12 Exact Moments AEW Booking Stopped Making Sense

by Michael Sidgwick

1 - The Death Of The Rankings System (April 2024)

AEW Rankings
AEW

It used to work, and it used to be great.

Remember when Darby Allin was on the rise in the early days? Simply seeing his face near the top of the rankings graphic was a visual hint as to how close he was to making it. Hangman Page hovering near the top, only to get displaced, was a clever device. The fans were told to worry about but never give up on him.

Now, with no fixed narrative structure in place, the idea and value of contendership is under constant (deserved) scrutiny. Broadly, AEW gets it right more often than not. Consider the Hangman Page comeback of 2025; he won the Owen Hart Cup, was protected in the booking elsewhere, and won a major match against MJF at Revolution. He was built brilliantly, and with conviction, as the World Champion-elect.

There is no flawless, wholly logical method to booking pro wrestling and determining who is positioned where - indeed, the rankings wasn’t that, either - but the dismantling of the system has spawned far too many bad and nonsensical habits.

Hologram embarked on a double-figures winning streak without even challenging for the lowly TNT championship. Challengers pin champions in a direct, potentially damaging, WWE-style way far more than they did in 2019 and 2020. Toni Storm has taken pins from Megan Bayne and Athena this year, in two examples of an accelerated development. It’s just as well that Toni is too big a star for this to matter.

Because Tony Khan has recruited too many star acts, wins and losses don’t matter as much as they once did. FTR, who win a great deal on their beloved Collision, should have received infinitely more tag title shots than they have over the years. FTR even made a mockery of this quirk on TV in 2022.

The Eliminator match has replaced the intricate map to the top, and it lacks any real heft. Who hasn’t “earned” the chance to defeat a champion at this point?

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Contributor
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!