There was a time when Anthony Ogogo looked like one of the hottest new names in AEW.

Initially pitched to play the heavy role in The Inner Circle instead of Jake Hager in the early, pre-Dynamite era of Tony Khan's company, Ogogo made his in-ring debut in an April edition of Dynamite against future The Factory faction mate Cole Karter before securing another big win over Austin Gunn in the lead up to his first-ever AEW Pay-Per-View match against the ever “Nightmarish” Cody Rhodes, who decided to take the match in a sort of USA vs. UK nationalistic spectacle.

The lead-up to the match had a little bit of everything, a way-too-long weigh-in that featured Paul Weight not knowing how to use a scale, weird video packages, and yet another failed attempt to get Rhodes over as a babyface before he “turned heel” during his final angle before jumping ship to WWE – even if no one knew that he was a heel at the time.

While working a big-time angle with Rhodes should have gotten Ogogo some positive rub in AEW even in defeat, that just wasn't meant to be; after just one more match, Ogogo had to undergo another surgery on his eye, the same eye that cost him his boxing career, and it held him out of action until December when he remerged for his first of 18 matches on either Dark or Dark Elevation over the last 12 months.

What gives? Is AEW going all-in on building up Ogogo the old-fashioned way, with steady in-ring work outside of the eyes of weekly television? Or did his failed angle at Double or Nothing 2022 really cost him badly in the eyes of AEW? Well, in the eyes of Ogogo, his match wasn't a failure at all, as he detailed to Cultaholic in an interview h/t Fightful.

“My favorite moment, retrospectively, was going to work every week and knowing what you’re doing, which doesn’t happen in wrestling,”  Ogogo said. “Everything is last minute [laughs]. When you’re working with an EVP, he had his stuff planned. He’s obviously the best wrestler I ever wrestled. He was the first person I ever locked up with. Working with him it was a bit unfair because he’s so good. No one is as good as him.”

Anthony Ogogo blames time constraints for his AEW PPV debut being just “good.”

Delving further into the actual intricacies of his match's in-ring minutia, Ogogo decided to let it slip that his match was not only shortened by six minutes because another bout went over, but that he wasn't afforded the “Beefeaters” or “Bulldogs” he asked for that, in his opinion, would have really put the match over the top.

“I don’t want to get into trouble, so I’m not going to talk too much,” Ogogo said. “Sometimes silence speaks a thousand words. I asked for the anthem, they said no for certain things, certain reasons. I asked for people dressed up like beefeaters. I didn’t get it. I asked for a few things to really ramp up. We actually lost…the match was good, it could have been really good, we lost six minutes of our match because time constraints. I think there was a battle royale before that went heavy. We filmed a really cool Rocky montage, a five-minute cool Rocky montage. The promo packages before the match, think of Austin and the Rock, by the time the bell goes, you’re frothing at the mouth. We filmed something really cool for that, but we had to cut that because of time. We had to cut 40% of our match time, which was the moments. The moments between the moves. Our match could have been better had we didn’t have to cut our time because we had these special moments planned and they had to go. That was really frustrating. It was my first foray on the big stage. I didn’t get my bulldogs, I didn’t get my beefeaters. The match wasn’t quite what it could have been because of time constraints, which I understand. After that, we had a big meeting, ‘people have to stick to their times.’ It’s not fair people having their matches [cut] because other people's unprofessionalism. It was a great way to make my way. I had a lot of fun. I would have liked certain things to change, like certain outcomes be a little different. I believe I can be a player in pro wrestling moving forward. I feel I will be a big deal.”

So… yeah, apparently, Rhodes and Ogogo could have had a magical match, a regular “Stone Cold” Steve Austin versus The Rock for the AEW era but the lack of time, video packages, and “Beefeaters” prevented it from reaching that potential. While even Ogogo has admitted that certain aspects of the angle were “F*cking Dogsh*t,” it's clear the actual in-ring match didn't go as planned either, which is a shame, considering how much time was put into building it up. Oh well, let's hope Ogogo-Rhodes II has better luck, how ever, if ever, that match comes into being.