EVERY Wrestling Gimmick Match Ranked From Worst To Best

7. Ladder / TLC

TLC/Escalera de la Muerte is better than the ladder match itself, historically - truly, there is no context into which it is detrimental to throw a table - and as such, the Ladder and TLC match is effectively the same thing these days, hence why they are grouped together here. It's not as if the ladder match is the strategic counterpart to TLC's unrelenting madness. They're both as nuts as they are ill-advised.

Almost completely normalised in 2024, the old, wonderfully metaphorical idea - that the ladder was climbed by the '90s WWF upper midcard act on the cusp of the main event - is dead now. Everybody gets to work one. Spectacular even when the things are barely climbed and instead used to do disconnected spots, great ladder matches - death-defying, terrifying, very painful-looking ladder matches - are still possible today. Sammy Guevara is something of a pariah in 2024, but his unbelievable 2022 jumping cutter spot remains an all-timer of an AEW moment. Yes, the genre simply isn't what it was - but there's an intense irony within its lore. They say that a dangerous spot isn't worth it because nobody will remember or feel anything towards it - and yet half the wrestlers who trot out that line haven't done a thing as unforgettable as Edge spearing Jeff Hardy out of midair.

6. Two Out Of Three Falls

The best match of all-time was worked under the Two out of Three Falls stip: Kazuchika Okada Vs. Kenny Omega at NJPW Dominion 2018. The first Bulldog pin in that was shocking, soul-destroying, an absolutely perfect way in which to cast Okada as a man simply unbeatable - which made for unparalleled drama, since Omega then had to defeat him twice. FTR are an amazing tag team who can lean into self-indulgence, but their grasp of the stipulation is masterful (or, it gives them a good reason to go long). As long as that first fall feels like there can be coming back from it, this match type yields unrelenting drama, and most promoters are astute enough to only allocate great wrestlers such a mammoth run-time - thereby assuring a near-perfect hit rate. There's a reason it is the lucha standard: it's unreal at its most effective.

5. Money In The Bank

WWE has perfected the Money In The Bank match to such an exhilarating extent that AEW - a promotion that largely signs more exciting aerial talent and allows them to work a faster and more high-risk style - still hasn't bettered it with their Face Of The Revolution equivalent. MITB is a nigh-on perfect fusion of white-knuckle action and stakes, since the audience is aware that they are watching the World champion-elect, and since that future champion is not quite on the level of the act destined to headline WrestleMania, the match is often more unpredictable than the Royal Rumble. That's not to state the match is as important or as iconic, but while it borders on sacrilege, it's in some ways better - or at least more exciting.

The Rumble, though, has endured for a damn good reason...

4. Anarchy In The Arena / Live Stadium Stampede

An incredible innovation so perfect for the company, it's little wonder Anarchy In The Arena has become AEW's trademark. The very vision of AEW is in its unabashed, borderless creativity - and AITA allows itself to explore that to an unprecedented extent. So chaotic that it almost benefirs from the missed spots, and those incredible quick cuts that only just capture some deranged stunt at the last possible moment, the genre is monumentally awesome because of its flaws. It removes the sense of contrivance lurking in every gimmick match. What the camera does capture is a hysterically violent 10-man brawl that spills out into every corner of a vast building, a melting pot consistent with the AEW ethos that incorporates elements from prime Memphis, PWG, DDT, the WWE Attitude Era. The buffet soaked in blood, sparks and mustard, a match so unhinged that in 2022 the audience completely accepted the idea that Eddie Kingston would kill a man during it.

And it's still not the best AEW stip!

3. Texas Death

The Texas Death match was a great attraction in the good old days, but it's a different and better beast altogether now. This is probably naive, but it would be wonderful, were Tony Khan to truly recognise what he has with the Texas Death match and exercise some discipline with it. Promote it at an absolute minimum twice per year because you can never get that level of aura back - and in a total masterstroke, the AEW Texas Death match has restored the primal, terrifying feeling of what violence in pro wrestling should be. It's not merely in the violence itself, although the guardrail piledrivers, shoot brick work and liberal use of barbed wire don't hurt (or rather do): it's in the way it's all registered. Jon Moxley wildly stabbing Lance Archer with a fork; Swerve Strickland conveying to Hangman Page that he can't be killed by stabbing himself with a staple gun; Hangman Page drinking Swerve's f*cking blood to prove that he can: the AEW Texas Death match is body language masterclass, tonal horror and despicable, frightening, primal violence. No other match in wrestling today possesses the same aura. It cannot be allowed to wither like the Lights Out match before it.

2. Hell In A Cell

A stip that ranges from utterly seminal to enclosed mediocre plunder brawl, it will never reach the heights set by the Undertaker and Shawn Michaels (and should never reach the literal heights set by 'Taker and Mick Foley). The original remains the best; the Undertaker has never felt more terrifying than when brutalising a claret-drenched Michaels in 1997. WWE marketed the 'Phenom' brilliantly, projecting an aura onto him for decades, and he never embodied it more than at Badd Blood. He performed as the last person a wrestler would ever wish to be in a fight against: a true horror movie monster in thrilling live action. Triple H knew how to craft one in his prime, entering several classic performances; when he didn't disappear up his own arse, he was exceptional at cycling through modes of unstoppable warlord and ass-showing stooge. In recent years, amid far too many glorified clichéd No DQ matches, Randy Orton and Jeff Hardy did some excellent torture-themed work, after which the women (Becky Lynch, Bayley and Sasha Banks most notably) quietly redefined the stip using the right angles of the cell walls to add a new dimension of creativity.

For its peaks, HIAC is right up there with the absolute best of the best - and as Cody Rhodes proved in 2022, it remains a real test of a performer's mettle.

1. Royal Rumble

So iconic that it has entered the wider mainstream lexicon, the WWE Royal Rumble is literally the perfect formula for a special pro wrestling attraction. This is a match than can enshrine wrestlers into legend, draw massive decibel levels with a descending count of 10, build half of the biggest show of the year with its omni-layered storytelling vehicle, debut new acts as instant game-changers, delight the inner child of the viewer with its nostalgic cameos, build the next big thing in a matter of minutes through the 'Diesel push' device, make lapsed fans watch all over again, make a reality of dream matches...

Provided the fans can recognise the entrance themes, the field is over, and Vince McMahon isn't in the mood to tell you to go f*ck yourself, it doesn't get better than the Royal Rumble: a Pat Patterson creation that Vince thought was "stupid".