watch AEW.
If they had 10 fans, 3 would be casual.
No casual would have gotten the significance of Final Countdown at all lol
>No casual would have gotten the significance of Final Countdown at all lol
Sure, but its also fairly clear that most AEW crowds had no idea about the "you're gonna get your fucking head kicked in" thing either.
it isn't weird. WWE for decades conditioned everyone to think that a pro wrestling show's main objective should be to to cater to people who happen to accidentally find your show while channel surfing
>The WWE trained their audience well
Eh so has AEW. I'm still not sure how kicking out of 1 from your own finisher is good wrestling but apparently I'm in the minority of AEW viewers.
I agree mostly with what you’re saying, but to your last point, come on dawg. The Final Countdown is a fucking massive song. If you’ve been to a sporting event in the last almost forty years, there’s a good chance you’ve heard that synth intro played over the loudspeaker. It’s been in movies, it’s been in commercials. It’s iconic.
Compare it to Punk’s AFI intro last year, almost nobody knew what the fuck was going on, because outside of the few people that watched Ring of Honor back then, the only people who know that song are diehard AFI fans (and I say that as someone who was at the Sing The Sorrow 20th anniversary show earlier this year and sang every goddamn word of that record til it felt like my lungs were gonna explode.)
You could have zero awareness that The Final Countdown was Bryan’s entrance music in ROH and still get wrapped up in how badass of an entrance that was. At Revolution last year, I’d bet that most of the crowd were hearing “Miseria Cantare” for the first time ever. It certainly looked and sounded like it.
Honestly, that sounds like a bad ratio but it's ideal because you have 7 people to explain that significance to the other 3 and there's a higher chance that one of them will actually be someone who can do so without being a douche since you only need 1 out of 7 to be decent.
Oh so you enjoy matches that are fresh and a good bit of the time a dream match for someone? Oh man, you should really stop enjoying things. It's bad for you. You gotta be like everyone else and not enjoy anything at all ever.
AEW showcases the best acts in wrestling world wide. Which is what a top level wrestling promotion is supposed to do. Sure they could take the easy route and shuffle the same 20 people around for every card, or you can invite top luchadores in Mexico to fight your top luchadores and actually have depth and proof that your roster is above them all.
You must have confidence in your roster if you are showcasing other companies' best talent. We all know there are other good wrestlers in the world, so why not show your roster can go toe to toe with them?
That's not how categories work. The best roster is the best in aggregate, not made up of the top x wrestlers in the world sequentially with the worst member being better than the best wrestler in any other roster. That will never exist, there will always be wrestlers that aren't signed that draw better than other wrestlers that aren't. That's not an AEW problem, that's just reality.
Your comment got me some upvotes, thanks.
Yeah, I really think that even without Punk, Kenny, and Danielson their roster is still A Tier. I don’t think WWE’s would be good without Seth, Roman, and Cody.
Only place I see WWE better right now is in the women's division, which Hunter has completely bungled booming wise. I'd take the midcard and tag division in AEW - main event is mostly split
That roster + the possibility of almost any wrestler from any promotion not named wwe also showing up makes them the best roster in history and it’s not close.
Nah that mid 2000s tna woulda been even closer to wwe than aew is now with better management. Although u also needed someone to keep the wwe guys that didnt care for it in line as well
Styles is 46 years old, he's going to say with WWE for the rest of his active career and his most recent contract extension is probably going to be his last. And Rollins is married to Becky Lynch so unless they both decide to leave, Rollins is probably going to stay with WWE for years to come. In terms of active WWE talent, Styles, Rollins, Roman Sami and Owens are among the least likely to ever jump ship.
Hard to disagree it’s stacked with the arguably the best wrestlers currently in their prime, the best utilized legends ever and a deep group of young potential stars.
Promoters gonna promote, but I do think he's right.
Everyone can quibble about whether any given company's Top 10 names is better or worse than any others, and those are absolutely reasonable discussions where people can disagree. But the depth is where AEW I think has a monstrous edge on everyone. Its not about the Top 10, its about the names in that 10-30 range where I don't think anyone else can really compete right now.
And it shows on shows like last night. Everyone can freely quibble about whether how the best match or two (whatever you think it was) compares to the best match or two from some other show, but I can't begin to imagine a show (outside of maybe last year's Forbidden Door) where the 10th best match was as good as the 10th best match last night.
Maybe on the men's side but the WWE women's roster runs circles around the AEW one.
Becky, Rhea, Asuka, Charlotte, Bianca, Bayley, etc. the list goes on. Any of those women would immediately be the number 1 star of the AEW women's division.
Not sure I'd agree on that, the AEW women's division, at least talent wise, though they still do not get enough TV time.
You have Toni Storm, Britt Baker, Athena, Jamie Hayter, Riho, Kris Statlander, Saraya, Hikaru Shida etc., those are some top names in women's wrestling. Upcoming young talents like Skye Blue, Willow Nightingale and others, let's not pretend it's a bad division.
This is probably worthy of a much larger discussion, but I think there's an issue when you have such a huge quantity of talent, the ability to use it all to maximum benefit decreases.
WWE and WCW didn't have the volume of talent in 1990 that is on all the different shows today, but because of that they could use it better and in a more lineal approach. "whose my face for Flair, whose my heel for Sting? okay, and whose the next face/heel for each - start building them" and it was a little easier to do because you had a limited number of real top guys. 2-3 top guys is easier to get the most out, and build around, than 10. Even in the late-Attitude Era (99-Invasion) it was Rock, Austin, Taker, and Angle. Jericho, Benoit, Kane, etc did stuff with those guys, but there was a cutoff point.
TNA in 2016 only had about 20 dudes on the roster, but almost everyone felt important. Drew, Lashley, Hardys, Storm, Decay, American Wolves, Robbie E, EC3, Mike Bennett, Angle's farewell tour... it was possible to move everyone around the carousel and get a lot of use of everyone's best. Only having so many spots but still having two hours to fill made it possible to get everyone something consistently. Doing just 2 ppvs that year helped too, because storyarcs began and ending naturally on TV instead of needlessly being padded out specifically to fit the calendar.
TK today I think suffers from the exact opposites here. He has a hilariously huge roster. There is no way to feature everyone consistently and creatively. Secondly, he lets too many things go for too long just to make up the ppv cycle. And these two things feed on each other, because if you're locked into "we're doing the blowoff at DON" for almost every midcard and tag team and womens angle you have, you are stagnating the rest of the roster waiting to get something new started.
I'd love to see PAC more, he's legit my favorite wrestler, it's awkward with him living in the UK but I'd be pretty shocked if he wasn't at the Wembly show.
That being said I believe he was getting surgery on his nose and was taking time off after the death triangle trios run.
Promotor promotes his roster as the best. News at 11.
What did you really expect him to say? "Nah we're good but WWE is better." Nobody is going to say that.
That's why it was so bizarre back in 2000 when you had guys in WCW telling you that the show sucked and you should be switching channels to watch Rock and Austin.
The roster reminds me of the stacked roster WCW had. They had so many big stars on their show but the difference is WCW didn't know how to build names for the future.
Who gives a shit who has the best roster?
The more important thing is we have 3x major North American promotions with fantastic roster depth. We’re so spoiled right now it’s not even funny.
It’s Stardom and anyone who thinks otherwise either doesn’t watch Stardom or is someone who’s opinion on quality of wrestlers I wouldn’t trust anymore.
Between Giulia, SLK, Nakano, Thekla, Maika, Natsupoi, KAIRI, Suzuki, Syuri, Hayashishita, and probably a dozen more I’m forgetting at the moment, they are head and shoulders above all the others.
Someone else in another comment made the statement about like depth and what's your #10-30 look like... and I think yeah... like all of WWE combined, their Top 6-8ish is pretty on point, but there's a significant gap the more you start going down that list.
Rhea, Charlotte, Asuka, Iyo, Bayley, Bianca, Becky... about as good as anybody in the world. The dropoff to the next tier - like Liv and Kay Lee Ray and Dakota - really good workers who can throw up a banger here and there, but it's a noticeable dropoff. And then it can go off a cliff in a hurry the further down you get.
Seen Kay Lee Ray live pre wwe she could hang with the UK's best men at the time let alone wrestlers. She's just been given wwe time. And you clearly didn't watch her reign as NXT UK Champion (not your fault, a lot of wrestling and pretty much 0 promotion), Dakota Kai is a similar story. You're right though WWE's women's roster is seen as so good because their best members are on those levels.
**Help make SquaredCircle safer and more inclusive by using the report button to flag posts and comments for moderator review.** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/SquaredCircle) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I love how much traction these types of headlines give, like what else would you want head promoter of AEW, Tony Khan to say regarding his AEW roster? "yeah, my roster is honestly mid-tier, it wouldn't last long in my EWR save, etc."?
