AEW Rampage Review - June 10, 2022

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Eddie Kingston def. Jake Hager

I can't think of many (if any) above-average matches I've seen Hager have in AEW, and while this was far from a hot opener, the crowd was into the action and it was enjoyable enough, largely thanks to Kingston (though Hager played the role of spoiler well). I feel like we rarely see Kingston win singles matches on AEW TV these days, so this was a necessary victory for him ahead of Blood and Guts at the end of the month.

Jay Lethal and Satnam Singh def. Davey Vega and Mat Fitchett

Can you believe it's been over two months since we saw the start of the storyline involving Lethal, Singh, Sonjay Dutt and Samoa Joe and only now Singh is making his in-ring debut? I swear, some storylines in AEW progress at the rate grass grows. This was exactly what it needed to be with Lethal and Singh making quick work of their unknown opponents and Singh being kept limited. I believe Joe is off TV filming a show or something along those lines and there's been no word on when he'll be back.

Kris Statlander def. Red Velvet

Statlander and Velvet have history as friends and they already faced off in the women's Owen Hart Cup. They worked well together again here and had a quality contest. I appreciated that they had some time to do their thing and not just five minutes. Velvet is so much better in the heel role and her matches are way more interesting. Statlander's latest win over Velvet gets her closer to challenging Jade Cargill for the AEW TBS Championship, unless Athena gets to Cargill first.

Trent Beretta and ROH World Tag Team Champions FTR def. United Empire (Will Ospreay and Aussie Open)

This stemmed from Ospreay and Aussie Open making their AEW debuts on Wednesday's Dynamite and attacking Beretta and FTR. Ospreay is one of my favorites to watch in New Japan Pro-Wrestling and I loved that he got to showcase his skills here, making for a very enjoyable main event. It could have been hotter, but what we got was very good. I can't say I understand the decision to have Beretta pick up the winning fall for his team, though. It'll likely lead somewhere, possibly Beretta vs. Ospreay one-on-one, but having Ospreay lose in his AEW debut is certainly questionable.

Overall Show

This wasn't nearly as newsworthy of a show as last week (for obvious reasons), and the fact it was taped in advance didn't help, but it did follow a similar formula that made sense: a semi-important opener followed by a squash and then a women's match and then the main event. The six-man tag team match was easily the best thing all night as expected, even though I wasn't too high on the outcome. It was a solid show on the whole.

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