AEW WrestleDream 2025: Biggest Winners & Losers

AEW WrestleDream 2025 was a marathon of wrestling, even by AEW standards, which leaves us plenty to talk about in the cold light of day. There were title matches, big money matches, Bush-era "enhanced interrogation" techniques, elderly scorpions, Opps turned bad, and, of course, lots of winners and lots of losers.

The following will not really deal with what happened on last night's PPV. Our steadfast results crew has already handled that. This also won't really get into things like "good" or "bad," "love" or "hate," or the like, as the Wrestling Inc. Staff has already dived deep and come back with plenty of well-put thoughts on that matter. Instead, I will be breaking down who came out of WrestleDream 2025 looking like a winner and who came out looking like a loser.

Sometimes a winner is a loser, like in the case of Darby Allin, who might be running out of ways to shock the audience. Sometimes losers are winners, like in the case of Konosuke Takeshita and Kazuchika Okada, who quite frankly had more to gain in loss than in victory last night. Sometimes a winner really is a winner, like in the case of Jack Perry, who delivered in a make-or-break position in St. Louis.

Enough teasing, though, let's get into the nitty-gritty and break down the winners and losers from AEW WrestleDream 2025.

Katsuyori Shibata is an elder statesman whose medical issues are well-documented and thoroughly memed. Samoa Joe is talking about retirement in the same way Donald Trump keeps talking about whether or not he's gonna make it to heaven. If there is anyone who has the most to gain from The Opps turning heel and attacking the AEW World Champion, it's Powerhouse Hobbs.

Hobbs has had a rocky road in AEW so far, first in Team Taz, and then getting lost in the shuffle of the ever-growing Don Callis Family, but his tenure with The Opps has seen the former AEW TNT Champion remind the audience why Jim Ross saw so many dollar signs when he first debuted in the company 5 years ago. The attack on Hangman Page now makes him the healthiest member of a top heel faction, when before he was simply the workhorse of a tentpole undercard attraction. It doesn't feel like Hobbs will be stuck defending the AEW Trios Titles on pre-shows much longer, and while Joe might still be the main event heavy hitter of the group, it doesn't change the fact that Hobbs will once again have a chance to prove himself against the Unified Champion or even have a more substantial run with the TNT Title. The turn gives Hobbs a lot of options, and each one of them is a fairly bright future, assuming the group capitalizes on the momentum they have from Saturday's shocker, and they finally let him off the chain.

Darby Allin and Jon Moxley told an enthralling story over the last 3-4 months, full of violence, bloodshed, from which neither man's ears will ever be the same, and I really don't have the urge to see either guy again for another 3-4 months.

For the last year, AEW has been consumed by Jon Moxley's quest to turn AEW into a roster made of iron and steel, and the last 3 or so months have been Darby chipping away at that armor. Moxley made a promise: No retreat, no surrender. On Saturday, Moxley stood naked in front of the AEW audience, and like he did at All In: Texas, he once again surrendered. If it were up to me, Moxley would be fed to the wolves, and his Death Riders would give him a little taste of "blood in, blood out," and send him packing for a while.

Darby's in a trickier situation because, by all metrics, he is now "The Guy" in AEW, and I am already sick of him. He conquered Moxley, like he conquered Mount Everest, thanks to some help from his guardian angel, Sting, who also passed on his trademark bat to the former AEW TNT Champion. I've seen Darby deliver a million different kinds of punishment. There is literally no Dick Cheney-approved enhanced interrogation tactic that I haven't seen him either inflict or have inflicted on him. There comes a point where it gets repetitive, and no amount of sociopathic creativity can salvage it. His road from the literal mountain top to the metaphorical valley has literally been paved by blood and fire. I really don't know where you go from here. 

Does he really need the AEW World Title? Do titles even matter to a guy like Darby? There's something a little hollow about the idea that Darby is about to go from saving the soul of AEW and conquering the natural world to...winning a title? Darby's in a weirdly existential place for a seemingly made man in wrestling, and while that leaves plenty of questions, it doesn't change the fact that it feels more like the start of a denouement than his crowning moment.

I went into WrestleDream terrified that we were about to see Kazuchika Okada and Konosuke Takeshita become wacky mismatched tag team champions who can't stand each other. It's a tried and true trope, but it feels like the Unified Champion and the newly minted IWGP World Heavyweight Champion have better things to do than bicker with each other while they squash The Gunns or someone.

Technically, everyone won on Saturday, as Brodido's underdog run with the tag titles now includes a win over two bona fide stars. Okada might not be the same "Rainmaker" he was in the 2010s, but a win over Okada is still a win over Okada, and doubly so of the new IWGP Champ, Takeshita. Tensions have been brewing between the two Don Callis Family members, and the choice to have the cracks in their bond cost them the AEW tag titles was one that made everyone look good. It's just wrestling 101 that a loss should make me say, "Man, I gotta see what's next for those losers," and Saturday's tag match did just that.

It doesn't matter if it's Okada or it's Takeshita, but either of these men leaving Don Callis's sweaty clutches will be a win for AEW, and let's face it, humanity in general.

It is an unfortunate fact of the "Ultimo Mone" gimmick that many champions will be sacrificed at the altar of the TBS Champion's glory, but there was something so unceremonious about the way the Interim ROH Women's Television Champion was thrown into the mix. Sure, she has history with Mercedes. Sure, she was already an audible due to an injury to Red Velvet. Sure, the show needed a filler match because Kota Ibushi got hurt. It doesn't change the fact that the build to a fairly big title-for-title match was nil. It was an open challenge that was announced roughly 24-36 hours before the PPV, about as unceremonious as one can get.

It was a good match. I'm not sure there was a single bad match all night. But this was definitely one that left me rubbing my chin at the result. I don't know where Mina goes from here. Sure, she's technically freed from the Interim Title to do whatever she wants, but she's got a lot of rebuilding to do after such an absent-minded display. I think that's what really rubs me the wrong way about this match, it just kinda made Mina look headstrong and foolish. Wrestling is admittedly full of headstrong fools, but it still felt like a lot of money was left on the table by just throwing this match out there with little notice.

Jurassic Express as a unit won on Saturday, but Luchasaurus is a very tall, athletic guy who seems to "know his role," so to speak, so I'm not sure he'll ever be in danger of wrestling not needing him. Jack Perry, however, was in a make-or-break position on Saturday and came out proving why everyone in AEW is so determined to make the "Beverly Hills 90210" scion work.

Perry is the definition of "a project," someone who came into AEW with tremendous potential, and who is slowly being molded into a singles star. His time as "Scapegoat" did more harm than good, some through his fault, and some simply through company missteps like playing the backstage footage of him getting Punk'd out (pun intended). His return and reunion with Luchasaurus had fans cautiously optimistic, but after watching him deliver the same kind of exciting tag action, though as a much thoroughly matured performer, was already enough to buy him some goodwill for his bus-driving days, but once Kenny Omega showed up, it really cemented that Perry could still be that hope for the future that AEW saw in Jungle Boy. He's not out of the wilderness yet, but he delivered just enough to show that this is now a tag team comprised of a man and his dinosaur, as opposed to a boy.

I can't explain it (but I'll try, after all that's kinda what I do here), but Eddie Kingston seems lost. Maybe he's just waiting for Continental Classic season, so he can show what he can do, but it feels like the former AEW Triple Crown Champion is completely unmotivated. His promos have no fire, and he's just kinda hanging around Hook.

It feels like every year could be "Eddie Kingston's Year," except for this one. He's a natural babyface, Dusty Rhodes from Yonkers, and yet AEW seems unable to find a way to truly capitalize on this longtime fan favorite.

Again, his return from injury is still new. He might be healing. He might just be hanging out. It doesn't change the fact that Kingston seems rudderless at the moment, and AEW can either make that text, and give him a story about being a tumbleweed in the wind or they can give him something to do. It also doesn't quite help Hook to have a monument to squandered potential cheering him on, so it might be in Hook's best interests for AEW to give Kingston something to do, too, lest he and Hook begin to feel like that episode of "South Park" where Stan Marsh hangs out with a drifter pretending to be his future self. So, unless Kingston is acting as some kind of grand ruse to get Hook to stay away from drugs, he should probably get something to do, quick.