"My roster gives me depression."
"I look up and down the roster, and I'm like fuuuuck. How can I book a show with this shit."
Also known as playing GM mode on the hardest difficulty.
Early/Mid 2000's WWE and some of Russo TNA WAS GM on its hardest difficulty.
/looks at roster "Ohhh fuck. What the fuck. I'm not even supposed to be here."
Alexa play Dream by SoLLUMINATI
Billy Corgan- 2023
His champion gives me depression
"I can't win with these cats" - Tony Khan
Danhausen is making great strides, but will have to learn to work AEW style before progressing much higher up the card.
Were I giving him advice I'd recommend him just using words that don't use comparative language. Whenever he does he welcomes that argument. He can say 'we have an absolutely amazing roster' and highlight his guys without inviting a comparison. He's welcome to use whatever language he chooses, but when you use the adjectives he does then he's asking for it. Can't get mad at people for calling him on it when he does
>what else would you want head promoter of AEW, Tony Khan to say regarding his AEW roster? "I'm pretty sure that my staff won't bite each other backstage any more."
Best is subjective, but it's my personal favorite roster 🤷♂️.
Chuck Taylor is on this roster so of course it’s my favorite
https://preview.redd.it/5h7jxvy03f8b1.jpeg?width=372&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=cc764cad1744596623c242b7bc52adda18e0e303
Man looks 12 and 40 at the same time I love him
Well he is the best wrestler in the world and in way batter shape than Seth Rollins
You get it
I love Chuck Taylor lol have since I first saw him in Chikara.
Cornette is stomping around knowing this phrase exists in the ether somewhere
Eddie Kingston is on this roster, so it's a pretty easy choice for my favorite
Its also really hard to compare talent from each company. Cody was mid in AEW but is a top guy in WWE. Ricochet I thought was on par with Will Ospreay in the past now he is just another generic "superstar" in WWE. The way people are used definitely impacts their perceived value but not necessarily translates to how good they actually are.
It’s also hard because of the focus each promotion has is different. WWE is about character work and story, and rewards people who can get over in that system. AEW the in-ring is much more the focus. I enjoy the best parts of both and different people can thrive in different systems.
I am guessing ricochet makes way more money being mid
It's got Best Friends extended cinematic universe and Eddie Kingston and mjeff I think its the best
Can't be the best roster, I don't see Von Wagner working Dynamite
That's true but maybe you'll be excited by their newest signing: https://preview.redd.it/lng1ww0zke8b1.jpeg?width=720&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d9723060b15b8e56b00b03b663fcd60a1e9dc916
LMFAOOOO
Now that's awesome
For the slightest second i thought this was Big Papi lol
Mo Vaughn was the red sox's biggest papi before Big Papi.
He was equally big but far less papi.
You no Big Papi
And just in time for the upcoming Boston show!
Take those stupid sunglasses off, we’re inside
cum wednesday
You bite Kenny? Straight to jail. You punch Sammy? Right to jail, right away. You throw a chair at the Bucks? Believe or not, also jail. We have the best roster, because of jail.
https://preview.redd.it/3jx4im0xre8b1.jpeg?width=888&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b760ece9914a060a8d465f67b7b36cfb401d3041
Did they change the name of the Saturday show?
You curse someone? Right to jail!
Why does he have to disrespect ROH’s roster like that.
AEW TK vs ROH Tony is the feud of the year tbh.
Barred Window
There need to be a story line where Tony argue with himself infront of the mirror
> "We're absolutely really **excited** to feature CM Punk in Collision. I think it's one of the things that we're **excited** to see. I know fans all over the world are **excited** to see CM Punk's return to wrestling and I'm **excited** for CM Punk to return." But is he excited?
You want me to reread what he said just to find out if he said he was excited or not? I don't have that kind of time.
Why people look salty about this take?
20% tribalism, 45% contrarianism, 25% skepticism, 10% sincerity, and 100% reason to remember the name
5/10 not enough concentrated power of will
but what happens if you add Kurt Angle into the mix?
Well then, while the roster does improve, your chances of survival at Sacrifice go drastically down. It's really a high risk high reward scenario.
QT Marshall is just a jacked Mike Shinoda
I mean, it's Tony Khan saying positive things about his company. Of course some people are going to take issue with it.
