Biggest Winners And Losers Of The Week — 4/21/2026

A couple weeks ago, we debuted our new feature, Winners and Losers of the Week. Well, a lot has happened since then, including AEW Dynasty and WWE WrestleMania 42! And yes, you can click those links and read about the winners and losers from both those events on their own — but who won (or lost) the last week overall?

That's the question we here at Wrestling Inc. aim to find out in this column. Did WWE or AEW come on on top over the last — oh, let's call it nine days? Did anyone or anything see their stock particularly raised or lowered? Here are your WINC winners and losers for the week of 4/21/2026!

It's been a rough few days for Kenny Omega's hyper-protected finisher. First, MJF technically kicked out of it at AEW Dynasty, though admittedly after being down for several seconds while a referee got into position to count. Then at WrestleMania, Jade Cargill broke it out during her match with Rhea Ripley, with Michael Cole referring to it as the "Sandstorm." And then Ripley kicked out of it, too.

Now, it should be mentioned that Omega — never one to fan the flames of tribalism — seems to be fine with Cargill using the move, and it did technically get a WrestleMania moment, if one cares about that kind of thing. But we're not used to two people kicking out of the One-Winged Angel in the space of eight days. At least at Dynasty there was a good reason for it; at WrestleMania, Cargill used it as almost a transitional move, though it remains to be seen how often she'll bust it out. All in all, you have to admit it's lost a little bit of luster this week, and seems just a little bit less unstoppable than it once did.

This one is obvious, but sometimes winners are. And when you beat Andrade El Idolo at Dynasty and win a world championship in your hometown, with the locker room emptying to celebrate with you and a legend like Sting giving you his official endorsement (not that Allin didn't have that already, but whatever) it's hard to be anything else.

Will Allin have a terribly long reign as world champ? Probably not. Most AEW fans are of the belief this will be a short run on top for Allin, who will quickly drop the title back to MJF. But AEW clearly wanted to have their own version of a WrestleMania moment this week, and Allin delivered that feel-good story — another of the vaunted pillars capturing championship gold. Allin probably feels pretty good too, a loyal AEW soldier being rewarded for literally planting the company's flag on the highest of all peaks. You might not agree with the decision to crown Darby on an only-a-little-random Wednesday TV broadcast, but you can't deny him as a winner of the week.

No matter how anyone tries to spin it, WrestleMania Saturday was not a good night for WWE — at least not in terms of public perception. The matches were too short, the ads were too long, and the main event made no sense. Afterward, the internet wrestling community was ablaze with criticism, with many calling out the show for having a soulless, corporate feel to it while highlighting celebrities like Jelly Roll and IShowSpeed over actual wrestlers. There was also a strong sense of disconnect between WrestleMania 42 Night 1 and the build leading up to it, as though the two things simply had nothing to do with each other.

It's often been said that you can tell when WWE has a rough night by the frequency of Tony Khan's promotional posts, and he sure was posting on Saturday. For at least one night, AEW seemed like everything it advertises itself to be: the home of real professional wrestling in an industry where the alternative is Pat McAfee. For that to happen on the first night of WWE's supposed biggest event of the year was nothing short of disastrous, no matter what the attendance figure actually was.

And yet, here we are. For all that WrestleMania Night 1 felt like a PR nightmare, Night 2 (and the "Raw" after WrestleMania) brought WWE immediately back to the winner's section, and frankly, it's going to be very easy for a lot of people to forget that Night 1 even happened.

Night 2 was a triumph in many ways, most notably in the opener — which saw the full ascension of white-hot new megastar Oba Femi, who seems to have retired the controversial Brock Lesnar — and the main event, which was almost universally agreed to be one of the best wrestling matches WWE had put on in recent memory. You can dispute that if you want, but the fact of the matter is that on Saturday, WWE wasn't even a wrestling promotion anymore, and on Sunday, CM Punk and Roman Reigns put on a spectacular wrestling match that has functionally laid those accusations to rest (at least for now). Add to that the fact that the "Raw" after WrestleMania was pretty good overall, featuring numerous "NXT" call-ups and elevating rising star Jacob Fatu into the pole position for Reigns' newly-won World Heavyweight Championship, and Night 1 feels like a distant memory, even if the criticisms it garnered are still entirely valid.

It's all about perception, and from a perception standpoint, WWE is already back on top after stumbling briefly on Saturday. You didn't see any Tony Khan promotional posts Sunday or Monday night, and there's a reason for that.