AEW Dynamite – 9/16/2026: 3 Things We Hated & 3 We Loved

AEW is rounding the corner and nearing All Out 2026. With just a few episodes of Dynamite and Collision left, Wednesday’s show was hard at work, getting all the pieces in place for next Saturday. You can read all about the various happenings over on the AEW Dynamite 9/16/2026 Results Page.

With a jam-packed show, comes plenty of emotions from the Wrestling Inc. crew. Steve Borden’s continued success in AEW, as well as the blistering opening and closing contests were high points of the broadcast, while the frustrating lack of variety in the women’s division was one of a handful of issues. The comments section will be open, as always, should you feel the need to keep the conversation going.

Enough from me though, let’s get in to what we loved and what we hated, starting with what we hated.

Professional wrestling is full of people feuding with one another for some ridiculous reasons. Jericho and Nick Wayne feuding over Wayne’s pooka shell necklace is definitely one such ridiculous reason, but I can’t help but feel like it crosses the line into being just a little bit too silly for it to become so intense down the line and hard for the fans to take even just a tiny bit seriously.

Here’s what I have a really hard time getting past with the two men feuding over a pooka shell necklace: they have become commonplace in 2026. It really wouldn’t be hard for Wayne’s character to replace the current pooka shell necklace he has with another very similar one he finds on the internet, especially because there hasn’t been any kind of sentimental value attached to this pooka shell necklace. There are so many other better reasons that Jericho and Wayne could be feuding over (such as Wayne wanting to make a name for himself as a young star by going after a veteran), and there’s no reason for AEW to have found something else for this storyline to be about.

While I can also appreciate that Jericho and Wayne tried something different in their match from this edition of “Dynamite” by having Jericho rip off Wayne’s pooka shell necklace, something about the pacing of it all felt clunky and random to me. It was an abrupt ending to an otherwise decent match, and just didn’t really work for me in the manner that it was intended to.

Written by Olivia Quinlan

As a certain someone would say, wrestling has more than one royal family. And, much like effectively any royal family, you have those who bear the weight of expectation well, but you also have those who are there purely because of their surname and little to nothing else.

Now it would be entirely unfair to give a final verdict this early into things, given Sting’s son Steven Borden only made his televised AEW debut during last week’s show. But, if these past two shows have been anything to go by, he appears to be ready to step up to the plate.

Let’s get it out of the way by saying he definitely looks the part, the spitting image of his dad and even without that subtext, an extremely attractive and fit guy. Wrestling, like it or not, is a visual medium so that will always be a positive. But Ted DiBiase Jr. looked the part, as did Tonga Loa, as did David Flair and Cody Hall. None of them have come even close to being the legends their fathers are. None of them had it, and that’s not for lack of trying on the companies’ part.

Borden seems to be in a much better position already. He is still green in certain aspects, and that’s why pairing him with Darby Allin is a natural fit, allowing him to get those reps in without overexposing his flaws. It’s what worked about Allin’s partnership with Sting: he gets to be the engine of the match while Borden is the extravagant and shiny bodywork.

This week he was additionally paired with Adam Copeland and Christian Cage to take on FTR, Kyle Fletcher, and Kevin Knight. So he was in safe hands, but that could well have left him as the weak link drowned out by the star power of his cohorts. He wasn’t, and one would go further to say the match was structured in a way that accentuated him.

Two matches down with a first pay-per-view bout announced for next weekend, and it certainly feels as though AEW has stumbled onto a hit in Baby Sting. He can work well already and will surely only get better; he looks like a carbon copy of his father and has that unmistakable aura about him, and he is over with the audience. That’s a booker’s and a fan’s dream when it comes to a second-generation wrestler.

Written by Max Everett

Despite what I’m about to say, I actually love a squash match when it is done right. In a company like AEW where sometimes it feels like it is mandatory that a match surpass 15 or 20 minutes, seeing someone get obliterated in less time than it takes to read all of this is rather refreshing. However, there are some squash matches that simply don’t need to exist, and Tommaso Ciampa was involved in one of them tonight.