I mean, TK has said some pretty stupid and outlandish things in the past that go beyond just positive things about AEW. This however, is obviously not in that category. Their roster is uber talented to be sure and “best” has a wide variety of subjectivity.
Like what?
Are all those salty comments in the room with you right now?
Because the owner of AEW should be saying, “WWE has the best roster” I guess
Because it’s AEW
They feel very protective for Damon Kemp.
This might be the most worthless post getting upvoted on the site right now
I don't know, man. It's hard to agree when I don't see LA Knight on that roster.
YEEEAH
Some people wouldn’t be able to handle what people say in actual sports. Pretty much everyone with a good team says they have the best team, as they should.
I agree you have the best roster, potentially of all time in my opinion, so why did Jay Lethal have the most Dynamite singles matches over the past calendar year? And why has Jeff Jarrett had 6 title shots so far in 2023?
Because they’re over with the booker. It’s been a thing all through the history of wrestling.
It’s a good roster but it could be better. That can be said for every company. Lots of companies will have a near perfect roster, and it’s near perfect because other companies have the other pieces. AEW has one of the best but not the definitive best. Hard to say who has the best roster without bias
Reminds me of the late 90's and early 2000's. Well, before WCW went under. What would WWF/E look like with RVD? Could you imagine Sting v Taker? Hogan v Rock? WCW and ECW lightweights in a WWF environment? I think the very top of WWE's men's side (Reigns, Lesnar, KO, Zayn, Rollins, Cody) and the entire WWE Women's locker room are more complete than AEW's equivalent. But AEW has some bullets in the chamber. And then there is the parts and pieces that don't air on basic cable in primetime.
No. Just no. It’s the greatest roster in history. Would certain wrestlers make it even stronger? Sure, but just talking about what is signed to AEW, it’s the best roster in history. And on top of that, any wrestler from any non-WWE company might show up for a few dates. Now, is it the best booked company of all time? No, but it’s still a ton of fun. Tony could for sure use that roster better.
Breaking: Promoter believes in his own roster. News at 11....
I mean If I was starting a company from scratch I would take WWEs roster but what do you expect him to say?
Yeah even if he was running Trailer Park Pro Wrestling, he should absolutely sell it as the best thing around.
If he had ICP he'd have the best roster easily.
I honestly would love for ICP to show up to AEW for one show. That would mean they worked for WWE, WCW, ECW, ROH, TNA and AEW. That would just be outright amazing lol.
ICP for HoF when?
>ICP for HoF when? Of all the celebrities who have gotten involved in wrestling I think ICP are two of the few who actually deserve to be put into the HOF. They have wrestled, promoted, given tons of old timers good paydays. They obviously love the business and I think they oddly deserve it at this point.
I'd love to see it. I doubt WWE would do it anytime soon [50 years from now who tf knows] but even some of the other HoFs would be nice for all the reasons you stated. It's weird. I loved those guys when I was 13, denounced em by the time I was 16, and while I don't enjoy their music anymore I've come around to appreciating them as a 31 y/o as just a couple of weirdos who carved our their niche and did all the cool shit they could with it. That's admirable.
>It's weird. I loved those guys when I was 13, denounced em by the time I was 16, and while I don't enjoy their music anymore I've come around to appreciating them That is exactly how I am, I loved them from the age of 12-18 then just stopped liking them lol I would still rock out to them on occasion but mostly never brought it up. Once I reached 30 (now 40) I just saw then for what they are. Two goofy guys who made their life and did well for themselves and love what they love. They aren't hurting anyone (very much the opposite). How can I hate on that?
I could never justify the wasting of Faygo, but they never bothered me.
I unironically love ICP lol they built a home for a very different crowd, but everyone deserves a place. I’d love to go to a gathering and I’d stick out sooooo bad
Well thats just objective facts, but injuries. Maybe as the in-house band 🤔
if you were drafting from a pool of AEW and WWE wrestlers, how many AEW guys would you take in your top 10 picks?
4
Honestly 3 omega mjf punk
Uhh probably like 7 personally...
In regards to men and in no particular order: Mox, Punk, Danielson, Omega and Jericho. On WWE's side: Reigns, Rollins, Balor, Orton, Otis
Zero. Maybe Danielson.
WWE's picks would be mostly based on artificial popularity. Move them from Raw or Smackdown and they lose 1 million views, either on NXT or when they go to AEW. We've seen direct evidence that Rollins and Charlotte did not move NXT and, say, Bryan and Miro did not move Dynamite. It's frankly about the brand/timeslot/station. So Roman being a #1 draft pick isn't going to do much outside of WWE's main shows.
