8 Ups & 2 Downs From AEW Dynamite (16 Feb)

Ups...

8. The Other Adam

Though a shade too Sports Entertainment-y in its construction and execution, the in-ring segment used to set up Hangman Page's next AEW World Heavyweight Title challenger was supremely over and performed well enough to get pass marks this week.

Page's attempted interview by Tony Schiavone was interrupted by Adam Cole, who turned his positive crowd reaction to a negative one by shooing the believed commentator out of the ring. Getting down to it, Cole built Page up, saying he respected him as a competitor, but ripped him for running off every group of friends he'd ever had, saying every time they'd shared a locker room, Page become known as "The Other Adam". This stoked the champ's fires, prompting him to put the microphone down and get ready for a fight. Cole, however, wanted to shake hands, saying he'd fight him fair and square, before reDRagon pulled the ruse, jumping Hangman as Cole left the ring following a handshake.

The Dark Order made the save, with 10 wrecking various security team members in the process. This sets the former Preston Vance up for a Cole bout on this week's Rampage.

Only a blind man couldn't have seen the reDRagon attack coming, though it was satisfying enough in the moment and tied in with the core concept of how these men interact with their respective allies. In this segment, Page drew closer to his. Cole, meanwhile, remains stuck in the middle of reDRagon and The Young Bucks, as we found out later on.