10 Wrestlers Who Could Be The Jokers In The AEW Owen Hart Tournament

6. Cesaro

AEW Jokers
WWE.com

This is more of a when and not an if, surely.

Hot, potentially incredibly unpopular take: WWE was right not to go with Cesaro as a multi-time World Champion headliner. He lacked the intangible magnetism, promo game and emotional crowd connection with which such stars stay over at that level.

But the man had literally everything else - height, look, explosive, creative, practically supernatural in-ring ability - and there's no reason at all why he couldn't have ran and ran with a midcard workhorse title that should have been synonymous with his brilliance. Well, there is - WWE's shrugging disregard for anybody outside of a handful of top stars - but you get the idea.

Cesaro is a perfect fit for AEW in that AEW fans receive great wrestlers enthusiastically. That's not to say he should be the World Champion, or anything, but an upper midcard twilight run is guaranteed to be unreal. John Silver, Fénix, Darby Allin, Wheeler YUTA, Dante Martin: there is a roster of awesome talents just begging to be thrown into the rafters and upper-cut on the way down.

A war of ridiculous propulsion opposite Hangman Page, an impossibly futuristic exhibition against Kenny Omega...there's more to wrestling than dream matches, but few are better positioned for that sort of run than Claudio.

A match against Joe wouldn't be half-bad either...

Probability: 90%

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Contributor

Michael Sidgwick is an editor, writer and podcaster for WhatCulture Wrestling. With over seven years of experience in wrestling analysis, Michael was published in the influential institution that was Power Slam magazine, and specialises in providing insights into All Elite Wrestling - so much so that he wrote a book about the subject. You can order Becoming All Elite: The Rise Of AEW on Amazon. Possessing a deep knowledge also of WWE, WCW, ECW and New Japan Pro Wrestling, Michael’s work has been publicly praised by former AEW World Champions Kenny Omega and MJF, and current Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes. When he isn’t putting your finger on why things are the way they are in the endlessly fascinating world of professional wrestling, Michael wraps his own around a hand grinder to explore the world of specialty coffee. Follow Michael on X (formerly known as Twitter) @MSidgwick for more!