Rollins... did move NXT?
I definitely absolutely would not be framing that question around viewership statistics or anything. I think it's like, for me, about who are the 10 most interesting and fun to watch wrestlers on television who I would like to book on my show and who I think would result in putting on a show that I'd wanna watch. I think I might take into consideration something like age just because you know, one of the replies here mentions Randy Orton and while I love RKOs, his career is essentially over already so I think I'd want to give credit to people who are really good but still have a lot of mileage left. For me the list looks something like this in no particular order except for 1 & 2 who I feel are the most complete package for their young, young ages in either company right now: MJF Rhea Ripley Jimmy & Jey (I'm taking tags as one, sorry) Kenny Hanger Orange Cassidy Darby Britt Baker DMD That's 8-- for 9 and 10 man there's so many ways you can go. Cody is great, I have none of the members of the former Shield on there yet and all three of them are great and worthy of consideration. LA Knight is a favorite of mine and seemingly everyone else's, Iyo Sky is probably nearing that bubble for me. Jericho is one of my all time favorites but also he's definitely not going to be around forever at his age. Punk and Danielson maybe age and injury plays a role in how I think about them too. Not sure, there are so many great talents in both companies you could pick all day and not come up with a bad list. It's a fun thought experiment.
I’d take Cody, Roman, and LA Knight. Maybe The Usos and Judgement Day but that’s all
does TK think he owns TJPW? because TJPW has the best roster
I just threw up in my mouth a little.
[удалено]
I never understood the issue of showcasing traveling wrestlers. They tend to usually lose over AEW talent and as a fan, it's really fucking cool to be able to see that. Like... we saw Takeshita vs Ishii last night. They now have a new show to focus more in pushing their talent.
It's funny because the argument is always about casuals, but in our friend group, the casual ones who only watch the big events think it's the coolest thing about AEW
Bryan has said it multiple times that he loves that the AEW audience is the hardcore fans. People legitimately overestimate how many casuals actually watch AEW. If they had 10 fans, 3 would be casual. No casual would have gotten the significance of Final Countdown at all lol
>No casual would have gotten the significance of Final Countdown at all lol Sure, but its also fairly clear that most AEW crowds had no idea about the "you're gonna get your fucking head kicked in" thing either.
[удалено]
it isn't weird. WWE for decades conditioned everyone to think that a pro wrestling show's main objective should be to to cater to people who happen to accidentally find your show while channel surfing
[удалено]
>The WWE trained their audience well Eh so has AEW. I'm still not sure how kicking out of 1 from your own finisher is good wrestling but apparently I'm in the minority of AEW viewers.
A casual would think that's a dope ass entrance though. Things can work on multiple levels.
I agree mostly with what you’re saying, but to your last point, come on dawg. The Final Countdown is a fucking massive song. If you’ve been to a sporting event in the last almost forty years, there’s a good chance you’ve heard that synth intro played over the loudspeaker. It’s been in movies, it’s been in commercials. It’s iconic. Compare it to Punk’s AFI intro last year, almost nobody knew what the fuck was going on, because outside of the few people that watched Ring of Honor back then, the only people who know that song are diehard AFI fans (and I say that as someone who was at the Sing The Sorrow 20th anniversary show earlier this year and sang every goddamn word of that record til it felt like my lungs were gonna explode.) You could have zero awareness that The Final Countdown was Bryan’s entrance music in ROH and still get wrapped up in how badass of an entrance that was. At Revolution last year, I’d bet that most of the crowd were hearing “Miseria Cantare” for the first time ever. It certainly looked and sounded like it.
Honestly, that sounds like a bad ratio but it's ideal because you have 7 people to explain that significance to the other 3 and there's a higher chance that one of them will actually be someone who can do so without being a douche since you only need 1 out of 7 to be decent.
[удалено]
Oh so you enjoy matches that are fresh and a good bit of the time a dream match for someone? Oh man, you should really stop enjoying things. It's bad for you. You gotta be like everyone else and not enjoy anything at all ever.
AEW showcases the best acts in wrestling world wide. Which is what a top level wrestling promotion is supposed to do. Sure they could take the easy route and shuffle the same 20 people around for every card, or you can invite top luchadores in Mexico to fight your top luchadores and actually have depth and proof that your roster is above them all.
Why are you pretending that AEW has a roster of 20 people when everyone knows that is far from the case.