For the past few weeks, Ciampa has been teasing the idea of wrestling a big name at AEW All Out 2026. He has done this solely in backstage segments, and his final plan was even revealed in a backstage segment tonight when he revealed he was challenging Kazuchika Okada to a match for the AEW International Championship. Then he went out and wrestled Myles Hawkins, who did make the most of his minutes in fairness to him, and beat him in a matter of seconds. He would later appear again backstage, attacking Okada to make sure the match was made official, and you’re sitting there thinking why Ciampa was even in a squash match to begin with.

I understand it, he is going to be in a high-profile match so getting him out in front of the audience keeps Ciampa’s name at the front of the fans’ brains. With that said, all of the heavy lifting has been done in backstage segments and it could have honestly stayed there. Squashing poor Myles Hawkins served absolutely no purpose other than the fans in Norfolk, Virginia getting to hear Ciampa’s entrance music and getting Hawkins a payday (which is fair enough).

On the opposite side of that, if AEW really wanted to get the most out of the squash match, have Ciampa tease who he wants to face backstage, do the squash, and then have him challenge Okada in front of the crowd to get the pop. It’s a first-time-ever match, the fans are going to react either way, so why not make the most of it? It is a bit of a nitpick as there wasn’t anything inherently wrong with tonight’s show, but it was a case of AEW failing to capitalize on a moment that will make the fans automatically more excited for the match because they got to see the announcement live in-person. Doing it backstage doesn’t always hit the same way, especially if it’s pre-taped because it just looks a bit unnatural as the performer can’t feed and bounce off of the crowd.

Overall, the squash wasn’t bad, it wasn’t offensive, it was just kind of there really, and that’s not a good feeling.

Written by Sam Palmer

The outcome may have been obvious, but I’m glad that Brody King, Bandido, and “Hangman” Adam Page are going to be the trio to challenge New Level and Swerve Strickland for the AEW World Trios Championships at All Out next weekend. While sure, it could very well be The Demand holding the gold after their match against the champions on “AEW Collision” this week, I doubt that’s the case. I don’t think Tony Khan is going to pass up pitting Page and Strickland against each other in a new way, and Kofi and Austin Creed against Bandido is going to be a lot of fun.

The number one contendership match tonight was also a lot of fun. The Conglomeration’s Kyle O’Reilly, Orange Cassidy, and Roderick Strong fought their hardest, but it was always going to be Brodido and Page in the end. Commentary even mentioned that Page hasn’t lost an AEW match in his home state of Virginia.

There were a lot of really fun spots throughout the match, like Cassidy countering King’s chops with high fives, and Strong throwing “OC” over his head, using him like a weapon, in a fallaway slam, only for Page to catch him and hit a fallaway slam of his own. I loved Bandido military pressing Cassidy over his head, then turning that into a cutter, and Page and Cassidy had dueling cute moments when they ended up on one another’s backs, and Cassidy teased a “ride ’em” motion like a cowboy. I feel like the trios division isn’t something that needs to be deadly serious all the time, even with a title opportunity on the line, and this match proved that.

The entire bout was really fast-paced and fun, and I like the feeling that the trios division has been revitalized with the addition of Kofi and Creed, since the tag team division and the scene around those titles is pretty set right now, especially for All Out. I wish we could have heard from the champions tonight, but they were laid out by Ricochet, Toa Liona, and Bishop Kaun before they could get to the ring to cut a promo, so hopefully, we get a face-to-face confrontation between the challengers and champions next week. We got a few things confirmed for All Out tonight, but I think the Trios Championship match was by far the most exciting.

Written by Daisy Ruth

The booking of the AEW women’s division always gets a lot of flak, and I will admit tonight it’s for very nitpicky reasons, likely due to injuries to top talent in the division right now. That being said, I didn’t love that the only women’s match tonight was between two women who already have a big spot confirmed at All Out.

