All Elite Wrestling is a big part of my life. I was there at the original All In event in Chicago when The Elite made history by selling out the then Sears Center, and then later on teamed with Tony Khan to make their own wrestling promotion. For the last six-plus years (as they announced the company on January 1st, 2019), AEW has been about trying to bring wrestling in North America back to where it NEEDED to be. Or, more simply, it needed to be about wrestling again. Last week, AEW All In Texas happened, the company’s biggest show of the year, and it was something to behold.
True to its name, the company went “all in” on numerous big matches and tried to “pay off” long-running storylines and feuds. When I was done watching the spectacle, I was in awe of all I had witnessed. From noon (Central Time) to 8 PM, I was basically glued to my computer chair, watching AEW All In Texas, and time was flying by with each match I saw. The event had so much to praise, and fans both at the show and watching from home couldn’t help but talk about how great it was. By the end, I asked myself a simple question, “Was this the best PPV I had ever seen?” For me, and to be clear, this is MY opinion, it definitely felt like the best PPV I’d witnessed, and it’s very easy to spell out why.
Reason #1 – The Wrestling Was Incredible Throughout
Let’s start with the most obvious, shall we? As I’ve made it clear in the past, AEW has arguably the most consistent epic wrestling out there. They do it on their TV shows, Dynamite and Collision, and then they REALLY show out at their PPVs. You might recall that before AEW All In Texas, I made a list of the best matches to watch on YouTube before the event started.
By the time the show was over, I could’ve put multiple matches from the event on that list if they were uploaded in full.
There were nine matches on the main card, and all of them delivered in one form or another. Just as important, they were long matches. That might seem important, but many have been “conditioned” by a certain “other place” that matches on PPVs can be short and “not be a bad thing.” The shortest match at AEW All In Texas, as noted by Cagematch, was 14:23.
Furthermore, three matches (the men’s casino gauntlet, Okada/Omega 5, and Hangman/Mox) were all over 30 minutes! A tally I personally kept was about how many times the crowd chanted “This is Awesome!” and “Fight Forever.” The final tally was 7 of the 9 matches got “This is Awesome!” and two got “Fight Forever.” That’s not too shabby.
Just for me personally, I enjoyed every match and can easily say there wasn’t “a dud on the card.” Heck, even in the pre-show had great matches, including FTR vs. The Outrunners, which went about 16 minutes!
There was hard-hitting action via the Trios Title match to start the night, there was aerial mastery with Swerve Strickland and Will Ospreay vs. The Young Bucks, two gauntlet matches that allowed numerous wrestlers to shine, and one of the most brutal main events you’ll ever see…that had blood flowing in three minutes flat.
The following days, I saw MULTIPLE people on my social media timelines talking about how they were rewatching matches, or straight-up rewatching the whole main card! That was a six-hour show (give or take) and yet they wanted to rewatch it, because they KNEW it was great. My only regret it not being able to do that myself! …dang work life…
Reason #2 – Honoring The Past and The Wrestlers
One thing AEW’s owner, Tony Khan, is never afraid to do is honor the wrestlers who have given so much to the company, and to wrestling as a whole. When Sting was in the company, Tony did all he could to make his run memorable, all the way up until his retirement match.
AEW All In Texas took this love of wrestling as a whole in different ways. For example, easily the lowest point of the night was when Adam Cole (BAY BAY!!!!) revealed that he was injured in such a way that he might have to retire. Tony Khan announced the shift in his TNT title match on the pre-show, and that could’ve been the end of it. Instead, TK allowed Adam Cole to address the audience that was there, and while it was a somber moment, it was needed. Adam Cole has been a BIG part of the wrestling world for decades, and if this was to be his end, it needed to be on a big stage like this, with his own words being spoken to the fans.
Naturally, everyone wondered how things would go after the very emotional moment, and if you watched the 4-way TNT title match, you know that the crowd was DEAD for most of it…until…Tony Khan pulled out a huge surprise…and had Dustin Rhodes win the title in his home state of Texas. The crowd ERUPTED at this, and Dustin, who’s been in the industry across five different decades, can now add his name to the lineage of AEW’s gold, and that moment felt good. Everybody was “alive” again, and the show built up a lot of momentum after that point.
But it didn’t stop there! In another surprise, Jojo Offerman came out to sing “Ain’t Nobody” by Chaka Khan to help introduce Swerve Strickland.
Jojo Offerman is singing "Ain't Nobody!" for Swerve
— Fightful Wrestling (@fightful.com) 2025-07-12T20:58:03.262Z
Why was that moment important? First, there were fireflies in the background to honor her late partner, wrestler Bray Wyatt, but also, that’s how Swerve used to come out on the indies! So, instead of being “rooted in what’s happening now with his music,” TK was fine with a cover of a classic song to let Swerve honor his past while paving his future via the company’s biggest event.
Or how about at the MAIN EVENT, when the camera did a pan to the “heel entrance,” as that’s where Hangman Adam Page had been coming out of recently, only to see that he came out the “face entrance,” in an attire that harkened back to his “true cowboy” days?
The camera looking to the heel side of the entrance only to show Hangman walking out of the babyface side is some EXCELLENT storytelling.#AEWAllIn #WrestleSky
— TDub says TRANS RIGHTS or GTFO (@twkreviews.bsky.social) 2025-07-13T00:11:59.729Z
I was AMAZED at how many people pointed out small details that showcased just how layered the storytelling was in not just the matches, but the entrances, the celebrations, the betrayals, and so on. The details matter in shows like this, and finding out about all of these, while witnessing others in real-time, just made the event resonate with me even more.
Reason #3 – Women’s Wrestling
As I noted in my “Best AEW Matches” list, women’s wrestling hasn’t always been the focus in the company. If you look at where it is now, compared to where it was in 2019/2020? It’s literally night and day. AEW All In Texas had two big women’s matches to pull off, and I was overjoyed when both were incredible.
I’ll start with Toni Storm vs. Mercedes Mone, because this match had a lot going on with it both on screen and off. On screen, Toni Storm is the most over woman in wrestling. She’s the reigning PWI (Pro Wrestling Illustrated) #1 women’s wrestler…and she might get that title again this year. As for Mone, from the moment she came to AEW, she’s been on a tear not just in the company, but all over the world. By the time this clash happened, she had six championship belts from six different promotions, including New Japan Pro Wrestling, Rev Pro, CMLL, and the TBS Championship. She’s been delivering banger matches and deserves a LOT of credit (alongside Toni and others) for elevating women’s wrestling in AEW.
…off-screen, though, many “haters” (no, not Jamie Hayter) have “voiced their opinions” that Mone is “overrated,” “doesn’t deserve what she has,” and most infamously, “has creative control over her booking, thus, she never loses.”
In order: wrong, wrong, and WRONG!!!!
I don’t get the hate for Mercedes, and it’s pathetic that it’s grown so big, which is why the match with Toni had to deliver…and it absolutely did. Hard-hitting, hilarious, full of passion and skill, these two women DELIVERED in their 25-minute match, and when Toni won…I was actually stunned. Personally, I thought Mone would win, but I was wrong, and I’m fine with being wrong!
These two delivered on the biggest stage, and showed why AEW can easily make the case for the best women’s roster in the world. Speaking of which…
…let’s talk about the Women’s Casino Gauntlet match! The backstory here is that this is “AEW’s match” in many respects since it debuted last year. Earlier this year, the women got their first ever one…but it was very short, and fans, including me, weren’t happy about that. But, AEW was going to run it back at All In Texas…and it was great.
Twelve women did battle in the gauntlet, showing the depths of the roster. Plus, we had “extra help” via Skye Blue, Harley Cameron, and Anna Jay. Yet, in the end, there could only be one winner…and it was the right one.
Yep! The Fallen Goddess Athena won the gauntlet, which is what pretty much EVERYONE wanted. Now, it’s her and Toni Storm on a collision course (no pun intended), and I can’t wait to see what happens next.
The women of AEW bring it every week, as last night’s Dynamite highlighted. Plus, they just brought in new blood via Alex Windsor and Syuri, so things might grow even more from here! You love to see it.
Reason #4 – Presentation and The Crowd
AEW ALL IN: TEXAS WAS A MOVIE 🎬️🍿💥 pic.twitter.com/QfpCKZ5yrt
— Globe Life Field (@GlobeLifeField) July 16, 2025
“A movie,” indeed! AEW All in Texas was designed to be the company’s biggest show of the year in terms of attendance, not to mention importance. As such, they needed to go all out (no pun intended…again…) to make it “feel big.” Oh, they did just that.
I showed you one part of Swerve’s entrance, but that was just one part of a MUCH bigger picture. We had MVP rapping The Hurt Syndicate to the ring, Will Ospreay doing another Assassin’s Creed-inspired entrance, Mercedes Mone riding up in a lowrider, complete with a gown naming all the women she’s beaten during her championship tour, and Kenny Omega brought out freaking druids to help him with his entrance!
The presentation was stunning, and it was so big that AEW compiled all the entrances for you to watch!
However, none of this would matter without the crowd being “invested” throughout the show. Trust me when I say that crowd numbers mean nothing if they’re not reacting. I’ve seen shows with 40K plus people and they’re barely reacting to the wrestling, which is never good.
In contrast, this crowd, which had people from all 50 states and numerous other countries, was invested nearly 100% of the time. They were pumping things up for each match, and even by the time the main event happened, when they had been there at Globe Life Stadium for over 8 HOURS…they were louder than ever. Why? Because they knew they were seeing something special! They didn’t want to “leave early” or something like that, because they knew that if they did, they likely would miss something epic.
The nearly 30,000 crowd helped make the AEW All In Texas special, so to all who were there live, thank you.
Reason #5 – Payoffs
One thing I hate about the hate that All Elite Wrestling gets is “AEW doesn’t tell stories.” Anyone who says that is a troll, a liar, or is just trying to bury the company unfairly. I’ve been watching since Day 1, and there have been PLENTY of epic stories told by the company and its wrestlers. Plus, they love telling stories IN THE RING and not just on the mic.
For me, AEW All In Texas highlighted that in many ways, as there were multiple “in-ring story” moments that helped sell what was going on, and not just in the main event.
In Swerve/Ospreay vs. The Young Bucks, the former was having trouble with the latter because they “weren’t a true tag team,” and they had to help each other be in the right mindset to win. Thus, when they won and stripped the Young Bucks of their EVP status, you could tell that it was an “earned victory.” They were taking bullets for one another in the match so that they didn’t lose, showing that they were as close as any tag team could be, even without having a lot of tag team experience together.
Then, there was the implosion of The Patriarchy, where Nick Wayne betrayed Christian Cage and was about to “end him,” when Cope came out and “saved him” before stating three simple words, “Go Find Yourself.” This was a callback to a previous meeting between the two where Christian told Cope to “F off,” and many feel this will lead to the two tag teaming one last time.
But, obviously, nothing compares to the main event, where Hangman Adam Page had the hopes of basically ALL FANS to try and defeat Jon Moxley and get the AEW men’s world title away from The Death Riders. For nine months, Moxley had been telling people to “step up and beat him,” and no one could. We all knew that Hangman was our “last shot,” and what a shot it was.
Everything paid off here in spectacular fashion. First off, the match was just brutal. It’s not called a “Texas Deathmatch” for nothing! Then, as the Death Riders started to interfere, the allies started to come out. First, it was Ospreay, who was a literal casualty of war. After that came Darby Allin and Bryan Danielson, who hadn’t been seen in months due to the Death Riders action. They cleared the deck, and things seemed to be well…
…until Marina Shafir and the Young Bucks interfered, and Hangman needed help from the one person he couldn’t ask for help from.
Yep. Even after everything Hangman and Swerve had put each other through in their legendary feud, Swerve knew that saving AEW was better than letting it be “ruined” by the man at the top. He belted the Young Bucks, Prince Nana handcuffed Marina, and Hangman took his shot.
What’s important for me personally on this is that every single person who interfered in the match DID NOT TOUCH MOXLEY. They only took out The Death Riders and The Young Bucks. Their purpose was to clear the table, and it was up to Hangman to do what needed to be done. When he got the submission win, and he finally opened the briefcase to show the AEW men’s world title…a belt that hadn’t been seen since WrestleDream last year…well…I’ll let the crowd reaction explain how everyone felt in that moment.
🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹@hangmanpage.bsky.social 🤴#AEW #AEWAllInTexas #Wrestling
— 𝕾𝖆𝖓𝖙𝖔𝖘 ㄒ卄乇 Ꮆㄖ卂ㄒ (@santosallelite.bsky.social) 2025-07-14T17:29:04.630Z
Just about says it all, doesn’t it? AEW All In Texas NEEDED to end this way, with Hangman Adam Page winning and setting a new path for the company going forward. That’s what we got, and we got it in the right way, with a wrestling match that was incredible, and a storyline woven throughout it that showed that the actions of the past and present do matter, and that many can come together to complete a common goal.
I’ve seen incredible PPVs feel “lackluster” afterward because they “didn’t stick the landing.” But not only did AEW All In Texas stick the landing, it helped punctuate the fact that right now, in this period of wrestling history, no one touches AEW when it comes to PPV quality. Period.
So, as I wrap up this piece, what is there left to say? In truth, plenty. I barely got to talk about certain things from the show, like the Kenny/Okada match, or the obvious story building that was done in the show to showcase where the company will go for Forbidden Door in the UK or All Out in Canada. However, I will conclude this piece with one simple point: AEW All In Texas was a lot of fun to watch.
It’s been almost a week since the show aired, and people are still talking about it, reminiscing about the moments that made them FEEL, and what matches were their favorites. This is why AEW is so awesome, because they deliver these kinds of moments often, and this event was just the latest peak that they obtained. So, to quote my favorite wrestling commentator, Excalibur, and put a perfect capper on this love letter to my favorite wrestling company:
“AEW is the home of professional wrestling.”
