The Post’s Joseph Staszewski brings you around the world of professional wrestling every Tuesday in his weekly column, the Post Match Angle.
We do not yet know what the future holds for Edge, but if Friday night was it, what a beautiful moment it was.
What we saw on SmackDown, marking 25 years of Edge in the WWE, felt like a celebration — and maybe a goodbye.
There was Edge, 49, wrestling friend Sheamus for the first time in what he said will be the last time he will wrestle in his hometown of Toronto. There was an amazing video package chronicling his legendary career. There was fellow WWE Hall of Famer and wife Beth Phoenix exuding all the emotions of a potential retirement in the front row alongside daughters Lyric and Ruby – whose initials were on the boots of their dad’s Maple Leafs-themed attire along with his mom Judy.
He and Sheamus had a fine match, the excitement building and building to the finish as it took two spears to finally put the Celtic Warrior down to a big pop. Pyro exploded in the background as Edge’s hand was raised before a hug with Sheamus.
Edge, who has done the retirement speech before when he thought his career was over due to a neck injury in 2011, addressed his hometown crowd after the match. He left the door open for his career to continue – just maybe not for too much longer. While this was the last match on his current WWE deal, his contract isn’t up until September and it didn’t sound like he planned on being around the business long enough to make it back to Toronto as a wrestler.
“I don’t know what the future holds, I really don’t,” he said. “I gotta sit home this week, lick my wounds, talk to my family and see what they want me to do.
“What I can say is this is my last time in front of y’all,” he said as the crowd booed. “… I’m just being honest with ya. But don’t let that be a downer. Because man, one experience you all gave me, I will never forget it.”
There are so many ways for this to play out.
Edge could never wrestle again and this would serve as an imperfect, but poetic, ending as he got to write his own version this time after returning in 2020. He could push this to WrestleMania 40 – going on a retirement tour of sorts – maybe begging someone to beat him and send him home for good.
There is the other option with more than three years of service to WWE complete since his return.
Edge doing a short stint in AEW – even if it can’t start at Wembley Stadium next Sunday – to reunite with best friend Christian Cage, who also came back from injury, one last time. It would likely check the final box of Edge’s return.
Maybe they retire in a match against each other or the Hardys. Maybe there is one last short run as tag team champions considering their last match together – outside a joint 2021 Royal Rumble appearance — was in 2011.
Edge versus MJF or Kenny Omega would be a dream match.
There were hints of Edge all over AEW Collision on Saturday: From CM Punk paying tribute with his Conquistadors-like disguise, Christian delivering a spear during his match and Jim Ross mentioning Edge by name on commentary
Friday night didn’t quite seem like the end for Edge — as it feels like there is just a little bit more to do.
But if it ends up being just that or only the first act to the close of Edge’s career, what a beautiful moment it was.
Empty feeling
Something about the whole Kenny Omega-Bullet Club Gold beatdown segment just didn’t click for me. There just seemed to be a lack of intensity to it all in an empty Daily’s Place. Jim Ross nonchalantly walking away as Omega got pummeled felt like a great meme, but man I wanted salty and fiery J.R. berating the heels or at least Don Callis maybe even calling for help.
The 2-x-4 shot Omega took was the worst of a so-so attack – certainly nothing that would make me believe he would need to be in a storyline hospital. Then we get “Hangman” Adam Page at the “hospital,” which was just an open ambulance backstage at the arena somewhere.
If my friend is in the hospital, I think I’d have more fire than Page showed. And his beer spot, while fun, seemed to take away from what should be the seriousness of the situation heading into the trio’s match at All In.
Back in Business
This was the Shinsuke Nakamura we have waited so long to see on the main roster in the WWE. His two-minute vignette to explain what he whispered in World Heavyweight champion Seth Rollins’ ear last week was arguably the best thing Nakamura has done in WWE.
