Last year Jon Moxley defeated Bryan Danielson at the WrestleDream pay-per-view to win the AEW World Championship for the fourth time in his career. While Moxley has been a top star in AEW since the beginning, fans have been very critical of his current title reign and ongoing storyline with the Death Riders.
Fightful Select reports that they never heard there was a plan for Swerve Strickland to win the AEW World Championship at the Dynasty pay-per-view. It was noted that a while back the word was that Jon Moxley was set for a lengthy run with the AEW World Championship even before he won the belt.
Internally AEW has touted the success of the Death Rider’s storyline as well as Moxley’s title reign, and it’s being said that there’s a disconnect with the online fans. AEW claims that the company’s live+dvr have climbed throughout the year with Jon Moxley as AEW Champion, and they peaked with the Moxley vs. Cope street fight.
It was also noted that Moxley retaining the title at Dynasty was not Bryan Danielson’s call as every final decision regarding what plays out on screen comes down to Tony Khan. One person even joked that if Bryan Danielson had that much say when it comes to creative then he never would have won the AEW World Championship last year.