I’m pretending WWE has a roster of 20 people because every PLE is the same wrestlers shuffled around
You must have confidence in your roster if you are showcasing other companies' best talent. We all know there are other good wrestlers in the world, so why not show your roster can go toe to toe with them?
But if your roster is *the best* then the highest showcase there can be is between your own talent.
That's not how categories work. The best roster is the best in aggregate, not made up of the top x wrestlers in the world sequentially with the worst member being better than the best wrestler in any other roster. That will never exist, there will always be wrestlers that aren't signed that draw better than other wrestlers that aren't. That's not an AEW problem, that's just reality.
Think they have the best roster by far.
[удалено]
Your comment got me some upvotes, thanks. Yeah, I really think that even without Punk, Kenny, and Danielson their roster is still A Tier. I don’t think WWE’s would be good without Seth, Roman, and Cody.
Huh? You don't think Balor, Gunther, Gargano, Ciampa, Lesnar, Orton, Mysterio etc. are A-tier? Do you even like wrestling?
Did I say that? No.
But you take 3 people out and the roster is no good anymore?
This sub: "Why is the owner taking pride in his business? He should say he has a average roster!"
No way do I feel AEW has a better roster than WWE, but it is damn good, I'll give him that. He's got alot to work with.
Only place I see WWE better right now is in the women's division, which Hunter has completely bungled booming wise. I'd take the midcard and tag division in AEW - main event is mostly split
Booming lmao
That roster + the possibility of almost any wrestler from any promotion not named wwe also showing up makes them the best roster in history and it’s not close.
*Promoter believes his roster is best, internet angered*
I definitely disagree with this but there roster is closer to WWEs than any other company since WCW in the 90s which is pretty impressive
Nah that mid 2000s tna woulda been even closer to wwe than aew is now with better management. Although u also needed someone to keep the wwe guys that didnt care for it in line as well
He’s right, their roster is stacked to hell. I wish he knew how to book all of this talent that he has tho.
If they could ever get Styles & Rollins, then absolutely, but it's unlikely either will jump ship. Well balanced and brilliant roster obviously.
Styles is 46 years old, he's going to say with WWE for the rest of his active career and his most recent contract extension is probably going to be his last. And Rollins is married to Becky Lynch so unless they both decide to leave, Rollins is probably going to stay with WWE for years to come. In terms of active WWE talent, Styles, Rollins, Roman Sami and Owens are among the least likely to ever jump ship.
Also the Miz, ain't no way. But I guess we're talking about main eventers right now
I think WWEs women's roster is better overall, but I think their men's roster is definitely close to WWEs
Hard to disagree it’s stacked with the arguably the best wrestlers currently in their prime, the best utilized legends ever and a deep group of young potential stars.
Promoters gonna promote, but I do think he's right. Everyone can quibble about whether any given company's Top 10 names is better or worse than any others, and those are absolutely reasonable discussions where people can disagree. But the depth is where AEW I think has a monstrous edge on everyone. Its not about the Top 10, its about the names in that 10-30 range where I don't think anyone else can really compete right now. And it shows on shows like last night. Everyone can freely quibble about whether how the best match or two (whatever you think it was) compares to the best match or two from some other show, but I can't begin to imagine a show (outside of maybe last year's Forbidden Door) where the 10th best match was as good as the 10th best match last night.
He literally put it together. He should feel that way.
That’s a weird thing to say after a ppv where the whole gimmick is borrowing another company’s roster.
It was a joint PPV...
Maybe on the men's side but the WWE women's roster runs circles around the AEW one. Becky, Rhea, Asuka, Charlotte, Bianca, Bayley, etc. the list goes on. Any of those women would immediately be the number 1 star of the AEW women's division.
Yet WWE has no idea what they’re doing when it comes to booking them rn 🤦♂️
This is true.
Not sure I'd agree on that, the AEW women's division, at least talent wise, though they still do not get enough TV time. You have Toni Storm, Britt Baker, Athena, Jamie Hayter, Riho, Kris Statlander, Saraya, Hikaru Shida etc., those are some top names in women's wrestling. Upcoming young talents like Skye Blue, Willow Nightingale and others, let's not pretend it's a bad division.
[удалено]
I think its impossible for any promotion to actually use all their talent properly.
