When Wardlow got in the ring with Samoa Joe, he wasn't exclusively looking to retain the AEW TNT Championship belt he held during the final days of 2022.

Sure, becoming a two-time TNT Champion certainly was on Wardlow's to-do list, as he was never technically pinned for the strap and instead watched Powerhouse Hobbs eat the pin in a three-way match, but ā€œMr. Mayhem'sā€ number one goal in the match was getting revenge on his former friend for cutting off his hair, and over the course of an upper-midcard contest, Wardlow got just that.

Hopping mad at Joe for using his vulnerability against him, Wardlow entered the ring at Revolution with a ferocity fans have seldom seen in AEW, embracing the chance to wrestle one of the greatest powerhouses in professional wrestling history, hitting the ā€œKing of Televisionā€ with Spinebusters, F-10s, and his signature Powerbomb, but none of it was enough. No, as Wardlow came to learn the hard way, Joe is as good at absorbing damage as he is at delivering it, and for there to be a new TNT Champion, he would need a new strategy that Joe wouldn't see coming.

Fortunately, Joe isn't the only person who learned something during the WarJoe era, and Wardlow decided to take a page from ā€œThe Samoan Submission Machine'sā€ book to secure victory using the Coquina Clutch.

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Swerve Strickland with a text bubble reading "But letā€™s be real, we are the best wrestling" next to Grayson Waller with the AEW logo as the background.

Matty Breisch Ā·

Swerve Strickland and Kofi Kingston with the AEW Dynasty logo as the background.

Matty Breisch Ā·

Swerve Strickland with a text bubble reading " Youā€™ve seen what me and Hangman Page can do" next to Samoa Joe with the AEW Dynasty logo as the background.

Matty Breisch Ā·

The good news? Wardlow is the new TNT Champion. The bad news? He now has to wrestle ā€œThe Face of the Revolution,ā€ Powerhouse Hobbs, on the next edition of Dynamite. No pressure, right?