Lena Kross defeated Jamie Hayter in an alright TV match, but they’re set to face off in a Chicago street fight alongside their respective tag partners, Megan Bayne and Alex Windsor, for the AEW Women’s World Tag Team Championships. I thought this spot tonight could have gone to other women who don’t have a spot on the card yet, or even just to showcase those who don’t often get a spot on TV.

That could be because, as was revealed before “Dynamite” went on the air, Maya World is currently out for an undetermined amount of time after undergoing a procedure. It felt like she was gearing up for a rematch for the TBS Championship against Persephone. World’s absence could be why we didn’t see Persephone and Britt Baker this week. Maybe AEW is hoping World will be cleared in the next 10 days to go in Chicago, but if not, hopefully they’re going to pivot to get Persephone and the title on the show, or at least on Zero Hour, maybe against a competitor like Mina Shirakawa or something.

The women’s scene also could have felt a little off tonight, due to AEW Women’s Champion Mercedes Mone also being out of action. Commentary revealed she won’t be cleared to compete at All Out, presumably due to her broken nose, but she will be good to go for WrestleDream. We got a fantastic pre-recorded segment where it was revealed Willow Nightingale will face off against Thekla for the number one contendership for Mone’s gold at All Out, which I did love. But after Thekla and Mone’s in-person promo battle last week, things definitely felt kind of odd. It would have been boring had AEW not aired the war of words between Thekla and Nightingale.

Again, these are all nitpicky reasons for me to not like what went down in the women’s division tonight, outside of the All Out number one contender’s match being confirmed, but AEW needs to get better at booking some women’s feuds, or at least other matches, outside of its title pictures. I didn’t need to see Hayter vs. Kross ahead of their street fight, and I bet we see Windsor vs. Bayne next week.

Written by Daisy Ruth

It’s a clean sweep for the multi-man matches on the September 16 episode of “AEW Dynamite” as one of the company’s best booking tropes shone through in the main event.

Closing out the show was a match that saw Jon Moxley, Gabe Kidd, and PAC represent the Death Riders against what has effectively become the western wing of the United Empire, Will Ospreay, Andrade El Idolo, and Francesco Akira. The “All Star” tag method of building to a pay-per-view did become something of a meme last year as they were booked on virtually every show, complete is duffel bags of cash for the winners on some occasions, but when they work this well it’s easy to see why Tony Khan relies so heavily on them.

Starting with the match itself, it was a lot of fun. It won’t be getting into any match of the year conversations or anything, but it served its purpose and everyone got the chance to shine. A special shout out to Akira in particular who is becoming one of my personal favorite recurring characters in AEW, and while I do think he should stay in New Japan Pro Wrestling because that company probably needs him more, I wouldn’t be against, nor would I be surprised if Akira eventually becomes “All Elite” himself. He was the scrappy underdog in the face of the rabid animals that were PAC and Kidd, who looked extremely vicious in certain moments, but when he was faced with Moxley, it was an entirely different test.

Despite letting the babyfaces get their stuff in, Moxley looked like a behemoth in this one, especially at the end where he took liberties with Akira by beating the absolute snot out of him to send a message to Ospreay. The AEW World Champion always works well in these multi-man settings where he can be the bolt of lightning during a down period, and what’s left to say about Andrade? He’s just the best isn’t he?

The extra layers that feed into the future as well worked nicely. The obvious was the build to Moxley vs. Ospreay at AEW All Out 2026, with the Death Riders threatening to break Akira’s neck in the same way they took Ospreay out of action a year ago. However, Andrade has that guaranteed title shot in his back pocket, so any interaction he had with Ospreay came with an extra level of tension since they both know they are on a collision course in the near future. An all-around great main event that hit every beat it needed to, and left me excited for what’s to come in the next few weeks. Good job guys.

Written by Sam Palmer