AEW needed the focus to remain on the positives happening around the company and not the drama around the firing of CM Punk.
All Out delivered everything the company could have hoped for a week after the success of All In at Wembley Stadium thanks to another superb collection of in-ring outings that made the show at the United Center on Sunday night as good as it could get without the presence of a major story arc to deliver on.
That stuff counts, too.
What we got was some incremental steps forward in stories, a few classic matches and the company continuing to build up its next wave of stars thanks to its current ones in Bryan Danielson, Kenny Omega, and Jon Moxley, specifically.
(AEW does have practice responding to Punk messes)
Orange Cassidy’s incredible run as AEW International champion came to an end in a bloody and violent main event — so pretty much a typical Moxley match, as Cassidy got a cut over his right eye that kept dripping blood.
The match itself felt like the perfect way for Cassidy to lose, fully completing his transformation into a bad ass as even his signature light kick escalated in ferocity.
By the end, Cassidy’s toughness and heart earned Moxley’s respect as he was left shaking his head before delivering a second Deathrider DDT for the win after a hunched over and wobbly Cassidy flipped him the double bird in one last act of defiance,
It’s the type of match that elevates the International championship and a loss that can propel Cassidy to bigger and better things, if not a win over Moxley down the road.
It took a three-time AEW world champion to end Cassidy’s 10-month reign that saw 25 successful defenses, which finally wore him down in storyline over time.
Cassidy was left in the ring to get a standing ovation from the crowd to close the show.
Just as Moxley initiated Cassidy into the main event scene, Danielson — who returned early from a broken arm – did the same for Ricky Starks.
The two wrestled a brutal strap match – in which Danielsom (who came out to the “Final Countdown” again) never threw a strike with his recovering right arm – that absolutely proved the toughness of Starks, whose character is more of a pretty boy.
Danielson and Starks mercilessly whipped each other with the strap throughout, with both men bloodied.
Starks, in what could end up turning him back babyface with his feud with Punk done, didn’t tap out to a strap-aided LeBell Lock but just passed out.
Danielson, who proves you don’t need four good limbs to put on a banger of a wrestling match, credited Starks with carrying in in this match.
Starkes continues to deliver when AEW gives him the ball and this was just another showcase of that.
Maybe no one got a bigger stamp of approval than Konosuke Takshita.
It’s become pretty clear that AEW has something special in the Japanese star and they are pushing all their chips in with him.
The 28-year-old and Omega put on a main-event-worthy match that showed off all of Takeshita’s physical gifts and talents – ending with him pinning one of the best wrestlers in the world for the second time in two weeks.
Takeshita hit Omega with a ridiculous avalanche Blue Thunder Bomb to start a fun sequence of false finishes.
Don Callis and Takeshita’ attempt to hit Omega with a screwdriver was thwarted, but Takeshita hit the former AEW champion with an exposed knee strike to end it.
Omega’s character has hit rock bottom now, which could mean he will need to lean even more on his friend Kota Ibushi to get his mojo back.
While there was an expectation for those matches to carry the show, Miro and Powerhouse Hobbs had the sneaky-good contest that was everything you’d expect from a hoss fight between two massive, agile and talented athletes.
The Chicago crowd started chanting “Slap that Meat” and “Meat Forever” during the match as Hobbs easily tossed Miro around times; the two traded arm strikes to the chest and kicked out of big moves late.
It took as second Game Over Submission for Hobbs to finally tap.
Then we got the biggest surprise of the show in the debut of Miro’s wife, CJ Perry – the former Lana in WWE.
She came out and stopped Hobbs’ postmatch attack, but Miro walked away from her as his character had already forsaken his wife and his God to focus on a quest for championship gold.
All of it seemed to work well to late, the foundation for a potential babyface turn for Miro.
Much of the rest of the show was a great night for heels and incremental storytelling.
A banged-up Darby Allin lost his TNT championship match to Luchasurus, who dominated the contest early.
Allin built momentum late, but Christian threatening to hit Nick Wayne with a ConChairTo distracted him enough to allow the champion to deliver multiple tombstone pile drivers and a lariat to finally get the pin.
It leaves Darby without a clear path forward as a singles wrestler unless he gets a rematch.
Jay White, Juice Robinson and The Gunns of Bullett Club Gold stole a win over the Young Bucks and FTR as the odd couple pairing wrestled pretty cohesively through out.
White, however, found an opportune moment for a Blade Runner on Cash Wheleer.
It feels like the Young Bucks, who weren’t in position to make a save, might be apologizing to FTR again.
Claudio Castagnoli’s hard Europen Uppercut out of nowhere was enough to pin Eddie Kingston and get him and Wheeler Yuta a tag team win over his rival and Katsuyori Shibata.
It could lead to Kingston doing something desperate to finally get a rematch for the ROH championship against Castagnoli.
One of the few true babyface to win was Kris Stantlander retaining her TBS championship against Ruby Soho, who is now 0-3 in singles championship matches in AEW, in a good back-and-forth contest.
In another example of some of the small story steps forward AEW took, Toni Storm emerged from under the ring to take the spray can away from Soho in what could possibly be the start of some true dissension amongst the Outcasts, if not end, as the move cost Soho the match.
MJF really is doing all the babyface things.
In his and Adam Cole’s successful Ring of Honor tag team championship defense against Jon Silver and Alex Reynolds, he worked a storyline neck injury and did the go-back-only-to-charge-out-and-help-win-the-match bit.
After it was over, AEW laid the groundwork for a Samoa Joe feud.
Joe, in a call back to his moment with MJF as an extra in NXT in Brooklyn by pushing the world champion as they passed on the ramp. MJF went into the ring to go back after Joe, who retained his ROH television title against Shane Taylor.
Dennis Rodman made his return to pro wrestling on the pre-show as he was in the corner of Billy Gunn and The Acclaimed for their trios championship defense against Jeff Jarrett, Jay Lethal and Satnam Singh. Rodman delivered a guitar shot to Singh to help his team retain.
Tony Khan announced at the postshow media scrum that Jack Perry is suspended indefinitely for his role in his backstage incident with CM Punk.
Biggest Winner: Konosuke Takshita, Orange Cassidy
Biggest Loser: Darby Allin
Best Match: Jon Moxley vs. Orange Cassidy
Grade: B+