Biggest Winners And Losers Of The Week — 6/30/2026

Another week has gone by in this glorious thing we call the wrestling industry, and you know what that means — it's once again time for Wrestling Inc. to name the winners and losers of the last seven days!

And what a last seven days it's been. This past weekend saw no fewer than four major events — WWE Night of Champions, TNA Slammiversary, WWE NXT Great American Bash, and AEW x NJPW Forbidden Door. Now you may have noticed that two of those events — Night of Champions and Forbidden Door — already got their own winners and losers columns. That's not to say we're staying away from those events completely, but if you were wondering why Sami Zayn isn't a winner here, for example, it's because he was already a winner for Night of Champions. We try not to step on each other's toes around these parts.

With that caveat aside, who ultimately rose to the top this week, and who came up short? Here are your WINC winners and losers for the week of 6/30/26!

While many fans may be excited for this new era of Solo Sikoa, he didn't exactly have the best week after interfering on the June 22 edition of "WWE Raw," where he hit his brother, Jimmy Uso, with a Samoan Spike to cost him his match against LA Knight. Thanks to his involvement, on last week's episode of the blue brand, Sikoa's remaining MFTs, Talla Tonga and Tonga Loa, told him they were out, and packed their bags and left.

Interfering in the match to prove to Knight that he wasn't involved in World Heavyweight Champion Roman Reigns' latest iteration of the Bloodline also did nothing for Sikoa. On "WWE SmackDown," he attempted to align himself with Knight in a fight against Reigns, the Usos, and Jacob Fatu over on "Raw," but Knight wasn't having it, still not believing Sikoa wouldn't just go crawling back to Reigns. "The Megastar" left Sikoa high and dry, saying he preferred to do things on his own, and left Sikoa in the ring.

The now-former leader of the MFTs has no one to back him up. Not his family, not an ally in Knight, and seemingly, not in Royce Keys, who he had been attempting to recruit to his now-defunct faction for weeks. In a backstage segment on "SmackDown," Keys just laughed at Sikoa, and asked if he was aware that Fatu would be coming for him. For a few weeks now, Fatu had been trying to convince Sikoa to rejoin them on "Raw," but Sikoa was never receptive.

On Friday, Sikoa was left with nothing, but he's still not going down without a fight. On Monday's edition of "Raw," following Night of Champions, he invaded the red brand to attack Jimmy with the Samoan Spike, once again coming to the aid of Knight following his loss. Things could be looking up for Sikoa, but Knight was pretty adamant he was going to work alone, so only time will tell whether or not Sikoa is going to have to continue his search for a new family to help take down the Bloodline.

Despite getting another one up on the Usos, it was revealed that Fatu is headed to "SmackDown" to "finish it" with Sikoa, by order of "The Tribal Chief." If he and Knight can't get on the same page by the time of that confrontation, it could spell more bad news for Sikoa.

Written by Daisy Ruth

WWE NXT has something really special in Kendal Grey, and it's nice to see them strike while the iron is hot. I am not the only one singing the praises of the former EVOLVE Women's Champion. She was last year's PWI Rookie of the Year. The NXT Women's division can be very hit or miss when it comes to pulling the trigger. It's easy to get lost in the chase on a show where development is often prioritized over glory.

Grey is entering rarified air with Oba Femi, where she's rocketing to the main event of "NXT" after her rookie year. She has the skills to back it up too. Her match with Lola Vice was an epic clash, and one that really played to Grey's strengths tremendously. Some NXT Champions are stars, and some are just local heroes, but it is undeniable that Grey is a future star. She was given a miserable task, main eventing a middling show, on a day when every promotion was running some kind of big show, and she still found a way to stand out. The babyface fire of Sting and the intensity of a Kurt Angle — she's a one-of-a-kind star, and Sunday marked the beginning of her era.

Written by Ross Berman

There will always be a time for a changing of guards at the World Championship level. No one can be expected to hold the title forever, and that certainly wouldn't be healthy for any corner of the business. But that doesn't change the fact that it can truly suck to see some title changes, as a fan, let alone how it must feel to be the one losing the title. 

Santana lost the title to Nic Nemeth at Slammiversary, ending his second reign with rumors that his contract is due to expire in mid-July. It may well be the case that Nemeth is taking the title on as Santana finishes up with the company. And this is hardly to say that Nemeth is a bad choice for the world title. He's actually a very good choice at maybe any other time. 

It just felt as though the way Santana lost was a little flimsy, collapsing into a Danger Zone less than 15 minutes into the match when he had it won. There were ways he could have lost that might have landed better, but honestly it didn't feel as though Nemeth would be or should have been the one to win the title from Santana. He should have lost to a younger talent in the vein of Leon Slater, passing the baton rather than just losing to an established main event heel. This just felt like a loss. And unfortunately that's a loss for Santana and for TNA this week.

Written by Max Everett

Despite the criticism surrounding the 12-man Steel Cage Match at AEW x NJPW Forbidden Door 2026, it turned out to be a refreshing change of pace on a show filled with mostly straight wrestling matches. There were orange slices, Lio Rush in a hocky equipment bag, Kevin Knight exploding and falling to his near demise — it really did have a lot to offer. But besides Mark Briscoe getting himself a shot at MJF's AEW World Championship by winning the match, one of the biggest winners of the match was Andrade El Idolo.

