After an intriguing opening pre-taped segment
, the Weds., July 1 AEW Dynamite immediately went to the World title defense set up by one of three main events at Sunday night’s Forbidden Door PPV. Mark Briscoe’s team team defeated Maxwell Jacob Friedman’s in the new Devil’s Door steel cage (thanks to an Andrade face turn), which meant that MJF could no longer duck the Sussex County Chicken — who’s had Max’s number over the past year.The match was a bloody affair, with both men taking crazy bumps,
especially after being in a cage match three days ago. Briscoe managed to hit Jay Driller, his late brother’s finisher and the move that beat Friedman multiple times. But this time Big Hebrew kicked out.
A rollup exchange and a counter slam later, the champ retained after a Heatseeker. MJF was also immediately met by Kenny Omega calling for a title shot, right here in San Diego! Max obviously said no, but did have a counter. He’ll defend against Omega next Wednesday on the Beach Break edition of Dynamite… if Omega agrees to the same stipulation Hangman Page had to make to get a shot at the champ: if he loses, he can never challenge for AEW’s top prize ever again!
Throughout the show, we got scenes of Owen Cup winner Will Ospreay confronting MJF about the stipulation, and right before Omega went through the curtain to give his anwer, another of Bruv telling Omega he didn’t have to go through with it.
Earlier, we’d see The Young Bucks try to talk Kenny out of it, too. But after a big babyface promo in Dynamite’s main event spot, the Best Bout Machine took the match.
Friedman responded with a cheap shot, but Kenny got the better of their show-ending pull apart.
So do we get a title change next week, or does Omega join Page (and Cody Rhodes, who he mentioned, should QB1 lose his dream gig at WWE) in the “can’t be AEW World champ” club? The idea behind reports Kenny could defend against Ospreay at All In London on Aug. 28 are based on the idea Omega’s pretty close to the end of his career… does that tell us anything about which way this match goes?
Lots to consider. Talk it out below, and get caught up on tonight’s Dynamite in Claire’s live blog par excellence here.
