Adam Blampied counts down the 10 best AEW matches from year 2. What's your favorite from AEW's sophomore year?
1:21 - HONORABLE MENTIONS
1:53 - #10
2:46 - #9
3:36 - #8
4:28 - #7
5:27 - #6
6:15 - #5
7:05 - #4
7:54 - #3
8:54 - #2
9:55 - #1
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1:21 - HONORABLE MENTIONS
1:53 - #10
2:46 - #9
3:36 - #8
4:28 - #7
5:27 - #6
6:15 - #5
7:05 - #4
7:54 - #3
8:54 - #2
9:55 - #1
SUBSCRIBE TO partsFUNknown: https://bit.ly/2J2Hl6q
TWITTER: https://twitter.com/partsfunknown
FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/partsfunknown/
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SportsTranscript
00:00 AEW is toddling into its terrible twos across a tightrope of TNT. They didn't have any matches
00:05 involving zombies, and I didn't realise that was a bar I needed major American promotions to clear.
00:10 Seriously though, AEW is flourishing right now, going unopposed on Wednesday night,
00:14 hitting the million viewer mark on more than one occasion, and their last two pay-per-views pulled
00:18 in the promotion's highest buy rates to date. This is great. Having another major player in town is
00:22 good news for everyone, wrestling fans, wrestlers, and especially the people at WWE are releasing
00:27 with what now appears to be grim regularity. It's not been a perfect year, AEW still has
00:31 stuff to learn about medical standards during live broadcasts and how to build exploding rings,
00:36 but even then, holy moly this was a tough list to put together. They've got some really good
00:40 wrestlers over there, you guys. I'm Adam, hailing from partsFUNknown, and these are the 10 best
00:45 matches from AEW year two, The Wrath of Khan. But before we kick into the list, we notice that
00:50 some of you watch our videos without subscribing, we get it, button pressing is hard, but it does
00:55 make a pretty big difference to the kind of ad revenue we can pull in, so if you could just
00:59 click that button and the bell, all those lovely buttons, we'd appreciate it, okay, thank you, bye.
01:05 Honorable mention, The Great Match, shame about the Finnish twins. Just wanted to make a quick
01:09 shout out to the barbed wire exploding death match and the blood and guts match, both seem
01:14 destined to be consigned to the popular opinion dustbin based purely on shoddily executed finishes,
01:19 i.e. laughable s*** boom booms and a poorly shot stunt fall. This is a shame as both matches were
01:25 very good up until those endings, very different from what you normally see in mainstream American
01:29 wrestling and featuring character peak performances from Eddie Kingston and MJF respectively, but the
01:34 only thing they remember is the Finnish, not my words, the words of my friend and lover,
01:39 Vincent Kennedy McMahon. Number 10, Brian Cage and Ricky Starks vs Sting and Darby Allin
01:44 Revolution, a sizzling take. Now aside from the Firefly Funhouse, this might be my favorite
01:49 cinematic match of the entire pandemic, I know, and it didn't even have Otis rubbing himself with
01:53 ham or ninjas or anything, it's just cool, Darby Allin's cool, Sting is still cool, somehow,
02:00 catching a bat thrown from across a warehouse and going old boy on Taz's nephew, Darby Allin
02:05 spider manning off a brick wall before plunging to his death, powerhouse Hobbs turning up in a
02:10 curry man disguise for no reason, Sting and Darby arriving in a way that looks like David Lynch
02:14 directing Back to the Future, I just really liked all of it, sorry. Some fans might see cinematic
02:19 matches as wrestling with cheat codes, but hell, Sting's still out there taking f***ing powerbomb
02:23 at 60, you could argue that Sting and Darby's match at Double or Nothing was a better watch
02:27 with the benefit of a joyous crowd and silly Sting doing silly things, but the street fight pipped it
02:32 for me, just. Number 9, FTR and the Young Bucks vs the Lucha Bros and the Butcher and the Blade,
02:37 Fighter Fest, so many things, not even half the tag division as well, god tag team wrestling's
02:42 the best. With the FTR-Bucks storyline yet to go off the rails, AEW told a pretty great story here
02:48 of everyone and their mother wanting to see FTR face the Bucks but playing with that expectation
02:52 by having them fight alongside each other, and not just that but really effectively too,
02:56 until the end of course. With plenty of great double team spots featuring an FTR teaming with
03:00 a Jackson, the super kick fake out to the DDT, it's just a chef's kiss of a spot. Add to that
03:06 the Lucha Bros, Rey Fenix being everywhere all of the time, Penta slapping the marrow from everyone's
03:11 bones as well as the Butcher and the Blade being there to soak up just a whole bunch of Cirque
03:14 du Soleil whirly dervish bulls***, and then there's the stupidest, coolest and stupidest Canadian
03:20 destroyer of all time, it's just a lot, but sometimes more is more.
