AEW Rampage Review - November 25, 2023

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

FTW Champion Hook def. Rocky Romero (Non-Title)

Romero is currently a champion in both MLW and CMLL, but he didn't come out with either of his titles here. This wasn't even for the FTW Championship, which is shocking because it feels rare for champions in AEW to have non-title matches nowadays. Romero is obviously experienced and is a good person for Hook to be working with. There was no story, but they had a nice match and it gave Hook a notable win. it continues to feel like he's spinning his wheels right now, though.

Kris Statlander def. Diamante

It was bizarre for Statlander to be having a regular match without addressing her loss of the AEW TBS Championship at Full Gear, where she wasn't pinned in that three-way. In fact, it looks like we're going to get Statlander and Willow Nightingale vs. Diamante and Mercedes Martinez soon based on what happened after this. That's fine, but didn't we already get that on Collision a few months ago? This was a well-worked match and I'm glad Diamante was made to look competitive against Statlander, but this lacked substance.

The Kingdom def. Duke Davis and Ganon Jones

The Kingdom got some mic time beforehand, which is the best way to get them over with the AEW audience, along with having them rack up wins. This was a standard squash win for them as it should have been. It would make sense for them to get their long-awaited shot at the ROH World Tag Team Championship at Final Battle next month, but with how little AEW cares about Ring of Honor right now, it's more likely it'll happen on an AEW show.

Wheeler Yuta def. Katsuyori Shibata in a Pure Rules Match to Win the ROH Pure Championship

Reportedly, Shibata has to head home as soon as possible, which is why the title randomly changed hands here. It gives Blackpool Combat Club gold again, but why couldn't it have been someone who hasn't held the title before? I guess it doesn't really matter since it's a Ring of Honor title, and this honestly should've happened on ROH TV. This was as well-wrestled as you'd expect from them, even if Pure Rules don't make for the most exciting matches.

Overall Show

Needless to say, this was a total afterthought of a show, even with Collision immediately following it. Putting it before Collision and not after it was smart (it would've aired opposite of WWE Survivor Series' third hour), but that didn't make this show any more important than usual. The first three matches were mostly inconsequential, but at least the title change in the main event was notable to a certain degree (despite it being an ROH title). A solid show on the whole but nothing you need to see, which might as well be the motto for Rampage these days.

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