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Last year, All Elite Wrestling's first pay-per-view was Double or Nothing. Since then, the company has grown considerably and the card for Double or Nothing 2020 is proof of its expansion.
This year, the TNT Championship was set to debut, a Casino Ladder Match was scheduled to determine a future No. 1 contender and The Elite and Inner Circle were on a collision course in a Stadium Stampede Match.
Even during the COVID-19 pandemic with no fans in attendance, this show had massive potential to be a crowd-pleasing spectacle.
Now that it's finished, was it mostly a success, or did some matches fail to live up to the hype?
Let's assess the damage and pinpoint some of the standout pros and cons of the night.
Presented in order of appearance, here are the highlights and low points of AEW Double or Nothing 2020.
Tune into TNT on Wednesday nights at 8 p.m. ET to catch all the action of All Elite Wrestling: Dynamite.
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- (Buy In) No. 1 Contender's Match: Best Friends defeated Private Party by pinfall.
- Brian Cage won the Casino Ladder Match.
- MJF defeated Jungle Boy by pinfall.
- Cody defeated Lance Archer by pinfall to win the TNT Championship.
- Kris Statlander defeated Penelope Ford by pinfall.
- Dustin Rhodes defeated Shawn Spears by pinfall.
- No Disqualification, No Count-Out Match: Hikaru Shida defeated Nyla Rose by pinfall to win the AEW Women's World Championship.
- Jon Moxley defeated Brodie Lee by referee stoppage to retain the AEW World Championship.
- Stadium Stampede Match: The Elite defeated The Inner Circle by pinfall.
AEW Double or Nothing 2020 results
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Some segments on this show weren't wholly positive or negative, but had both good and bad moments still worth touching on with a more in-depth analysis.
For instance, Best Friends vs. Private Party was a decent opener to whet the appetite, but nothing you have to go back and check out if you missed it.
Kris Statlander beating Penelope Ford was the right call, as she's the more serious competitor between the two.
It was nice to see AEW acknowledge the passings of Shad Gaspard and Hana Kimura.
Jon Moxley vs. Mr. Brodie Lee would have been better if it had been No Disqualification, as the best part of the match was the Paradigm Shift through the entrance ramp. Ultimately, only having that moment as a standout made the rest of it feel underwhelming, as these two are capable of a better brawl down the line.
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Ladder matches are so fundamentally fun that they're rarely ever not a highlight of any event. Such was the case with the Casino Ladder Match that opened this show.
The addition of intervals for entrants could have been problematic, but worked rather well. Instead of feeling like a waste of time until the last competitor joined, everyone kept up a good pace.
That final mystery participant was Brian Cage—a welcome surprise and addition to the roster. He is massive and towers over most on the roster.
With this win, he should be one of the most dangerous threats to the world title, which further legitimizes how important this match was.
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There are lots of young, talented stars in AEW who are already building a strong foundation for their future. Two with the most firm launching pads are MJF and Jungle Boy, who continue to have consistent chemistry.
Every time they step in the ring, it feels like the early work of a future world title feud, rather than two rookies who are still trying to figure things out.
They're already rock solid and this match was no exception to that, both in the ring and as a showcase of their characters.
Jungle Boy lost, but put up a great fight. Meanwhile, MJF had his moments of being a total jerk, like when he faked a leg injury.
This could have easily been a pointless filler match if it weren't starring two dedicated professionals who made sure to give it their all. Thankfully, they did just that.
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Cody's developed a strong track record of having quality matches on these shows that feature more psychology than most other performers in AEW.
Amid a sea of matches that are pure athleticism, it's refreshing to watch something that has more story and depth to it like this tournament final.
Lance Archer exhibited raw power while Cody fought back from the underdog spot with heart and determination, just as they had set up ahead of time with Arn Anderson's view on what was to come.
Ultimately, that grit gave The American Nightmare the edge to come out victorious, which was the best call AEW could have made.
As Cody isn't supposed to be challenging for the AEW World Championship anymore, being the inagural TNT champion allows him to put his stamp on that title, instead.
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While there's been a running theme of Shawn Spears having issues with the Rhodes family for the past year, not a lot of effort was put into building this particular match heading into the show.
That could have been forgiven if the end result would have made up for it, but that wasn't the case.
Instead of the tease that Dustin Rhodes wouldn't show up leading somewhere interesting, he simply came out from behind Spears, which was flat and uneventful.
The rest of the match was silly nonsense of Spears being stripped and wrestling with his butt crack showing. That type of comedy is hit or miss and this was more of a whiff.
Tthe same segment would undoubtedly draw intense ire if it were to happen on a WWE program, but it's likely many fans will let it slide here just because it's AEW, which isn't a fair comparison.
To cap it off, giving Rhodes the win may be a long-term mistake. Beating Spears doesn't do much for him, but it does damage The Chairman's credibility.
The more losses Spears takes like this—against people he could easily beat without upsetting the roster hierarchy—the harder it will ever be to take him seriously as a title contender down the line.
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The No Disqualification, No Count-Out match between Hikaru Shida and Nyla Rose itself wasn't a must-see affair, but it did accomplish a significant goal in crowning a new champion.
Rose hasn't held the title an exorbitant amount of time, but she had already run through the roster in a way that left her with little options other than redoing a feud with Kris Statlander. No other babyfaces in the women's division were better suited to dethrone her than Shida.
It was only a matter of time Shida would win that title, too, so it makes sense for that to have happened at a pay-per-view like this. Now that she's toppled the biggest threat in the division, she's already established herself a strong champion.
Assuming Britt Baker is able to overcome her injuries by September 5, it's likely Shida will feud with Rose, Penelope Ford and others until All Out, where she'll drop the title to the good doctor.
That's seemingly the natural order of things and for that to happen, Shida had to beat Rose here.
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This was absolutely ludicrous, completely ridiculous and absolutely entertaining from start to finish.
The entrances were hokey, but a fun way to set the tone for what was to come.
The visual of the ring on the football field was captivating, even without an audience in attendance. That also allowed some normal wrestling action to take place amid the other chaos.
All the gags played into the gimmick and were worth a laugh, like Matt Jackson going the full 100 yards by suplexing Sammy Guevara for a touchdown, Chris Jericho challenging a pinfall and wanting a replay and Adam Page using the line marker over The Painmaker.
By far, this was the biggest highlight of the night and a fantastic end to the show.
Anthony Mango is the owner of the wrestling website Smark Out Moment and the host of the podcast show Smack Talk on YouTube, iTunes and Stitcher. You can follow him on Facebook and elsewhere for more.
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