03:23 8. Rey Fenix vs Kenny Omega New Year's Smash Night 1
03:27 Do you think Rey Fenix is going to be AEW Champion one day? Like he's one of the most
03:30 consistently awesome, consistently inventive wrestlers in the entire world, but doesn't it
03:35 just feel like he's never going to be AEW Champion, which is a shame because bloody hell,
03:39 this AEW Championship match is good stuff, capital G, capital stuff. Omega's first defense since
03:44 winning it with industry shifting shenanigans, the winner was never in doubt here, but they
03:48 sure did have some fun out there. Some bits of this match are so fast paced, so fluid,
03:52 but also grounded with a vicious stiffness phrasing, with kicks, knees and slaps and
03:57 snapdragons on the outside, oh no your neck, horrific German suplexes, oh no your neck,
04:02 also that knee into a kip up into a super kick was fun, fun, fun, so yeah it's a bunch of moves,
04:07 but all the moves are very good, and after the match the good brothers make their AEW
04:11 debut fun for all the family, as long as your family regularly features on Being The Elite.
04:15 Number 7, The Young Bucks vs Death Triangle Dynamite. Oh hello again Ray Phoenix,
04:20 you get everywhere, there is so much violent dancing in this match. It's a spot fest sundae
04:26 with whip spots, crush spots, spot sauce and a cherry on the spot, but when it's all so beautifully
04:31 timed and crisp like this you can't help but just sit there with your mouth hanging open,
04:35 get that sundae down ya. This list isn't just going to be a list of Elite Family spot fests,
04:39 promise, but if flippy s*** is your bag, it doesn't really get much better than this,
04:43 could have done without all the cuts to tag teams watching in the stands,
04:47 tbh, although the crowd chanting "those are fake" at the Bucks Dior Jordans was hilarious.
04:51 There's just a bit of everything you expect from the names involved, Dickhead posturing from the
04:55 Bucks, Ray Phoenix doing ludicrous things like just swan toning over the top rope to the outside,
05:00 walking tightropes, hitting thrust kicks mid tightrope, another crazy dumb Canadian Destroyer,
05:05 Pac being a vicious, weirdly strong Geordie beastie, the diabolical mask base finish,
05:11 it's all here, tag team wrestling is the f***ing best.
05:14 9. Kenny Omega vs Orange Cassidy vs Pac, Double or Nothing
05:18 Double or Nothing was a hell of a show, we've already talked about the Sting match,
05:21 but also the Stadium Stampede was fun, Hangman Page was over like Rover,
05:25 and John Moxley and Eddie Kingston vs The Young Bucks was dangerously close to making this list,
05:29 ain't no one cutting promos like Mox and Eddie right now, but Match of the Night belonged to
05:33 the AEW title, Omega's first defence in front of a capacity crowd, and it made all the difference
05:38 in the world, it's one of the best triple threats in recent memory, everyone's over and everyone's
05:43 working their arse off, especially and ironically Orange Cassidy who's out here hitting double
05:47 Hurricane Rana's and more Superman punches than a litter of Roman Reigns'. It also features one of
05:52 my favourite spots of the year with Omega just yeeting Pac into the corner, lots of amazing spots,
05:56 most of which made the most of the triple threat stipulation, there's generally too many fun
06:00 moments to list and we'll just go and watch it again.
06:02 5. Santana and Ortiz vs Best Friends vs Dynamite
06:05 Parking lot brawls used to be an excuse to take a whole bunch of shortcuts in a match,
06:08 a few spots here or there but then the rest of the match is just some sweaty dudes grunting and
06:12 walking each other around like they're escorting a drunk friend home, pausing to bash each other's
06:16 heads into stuff in an endless cycle of tedium, unrelated shot of Edge and Orton from Mania 36,
06:22 not so this match which is not only an unbelievable amount of fun, but has possibly
06:26 the funniest closing moment in wrestling TV history, that middle finger man, Gold Star Trent
06:32's mom. It was just a day at the office where everything went right, all the spots worked,
06:36 the sledgehammer lodging in the glass, the windscreen buckling perfectly under Trent after
06:40 the dual powerbomb, Orange Cassidy emerging from the boot like slacker Gandalf riding in from the
06:46 east, creatively violent, violently creative, no shortcuts taken.
