AEW Rampage Review - May 6, 2022

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Toni Storm and Ruby Soho def. Britt Baker and Jamie Hayter

Storm has had a few matches on the Dark shows in recent weeks, but I don't think she's had a televised match since her debut on Dynamite in late March. I know AEW has a loaded roster, but to not have Storm in a televised match since then is inexcusable in my opinion. That said, these four women worked really well together. This had an energetic pace and the action was entertaining. Storm pinning Baker was certainly a surprise, but I'm not complaining.

Hook def. JD Drake

Hook to continues to be extremely over with the audience and this was another dominant showing from him. Drake doesn't often get the credit he deserves for being a good hand in the ring and I thought he helped make Hook look great in there. Drake being a bigger guy made Hook's offense look more impressive. We also found out it will be Tony Nese vs. Danhausen next week, so we'll see how that plays out.

Riho def. Yuka Sakazaki to Qualify for the Women's Owen Hart Cup

Sakazaki was last seen in AEW last summer, while this was Riho's return from injury after four months on the shelf. It's worth noting that Riho was wearing black here for the first time in AEW. If it's supposed to signal a darker turn for her, I'd be interested because she's been doing the same thing for almost three years, but then again, we've already seen that from Kris Statlander and Julia Hart. Is that all AEW knows what to do with the women as far as progressing their characters? At any rate, this was a fine match. I'm not a big fan of either woman, but they worked hard. That delayed three count down the stretch was pretty bad, though.

Frankie Kazarian Confronted Men of the Year and Dan Lambert

Good lord. I hoped and prayed we had seen the last of Men of the Year feuding with Sammy Guevara and Tay Conti, but apparently not. Ugh. I forgot about the mixed tag team match they agreed to a few weeks ago. Can we please skip to the part where Sky branches off on his own and goes back to being a babyface? I'm looking forward to Sky defending against Frankie Kazarian next week, but the rest of this segment was a lot of nothing.

Jay Lethal def. Konosuke Takeshita

For someone I wasn't at all familiar with before he started appearing in AEW, Takeshita has been a standout on the Dark shows as of late and it was cool to see him get the spotlight in the Rampage main event. Being the seasoned veteran he is, Lethal was the perfect opponent for him. This didn't get a ton of time, but they made the most of the time they had and it was a quality contest. The post-match angle seemed to set up Lethal, Sonjay Dutt and Satnam Singh against all of Best Friends in a six-man tag team match, unless they go with Singh vs. Orange Cassidy in a straight-up singles matchup instead.

Overall Show

The best part about this show was that it started almost five hours earlier due to the NHL. I'm not kidding when I say the earlier start time adds to my enjoyment of the episode and makes it more bearable because more often than not, Rampage isn't nearly as must-see as Dynamite. Of course, that was once again the case with this installment, but the hour flew by and the opening and closing matches were the highlights.

SEE MORE: Rampage Reviews