I understand that Andrade was on the losing team, but out of the six men who lost the match, he arguably gained more from losing than he would from winning. There had been subtle teases for a number of weeks that Andrade wasn't happy in The Don Callis Family, with Callis himself having the attention span of a small child in a toy store with an unlimited gift card. He has been looked over in favor of Jake Doyle's arrival, the rise of Mark Davis, and most recently the acquisition of Kevin Knight, who was promised a title shot before Andrade was; this was the conclusion to that story and it worked perfectly.

There was a lot of trepidation surrounding Andrade's return to AEW in the fall of last year, but he has been one of the best signings AEW has made over the past year. His gimmick essentially being "I'm a sexy Latino man who can do whatever he wants" has gotten over big with the fans, but it did feel a little out of place within The Don Callis Family. In a similar fashion to what happened with Konosuke Takeshita, he got over organically with the fans which goes against the philosophy of Callis' group where he wants to take all the glory, and now that he's broken away from them, he can be free to flirt with every woman he sees, take his pants off as much as he wants, and wrestle a style that is going to get the right sort of reactions because he's now a babyface.

As for what's next, I don't think he's winning the AEW World Championship anytime soon, especially now that Will Ospreay has his Wembley main event. However, he has a built-in feud with MJF already set up, which will likely feature an AEW World Championship match in the coming weeks. This puts him in a great position heading into the back-end of the year.

Written by Sam Palmer 

You might be asking why Yota Tsuji is placed in the loser section of this entire thing given that he's the current IWGP Heavyweight Champion and is one of the top stars in New Japan Pro Wrestling. That doesn't sound like a loser, and he isn't, but there is something he might have been a bit off-base about.

Tsuji infamously boycotted the recent AEW x NJPW Forbidden Door 2026 pay-per-view, and has been very vocal about the partnership between All Elite Wrestling and the promotion he calls home. He feels like it's a one-way street that only benefits AEW, he doesn't think the IWGP Heavyweight Championship has been treated well on AEW programming at all, and thinks that the only way to restore the historic lineage to the title is by keeping it in Japan and keeping any and all AEW wrestlers away from it. If they want a New Japan title, everything else is on offer, but if you want his title, you have to be under a New Japan contract. You do have to give him credit for sticking by what he believes in, but considering how Forbidden Door actually went, Tsuji might have gotten this one wrong.

Forbidden Door, like many AEW pay-per-views, has been critically acclaimed, and a number of NJPW stars got the chance to shine on the night. It wasn't as much of a one-way street as he might have thought it would have been, and it does make you think that if Tsuji was part of the show, he would have probably benefited more than most New Japan stars. Tony Khan has stated many times he is a fan of Tsuji, and is the type of guy who would probably agree with Tsuji's vision of what the IWGP Heavyweight Championship should be, so he wouldn't have had to defend it to begin with.

Tsuji would have likely gotten a high-profile opponent that he would have beaten because he's the champion to keep him strong, and his comments would have also made his match one that had a fair bit of story going into it. It wouldn't need to be "Brand Warfare," but it would have played up that competitive nature well, and Tsuji boycotting an event that not only went extremely well, but would have been a huge platform for him to show AEW fans that NJPW is still a company with something to offer, just seems like a missed chance for the guy.

You have to respect a guy who stands by what he believes in, but the best champions never leave money on the table, and in Tsuji's case, his pride might have gotten in the way of a game-changing night.

Written by Sam Palmer

Sunday's Forbidden Door was about as perfect as you could get to a bang-for-buck professional wrestling experience. Not everyone will agree (there were two other shows on Sunday and an additional event on Saturday) and that's okay. But personally, Forbidden Door delivered everything one could really want from a wrestling show. The Young Bucks, Mistico and Mascara Dorada, and Shingo Takagi and Titan staged a really fun three-way tag match. That was then followed by Kenny Omega versus Zack Sabre Jr.. It should be a given that was a great contest, even if not the best work either man are capable of putting on; their perfectly fine is better than most's very good. 

That was then followed by a bloody battle between Bandido and Jon Moxley, Bandido being an explosive, endearing babyface luchador with the strength of a man twice his size, and Moxley being one of wrestling's holy trinity since 2015. Bandido wore white, and Moxley is Moxley, so that was always going to be bloody. It just helped things along that it was also bloody good. 

Shota Umino versus PAC was a good wrestling match, even if personally it was one of the less interesting affairs on the card. Then came Thekla and Starlight Kid, the most Forbidden Door feeling match of them all as part of a feud between the AEW Women's Champion and the entirety of STARDOM, chief of all President Taro Okada. Not only was that a brilliant match in itself. But then Thekla brought even more Forbidden Door spirit and unadulterated wrestling villainy to rip Starlight Kid's mask off – shout out to Rick Knox for being on the spot to cover her face – and beat Okada with it at ringside. Pure insanity in the best way. 

Jay White returned to set up a feud with the Dogs. That's Bullet Club legacy stuff, which is cool. Maya World and Mercedes Mone in the Women's Owen Hart Cup final followed that, and stole the show as far as this writer was concerned. World made a star of herself, Mone is headed to Wembley, and it was a great journey to get to those results. 

The cage match between Team Briscoe and DCMJF was unhinged violence in a circular cage. It took some getting used to but the bout itself was just half an hour of ridiculous enjoyment. And then the main event was Will Ospreay and Swerve Strickland wrestling what truly felt like a crescendo. 

Value in quantity and quality. That was Forbidden Door.

Written by Max Everett