06:49 4. Cody Rhodes vs Mr Brodie Lee vs Dynamite
06:53 While one of AEW's biggest assets is the variety of matches they produce, you could levy the
06:57 criticism at them that their matches do have a bit of a samey structure, WWE's mode du jour of
07:02 keeping everyone looking strong is very short matches with distractions/non finishes, while
07:06 AEW pulls all the way in the opposite direction, stuffing matches with arguably too many things to
07:12 make their stars look good. Thank heavens then that they still have the nows to every once in
07:16 a while book a match like this, an exhibition squash featuring the biggest star in the company
07:21 having his dick ripped off by a brand new monster, an unapologetic love letter to Antonio Inoki
07:26 getting trampled by Vader in New Japan, the late great Mr Brodie Lee demolishes Cody in one of the
07:31 biggest wrestling shockers of the decade, single handedly revitalising the TNT title, Brodie,
07:37 and the Dark Order all in one discus lariat. A joyous, vicious rug pull.
07:42 3. Britt Baker vs Thunder Rosa St Patrick's Day Slam
07:45 Earning the most improved sticker in year 2 is AEW's women's division,
07:49 it's still not quite to the standard of NXT, it's still lacking in a few areas of its presentation,
07:54 but the company has made some big strides, Britt Baker becoming champ, the women's eliminator
07:58 having some really fun matches like Rhea vs Serena Deep, Nyla Rose and Vickie Guerrero was a really
08:03 fun pairing, but the single biggest improvement was bringing Thunder Rosa on board from the NWA.
08:08 Thunder Rosa is f***ing brilliant, and she ended up having one of the best overall rivalries in
08:12 AEW's history with Baker, the division's strongest character, culminating in a lights out match at
08:17 St Patrick's Day Slam. It's good, bringing a level of bloody brutality that you so rarely see
08:23 even in Western women's wrestling, with Britt Baker making her boyfriend's death matches look
08:27 like Sunday at the community centre, there's biting of wounds, G's, Death Valley Drivers onto ladders,
08:32 a Crimson Masked Baker taking a powerbomb onto thumbtacks, it's star cementing stuff,
08:38 and a giant bloody footprint in the right direction for women's wrestling in AEW.
08:42 2. The Young Bucks vs FTR Full Gear A comprehensive history of tag team
08:48 wrestling, squeezed into 30 glorious minutes. It's not quite as good as the Revolution tag,
08:53 but hell it's close, and that's saying something. After what was, let's be honest,
08:57 a build that was WWE levels of way more convoluted than a dream match needed to be, this blow off was
09:03 everything we always hoped it would be, combining the best traits of both teams,
09:07 the jaw dropping spot intricacy of the Bucks vs the psychological focus of FTR. Not only did
09:12 both teams do their thing, but they even forced a change in their opponents, the relentless limb
09:18 work to Matt Jackson's ankle forced the Bucks to slow down and wrestle a more emotionally and
09:22 narratively resonant match than they usually do, and Cashewila ending up courting Ruin by going
09:27 for a flip rather than a fist, it felt like a match that could only be possible with these
09:31 two specific teams, and that is the highest compliment I can think of for the work each pair
09:36 has done to build their signature style. AEW continues to reign supreme as the king of tag
09:41 wrestling, and speaking of. 1. John Silver, Alex Reynolds and
09:45 Adam Page vs the inner circle, Brodie Lee's celebration of life, I mean, yeah.
09:50 The strongest possible argument you can make for wrestling being a brief escape from life's
09:55 cruelty, how wrestling can create a symbol of that cruelty which can, if only for one night,
10:01 be defeated with strength and courage and help from dear friends. MJF going off on -1 only for
10:07 him to make the difference in the finish, the papers, the run in from Eric 'Red Beard' Rowan,
10:12 John Silver's best day emerging from one of his worst. It's all so beautifully, profoundly silly.
10:18 Modern wrestling is inextricably linked from the production process, how one of the reasons it's
10:22 so compulsive is watching real life decision making and drama seep onto the camera. It's
10:27 also one of the reasons why there's so much drama around AEW because not only is it a wrestling show
10:32 but it's also the enemy of WWE. As an isolated match, this is a good to very good TV wrestling
10:39 match. As a piece of real life, it's genuinely, deeply moving and helpful. The post match is…
10:46 it is. See you down the road. Well done AEW, here's to year 3.
10:52 And that's our list. What were your favourite matches from AEW's second year? Let us know in
10:57 the comments and don't forget to like and share this video around and subscribe to
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