AEW Rampage: Quake by the Lake Review - August 12, 2022

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Daniel Garcia Confronted Bryan Danielson

This marked Danielson's first appearance since being beaten by Garcia on Dynamite a few weeks ago. I've never found Garcia to be a particularly great talker, but he's getting better, I'll give him that. They had a solid exchange that hyped up their two-out-of-three falls match for Wednesday's show. I imagine Danielson is winning that rubber match, but Garcia should be made to look credible in defeat.

AAA World Mixed Tag Team Champions Sammy Guevara and Tay Melo def. Dante Martin and Skye Blue

Guevara beat Martin on Dynamite weeks ago, so there was no real reason behind this bout happening other than Martin being from the area. By the way, Conti was apparently the surname of Tay's ex-husband, so now she's using her maiden name. I'm actually surprised Guevara and Melo were on the shows this week considering they just got married over the weekend. AAA's mixed tag titles have no business being defended on AEW programming when these shows have enough titles as it is, but from an in-ring standpoint, this was a fun affair.

Parker Boudreaux def. Sonny Kiss

This stemmed from Kiss losing a six-man tag team match to Boudreaux/The Trustbusters on Tuesday's Dark. If I'm not mistaken, I believe this was the first time we've seen Kiss on AEW TV since late 2020. This wasn't competitive nor should it have been. Boudreaux showed signs of potential during his time in WWE NXT, so I'm still shocked he was released. Oh well, their loss is AEW's gain. This was a straightforward squash.

Gunn Club (Austin and Colten Gunn) def. Beardhausen

Danhausen's loyalty apparently doesn't lie with any one person or faction. He started off with Best Friends in AEW, then formed a team with Hook, and now he's partners with Redbeard. Okay, so I assume this was a one-off, but it was quite random. They basically a popular team for Gunn Club to beat and give them more heat. The match was behind Beardhausen and it was a nice match all things considered, but this didn't do much for me, personally.

Zack Clayton Challenged FTW Champion Hook

Hook was being "interviewed" (he barely said anything) by Tony Schiavone when he was interrupted by Clayton, who claimed to be a reality star from New Jersey. The only reason I know who he is, is because he's made a number of appearances on the Dark shows over the last year and even competed on Tuesday's episode in a losing effort. He is not an interesting opponent for Hook at all, and while I'm fine with Hook destroying random dudes, I don't this segment needed to exist and kill television time.

Orange Cassidy def. Ari Daivari

Daivari offered Cassidy a spot in his loser stable The Trustbusters, who will face Best Friends in an AEW World Trios Championship Tournament quarterfinal match next Friday on Rampage. Obviously, Cassidy declined. I know Daivari is a Minneapolis native, but I really couldn't have cared less about him wrestling in the main event. This is the sort of stuff that makes Rampage feel more and more like Dark. This was an average outing with Cassidy's popularity being the only thing that kept the crowd engaged. Kiss turning heel and joining The Trustbusters was an interesting development, I suppose.

Overall Show

​This weekend marks one year since Rampage premiered, and you look the recent ratings and they've never been lower. Looking back at what this show had to offer, I'm not at all surprised. I've seen far worse hours of wrestling, but very little about this edition of Rampage felt worthwhile. I mean, they had freakin' Ari Daivari in the main event; how eventful could the episode be? If you didn't tune in, you missed nothing other than a Sonny Kiss heel turn, and the jury is still out on how that's going to go. This was one of Rampage's most mediocre shows in some time.

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