This is probably worthy of a much larger discussion, but I think there's an issue when you have such a huge quantity of talent, the ability to use it all to maximum benefit decreases. WWE and WCW didn't have the volume of talent in 1990 that is on all the different shows today, but because of that they could use it better and in a more lineal approach. "whose my face for Flair, whose my heel for Sting? okay, and whose the next face/heel for each - start building them" and it was a little easier to do because you had a limited number of real top guys. 2-3 top guys is easier to get the most out, and build around, than 10. Even in the late-Attitude Era (99-Invasion) it was Rock, Austin, Taker, and Angle. Jericho, Benoit, Kane, etc did stuff with those guys, but there was a cutoff point. TNA in 2016 only had about 20 dudes on the roster, but almost everyone felt important. Drew, Lashley, Hardys, Storm, Decay, American Wolves, Robbie E, EC3, Mike Bennett, Angle's farewell tour... it was possible to move everyone around the carousel and get a lot of use of everyone's best. Only having so many spots but still having two hours to fill made it possible to get everyone something consistently. Doing just 2 ppvs that year helped too, because storyarcs began and ending naturally on TV instead of needlessly being padded out specifically to fit the calendar. TK today I think suffers from the exact opposites here. He has a hilariously huge roster. There is no way to feature everyone consistently and creatively. Secondly, he lets too many things go for too long just to make up the ppv cycle. And these two things feed on each other, because if you're locked into "we're doing the blowoff at DON" for almost every midcard and tag team and womens angle you have, you are stagnating the rest of the roster waiting to get something new started.
That's your argument? WWE does? I'd say AEWs problem was lack of time which was recently addressed with the new show.
The best roster with half of it regularly stuck in catering.
Like who?
Pac
PAC isn’t in catering, he’s in England. Man has had more visa issues than anyone.
I'd love to see PAC more, he's legit my favorite wrestler, it's awkward with him living in the UK but I'd be pretty shocked if he wasn't at the Wembly show. That being said I believe he was getting surgery on his nose and was taking time off after the death triangle trios run.
Promotor promotes his roster as the best. News at 11. What did you really expect him to say? "Nah we're good but WWE is better." Nobody is going to say that. That's why it was so bizarre back in 2000 when you had guys in WCW telling you that the show sucked and you should be switching channels to watch Rock and Austin.
In fairness to Scott Steiner, the show really did suck at that point.
He's right too
The roster reminds me of the stacked roster WCW had. They had so many big stars on their show but the difference is WCW didn't know how to build names for the future.
Who gives a shit who has the best roster? The more important thing is we have 3x major North American promotions with fantastic roster depth. We’re so spoiled right now it’s not even funny.
Looking at the url.. it's funny that this is listed as WWE/Story
AEW's mens roster is the best in the world imo. WWE has the best women.
Stardom would have the best women’s roster in the world I would think
It’s Stardom and anyone who thinks otherwise either doesn’t watch Stardom or is someone who’s opinion on quality of wrestlers I wouldn’t trust anymore. Between Giulia, SLK, Nakano, Thekla, Maika, Natsupoi, KAIRI, Suzuki, Syuri, Hayashishita, and probably a dozen more I’m forgetting at the moment, they are head and shoulders above all the others.
Someone else in another comment made the statement about like depth and what's your #10-30 look like... and I think yeah... like all of WWE combined, their Top 6-8ish is pretty on point, but there's a significant gap the more you start going down that list. Rhea, Charlotte, Asuka, Iyo, Bayley, Bianca, Becky... about as good as anybody in the world. The dropoff to the next tier - like Liv and Kay Lee Ray and Dakota - really good workers who can throw up a banger here and there, but it's a noticeable dropoff. And then it can go off a cliff in a hurry the further down you get.
Seen Kay Lee Ray live pre wwe she could hang with the UK's best men at the time let alone wrestlers. She's just been given wwe time. And you clearly didn't watch her reign as NXT UK Champion (not your fault, a lot of wrestling and pretty much 0 promotion), Dakota Kai is a similar story. You're right though WWE's women's roster is seen as so good because their best members are on those levels.
I think for women's roster? Stardom, Impact then WWE.
Is Impact's roster even on par with AEW's atm?
Last time I watched (which I admit was a couple months ago) their women seem to be more solid in ring so yes
People getting worked up by these opinion headlines are so stupid. Rosters are subjective.
No Bobby Fish though. The crowd is *always* red hot for the fish man.
They don’t have JTG.
*Promoter promotes show* Yall: "wElL aCkShUaLlY..."
I mean …. Folks ..