He came off on “Monday Night Raw” as cold, evil and calculated as he revealed he knew about Rollins’ serious back injuries and planned to exploit them. The constant images of Rollins grimacing along with having to read the subtitles made it even harder to take your eye off the package. Nakamura has moved into a heartless assassin phase and WWE might have no choice but to run hard with it.
The 10 Count
Chris Jericho and Don Callis took us on quite the roller coaster ride as the former joined Callis’ family then backed out after seeing his friend holding his chopped-off head in a painting. Jericho asking Callis if he was going to assassinate him was also a nice foreshadowing of Will Ospreay – The Aerial Assasin – showing up to attack him later.
Piper Nevin may just be an even more perfect partner for Chelsea Green from a storyline perspective. Nevin is dominant enough to go win matches on her own without any help from Green, leaving endless possibilities.
The NXT video package, which included old home movies, to tell Angel Garza and Humberto Carrillo’s story of wanting to make grandfather Humberto Garza proud after some failed gimmicks was as good as it gets. It makes you realize how shallow typecasting Latin stars as ladies’ men really is when real life is so much more compelling.
The Street Profits’ new power bomb-neckbreaker finisher looked pretty sweet. Their gear, however, may need a little work as their new logo actually looked very similar to the OC’s in the match.
Crazzy Steve delivered as personal a promo as you can in pro wrestling, speaking about being mentally and physically abused by his dad as a child and about his mom – who had health issues after he was born – committing suicide three weeks before he signed his Impact contract. Tom Hanfin handled reacting to it well in the interview segment. It is certainly a risky choice by the promotion as we wait to see where it all goes.
Chad Gable’s win over Gunther was a perfect use of count-out. Gable gets a well-deserved moment, Gunther gets to be absolutely livid and this intriguing story gets to continue with some hope for Alpha Acedemy’s leader.
I understand sponsorship money – that ended up being donated to help the victims of the Maui wildfires –but man that Texas Chainsaw Deathmatch between Jeff Hardy and Jeff Jarrett wasn’t a Robocop-type moment, but it might be the hookiest, most sports entertainment, most WWE match in AEW history.
As good as House of Black’s vignette on Billy Gunn was on Collision, it was equally confusing why AEW had Ricky Starks cut a backstage promo to set up him managing Big Bill, the cut to him doing a Zoolander-style vignette and then have him lead Bill to the ring.
Matt Cardona gave us another reminder of how special his wrestling mind is and he and Steph De Lander doing a Ghostbuster entrance (Deathmatchbuster) for their GCW deathmatch against Nick Gage and Maki Itoh.
Wrestling has never been a healthier business than it is now with WWE breaking its WrestleMania gate record the day tickets for No. 40 in Philly went on sale and AEW breaking WWE’s tickets distributed record for a single show with All In. Enjoy it, don’t take it for granted.
Wrestler of the Week
Wes Lee, NXT
Lee remained on quite the upward trajectory in NXT. Just a month after losing his North American championship to Dominik Mysterio, Lee finds himself the No 1 contender for Carmelo Hayes’ NXT championship at Heatwave this week after defeating Dijak and then immediately demanding a contract signing.
Match to Watch
MJF (c) vs. Adam Cole, AEW world champion at All In (Sunday, 1 p.m., B/R Live)
MJF and Cole have been telling AEW’s most compelling story over the past two months as the two unexpected friends have a chance to keep adding to that while wrestling for the Ring of Honor tag title on the preshow and then the world title in the main event. Both men have teased potentially turning on the other and Wembley Stadium in front of 80,000-plus feels like the best place for a major shift one way or the other.
Around The Ring
Major League Wrestling returns to New York City for MLW: ONE-SHOT on December 7 at the Melrose Ballroom.
John Cena will return to “Friday Night SmackDown” on Sept. 1 and be a part of WWE “Superstar Spectacle” in India on Sept. 3. Cena also has a new movie “Freelance” hitting theaters Oct. 6.