9 Ups & 3 Downs From ROH Final Battle 2022

3. The Right Decision

Claudio Castagnoli ROH Final Battle 2022
ROH

Claudio Castagnoli regaining the ROH World Title from Chris Jericho was absolutely the right move.

With a BS tease of Claudio joining the Jericho Appreciation Society should he lose at Final Battle, Tony Khan thankfully opted to go the other way. To be fair, that stipulation may have signposted Castagnoli's win here, but that's fine. After all, the last thing anyone wanted was for the Swiss Superman to be comparing hats with Jake Hager or for AEW to do yet another variation of the 'Group A owns Wrestler B' story that's been seen numerous times in the company's short lifespan.

While your writer here is a huge fan of Claudio, the simple fact of the matter is that Chris Jericho is a bigger star than the former Cesaro. As such, it was only ever going to be a short-term arrangement to have the Ocho focus his time on all things ROH. Now, Jericho can be utilised on AEW programming without having to be tied to the ROH letters. And for Claudio, he's the ideal choice to head up a wrestling-heavy ROH product and put on great match after great match with a wide variety of opponents.

Added to that, Chris Jericho could only go on for so long beating former ROH title holders before that schtick got old or started to impact the legacy of ROH.

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Senior Writer
Senior Writer

Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main dayjob, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks, Jamie Hayer, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg.