UNO also runs the AEW Games stuff so he's pretty protected.
The only member of Dark Order I would be bummed to see leave is 10.
I would love for 10 to be given a TNT title run with -1 by his side.
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All Elite Wrestling |OT9| Where We’re Going We Don’t Need Rhodes
- Thread starter Naijaboy
- Start date
The only member of Dark Order I would be bummed to see leave is 10.
I would love for 10 to be given a TNT title run with -1 by his side.
I love Stu to death, but he doesn't strikes me as someone who goes out of his way to get involved or trying to get himself over the most he can. I also wonder if he's ever been 100% dedicated to wrestling, that was a little bit of the word going around when he was in the Quebec scene. He talked about it a little bit in the Colt Cabana podcast (and he was also hesitant to say it) but he has his own construction company with his dad.
He rarely used to take indy booking during the week (and he only takes booking near Ottawa these day, so only C4 and Acclaim) because he would get less money from the wrestling than with his construction company. Them not coming to term on a new contract doesn't really surprise me and I would wait before he addresses the situation before saying things we don't know about.
Also, if some of you can understand french, you can listen to this podcast : https://www.qub.ca/radio/balado/les-anti-pods-de-la-lutte (around 16:00)
Uno and Stu were on a french podcast around Christmas and something that was kind of odd was when the host of the podcast were wondering why we weren't seeing their funnier side on TV, they said that unlike John Silver they wanted/were told by Cody and Tony to be seen as more serious so that they could go after titles. I'm not really sure I agree with that and that might be a factor why they didn't get as over as Silver.
He rarely used to take indy booking during the week (and he only takes booking near Ottawa these day, so only C4 and Acclaim) because he would get less money from the wrestling than with his construction company. Them not coming to term on a new contract doesn't really surprise me and I would wait before he addresses the situation before saying things we don't know about.
Also, if some of you can understand french, you can listen to this podcast : https://www.qub.ca/radio/balado/les-anti-pods-de-la-lutte (around 16:00)
Uno and Stu were on a french podcast around Christmas and something that was kind of odd was when the host of the podcast were wondering why we weren't seeing their funnier side on TV, they said that unlike John Silver they wanted/were told by Cody and Tony to be seen as more serious so that they could go after titles. I'm not really sure I agree with that and that might be a factor why they didn't get as over as Silver.
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Being attached to the Dark Order is not a good thing right now They will do nothing with them and won't break them up because of their connection to Brodie. Looking at how the roster is exploding; can you really see them doing anything with that group? Look at how quick they dropped the connection to Hangman.
Ive said this a million times, but what AEW was aspiring to be in 2019 vs what AEW actually is in 2022 are not the same thing. 2019 AEW wanted to be a fusion of good WCW Nitro (with tons of imported talent and different styles of matches) and a super indie with all the best talent from all reaches of the globe, while making money doing TV. In 2022, AEW is far beyond that- they are very close to beating WWE in ratings many weeks, they have brought in top, highly paid talent like CM Punk and Bryan Danielson, and they have laid the foundation to be a property that lasts for decades at a high level, where after their next TV contract, they will be able to offer free agents 7 figure deals to compete with WWE. AEW has spent this entire year without Kenny Omega, and most of the year without Cody Rhodes. If you had said "No Cody, No Omega" back in 2019, you would have assumed their business would be in the toilet- but they have developed and signed enough top talent that it barely even registers.
There are a lot of guys who signed in 2019 that really don't have a place in AEW in 2022
There are a lot of guys who signed in 2019 that really don't have a place in AEW in 2022
I think the whole DO-gimmick should be done away with and they should figure out new direction for anyone who'd still remain with AEW.
Namely I think there's value in Silver & Reynolds, either as a tag team or singles.
Maybe have them work the new ROH mainly and then bring them back as a tag team to be taken seriously at some point.
All the other people are cool too but I just don't see the kind of "can't miss"-potential in 10 or Angels for example.
Namely I think there's value in Silver & Reynolds, either as a tag team or singles.
Maybe have them work the new ROH mainly and then bring them back as a tag team to be taken seriously at some point.
All the other people are cool too but I just don't see the kind of "can't miss"-potential in 10 or Angels for example.
I really do love these commercials, though maybe it wasn't a good idea to show a slow-mo of the fireball right at the start here. You can clearly see it grazing the top of Kingston's head. Still a cool angle, though!
Eh I get what you mean but at the same time the heat from fire is also an issue rather than just the actual flames touching you so I think it can still work at it coming across as a dangerous attack.
Yeah, it's not that serious in the end, and the flame does still look cool in slow-mo. They've got my interest with this JAS/Eddie story, and I'm wondering if we'll be introduced to Eddie's two extra partners this week. I'm assuming it will be Homicide and Hernandez, but I'm secretly hoping for Diamante and someone else. I could believably buy Diamante beating up Cool Hand Ange in an intergender situation.
Yeah I'm curious who it will be, original LAX is the obvious choice since they already brought in homicide before but it will be interesting to see when they eventually move the story forward.
I hope it's for ROH more than AEW. I mean if anything, I think they should really start thinking of moving Rampage to Tuesdays. NXT now is so far removed of what made them hot years ago that by moving AEW over there, the cannibalizing of the wrestling audience that night would be so minuscule. NXT's ratings are getting lower and lower and their majority of audience are old people.
Agreed.
And at this point Rampage is a show I don't mind missing. But it doesn't make sense, the card is always stacked.
Stu Grayson's contract expired. They failed to come to an agreement on a new one. They may or may not be in negotiations still. Nothing controversial or nefarious.
AKA this is pro wrestling.
This happens all the time. Performers come and go. They lose steam or they get over. Performers ask for more than they can get, or they just want to move on and try new things. It just happens.
I mean, not coming to an agreement with Stu is pretty controversial. And if Tony genuinely tried to cut Stu's contract down to a part-time Tier 0 contract, that could certainly be read as nefarious depending on your perspective.
Not sure what you think people have been talking about up until now. This has always been the assumption. It's always been the controversy.
I remember there was talk a while back that the new reality show would be about Darby.
Yup and Stu is essentially the veteran 3rd string QB who you don't really need when you can get someone younger and cheaper in that spot.
This is Stu Greyson we are talking about not the Young Bucks lol.
I mean if I was Stu I wouldn't resign either.. I bet he could make a lot more money doing the indies and popping up in Impact. I'm sure Stu will be fine.. shit Stu might even pull a go away for a year or two become a bigger name and then come back. We have to remember this isn't a charity it is a business. It think it is great that TK won't let people go mid contract.
I'm not trying to downplay Dark Order but I feel like they did their job when AEW started. They were fundamental to the start of AEW and now not such much. All they are at this point are like the gatekeepers on Dark/Elevation and they get called up to job every now and then.
I mean if I was Stu I wouldn't resign either.. I bet he could make a lot more money doing the indies and popping up in Impact. I'm sure Stu will be fine.. shit Stu might even pull a go away for a year or two become a bigger name and then come back. We have to remember this isn't a charity it is a business. It think it is great that TK won't let people go mid contract.
I'm not trying to downplay Dark Order but I feel like they did their job when AEW started. They were fundamental to the start of AEW and now not such much. All they are at this point are like the gatekeepers on Dark/Elevation and they get called up to job every now and then.
DO has barely been on TV since Hangman won the title and they've basically been jobbers since then. Because what can you really do with them as they currently are? Yeah, they're great wrestlers but they're a group of great wrestlers in a company stacked with great or phenomenal wrestlers. The issue with the DO is while the crowd hasn't turned on them like what happened with Cody they're not anywhere near as hot on DO as they were because their characters are all very one note comedy goobers that you can really only do so much with.
They need to do things to freshen them up but most of those solutions would mean adding or removing people from the group or potentially turning some or all of them heel all of which are things they probably can't really do or are super hesitant to do due to the Brodie connection. Alan Angels and Preston Vance probably are the two guys with the most obvious long term potential as being something bigger than they are as this industry is always going to love big guys like Vance and Angels is not just the best worker in DO but obviously a just generally great worker.
Uno & Stu and Silver & Reynolds are great teams but I would do title runs with just about every other team in AEW before putting belts on them (excluding Varsity Blondes who are easily the worst tag team in AEW). Uno can talk but the other 3 are super one note. Not to mention DO promos and such are pretty much entirely relegated to BTE which I don't think they can count on vlogs and such for getting people or storylines over anymore. As tapped into the industry as AEW's audience generally is the bulk of that audience doesn't watch vlogs or Dark/Elevation and just doesn't seem to care about stuff on those anymore. Basically, I think guys like Stu, Silver and Reynolds are going to have to shake things up on their own in some way because as it stands they're solid workers but it's hard to imagine giving any of them any kind of push or prioritizing TV time for any of them over someone else on the roster.
So if there's controversy here it's that a member of the DO is no longer with the company. That said, do you sign someone to a deal that they're not worth just because of the Brodie connection? Stu's great but with where the roster currently is he's probably not worth what he wanted.
That said, once ROH lands a TV or streaming deal and Tony starts signing up more people to fill out that roster I wonder if a guy like Stu gets brought back into the fold as an ROH guy? Tony does seem to treat them as separate financial entities as they're technically still separate companies. Tony has already signed some folks for ROH including Brian Cage though that was a contract extension of his AEW deal so he would technically still be an AEW guy and Samoa Joe was seemingly signed for use in ROH but is also technically signed to an AEW deal so I don't know that they've truly signed anyone to ROH yet. I don't think the plan is for 90% of the roster to be AEW people so I would guess the ROH signing frenzy won't start until Tony gets a TV or Streaming deal.
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The Dark Order thing is obviously a focus for a lot of people. All of the members of the DO are like family. But it's not just that.
Stu Grayson is genuinely a great wrestler. He's probably the most talented wrestler in the Dark Order, though Evil Uno's right there with him, too. And Stu never got a push. Once Tony took over the booking to start 2020, he killed all of the individual Dark Order members' momentum, outside of Brodie's debut and run. Stu was left dead in the water by Tony throughout his entire contract past those initial few months.
It's just such an incredible insult for Tony not to bring Stu back. All comes off as incredibly exploitative.
Fuck Tony, man.
Stu Grayson is genuinely a great wrestler. He's probably the most talented wrestler in the Dark Order, though Evil Uno's right there with him, too. And Stu never got a push. Once Tony took over the booking to start 2020, he killed all of the individual Dark Order members' momentum, outside of Brodie's debut and run. Stu was left dead in the water by Tony throughout his entire contract past those initial few months.
It's just such an incredible insult for Tony not to bring Stu back. All comes off as incredibly exploitative.
Fuck Tony, man.
Grayson is 33, making him 5 years younger than the current TNT champ.
Stop acting like he's too old and you can't do anything with him, I'm not saying make him the next world champ but he never had a singles match on TV, even after killing it in multi man tags and getting biggest reactions for the crazy stuff he could do.
If this was some WWE guy who had been "held back" by main roster booking people would be crying for AEW to sign them so they could show what he could really do. Well Stu was held back and I'm having a more than fair moan about it.
Stop acting like he's too old and you can't do anything with him, I'm not saying make him the next world champ but he never had a singles match on TV, even after killing it in multi man tags and getting biggest reactions for the crazy stuff he could do.
If this was some WWE guy who had been "held back" by main roster booking people would be crying for AEW to sign them so they could show what he could really do. Well Stu was held back and I'm having a more than fair moan about it.
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Do you know how an AEW contract works? This was not exploitative.
This is why I dip in out out of the thread. It's become mostly arguing for a while now.
Damn, I honestly thought Stu was the best wrestler in the DO. I'm going to miss Anna bullying him on Being the Elite. As for the DO themselves, they're pretty much being treated as enhancement talent that the crowd loves due to the Hangman and Brodie Lee stuff.
Also, anyone know if it's true that for one of the Owen Hart qualifying matches it will be Dante Martin vs Rey Fenix in his first match back? I heard a rumor about it this morning.
Also, anyone know if it's true that for one of the Owen Hart qualifying matches it will be Dante Martin vs Rey Fenix in his first match back? I heard a rumor about it this morning.
Yes, it'll probably be officially announced on Dark today
It's going to be pretty insufferable if everyone's whose contract doesn't get renewed is seen as a personal attack.
Bad take: People shouldn't talk about shitty things.
Good take: Let's talk about shitty things and hope they improve.
Don't you know it's exploitation to pay someone for three years and then not renew the contract.
But seriously, you're right.
Agree with this, I dunno what people are getting up in arms about.
Contracts are gonna expire and people are gonna leave AEW. That's life.
Agreed.
I really like Stu and want him to stay but if they are unable to come to an agreement then what can you do?
People always complain about roster bloat or worry about budget issues and this is the unfortunate reality of those issues.
It's also a result of AEW actually fulfilling contracts until they end, meaning they aren't going to just cut people who maybe aren't working and aren't worth as much as some others because their contract isn't up so you will be in a situation where they don't renew a wrestler whilst still having others who may not be worth as much in people's personal opinions.
User Banned (1 Day): Hostility
What the fuck are you even talking about Carnby? Who said it was the contract that was exploitative? I'm talking about Tony's booking surrounding the Dark Order and the treatment of Stu in particular.
Why's it always the same people policing this thread like they're some sort of fucking hall monitors? You don't want to have conversations about AEW that don't involve licking Tony's boots, fuck off to the Wrestling thread.
Did they release the details as to why Stu didn't re-sign and I missed it? Why is it "fuck Tony" if we don't know for sure?
I just assumed Stu was unhappy with how little he was used and how rarely he was on tv so he decided to walk on his own when his contract was up. He was one of the most underused talented wrestlers in AEW. If Tony could have extended him for a similar price as he had previously, I'm assuming he would have. But I'm guessing Stu wanted more time if he wasn't getting paid a lot more and Tony couldn't promise the tv time.
If Stu wanted to come back at a reasonable rate and didn't mind not being promised more time then sure, fuck Tony for making a silly decision like that I guess. But until we know for sure, why are we jumping on anyone? Regardless, I wouldn't be surprised if he comes back down the road.
Edit: yeah, I see it was a money issue apparently. So he probably wanted more money if he wasn't going to get a bigger tv opportunity and Tony said nope. I can't really blame Tony for that. A lot of people aren't happy about it but Dark Order is what it is right now - a low card comedy act. Hopefully they revamp things a bit and go through somewhat of a revival. I still wouldn't be surprised to see him back within a few months.
I just assumed Stu was unhappy with how little he was used and how rarely he was on tv so he decided to walk on his own when his contract was up. He was one of the most underused talented wrestlers in AEW. If Tony could have extended him for a similar price as he had previously, I'm assuming he would have. But I'm guessing Stu wanted more time if he wasn't getting paid a lot more and Tony couldn't promise the tv time.
If Stu wanted to come back at a reasonable rate and didn't mind not being promised more time then sure, fuck Tony for making a silly decision like that I guess. But until we know for sure, why are we jumping on anyone? Regardless, I wouldn't be surprised if he comes back down the road.
Edit: yeah, I see it was a money issue apparently. So he probably wanted more money if he wasn't going to get a bigger tv opportunity and Tony said nope. I can't really blame Tony for that. A lot of people aren't happy about it but Dark Order is what it is right now - a low card comedy act. Hopefully they revamp things a bit and go through somewhat of a revival. I still wouldn't be surprised to see him back within a few months.
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"If Stu wanted to come back at a reasonable rate and didn't mind not being promised more time then sure, fuck Tony for making a silly decision like that I guess."
This is the assumption that I think all logic points to. Does anything about Stu come across as the person who sees he's not being used and so is going to demand more money? This Canadian wrestling coach that's already donating his free time to doing stupid BTE bits and gym reviews for Evil Uno's blog? Gimme a break. Does everything we know about Tony indicate he'd try and pay Stu less and/or put him on a Tier 0 contract? Absolutely.
Unless it's the Varsity Blonds No one likes those jobbers. They can get released and lose a job! /s
People best prepare themselves for more of these stories in the next month. AEW ain't the same company it was in 2019. Indie unknowns with a few top stars were the building blocks of the company and now it has grown/changed from it's original incarnation. Some lower on the card will get 0 Tier contract deals that will pay a bit more and will be happy. Others will think they can do better elsewhere or want's to do something different. I told myself months ago that this year will be a big telling on AEW with how much talent will leave once their contracts expire and don't resign. Many will go to the indies, others might see what Cody did and try WWE if money is the be all end all for them. At the end of the day I just want the wrestlers to be happy no matter where they land.
I don't think I've ever seen anyone complaining about roster bloat here, other then responding to Twitter concern trolling. Similarly, no one here's been worried about roster budget, either. We all know Tony's likely got big stuff happening for spin-off shows and a streaming deal. Not to mention the inevitable TV re-up that'll be 3-5 times higher than what they currently have.
If anything, people complain that Tony isn't using the roster effectively or efficiently. That they want to see more of the roster used every week on Dark and Dark Elevation, if not TV. And further, that they want AEW to sign more people even if they see less of some folk who are on TV every week.
If anything, people complain that Tony isn't using the roster effectively or efficiently. That they want to see more of the roster used every week on Dark and Dark Elevation, if not TV. And further, that they want AEW to sign more people even if they see less of some folk who are on TV every week.
