Kenny Omega will team with The Young Bucks on tonight’s All Out go-home edition of AEW Dynamite to face United Empire (IWGP United States Heavyweight Champion Will Ospreay and NJPW Strong Openweight Tag Team Champions Mark Davis and Kyle Fletcher of Aussie Open). The winners will advance to All Out to face the winner of Friday’s AEW Rampage match between The Dark Order and The Best Friends, with the winners at All Out crowned the inaugural AEW World Trios Champions.
Dynamite will mark the next chapter in the Omega vs. Ospreay rivalry, and the first time they’ve shared a ring since a NJPW tag team match in December 2018, where Omega and Kota Ibushi defeated Ospreay and Hiroshi Tanahashi. Omega and Ospreay took shots at each other after last week’s AEW Dynamite, as seen in the video below, and fans have made sure to keep the rivalry going on social media when they wrestlers aren’t. Omega recently spoke with Sports Illustrated’s Justin Barrasso and talked about the feud, and their differences.
“We look at the business in two very different ways,” Omega said. “The way we go about our matches is different, and even what we want to leave behind in wrestling is different. We’re both shooting to be the top performer wherever we go, but we go about it in very different ways.”
Omega said he and Ospreay do not share much in common, on and off the air. Ospreay genuinely believes he is the better performer, and they will finally have the chance to make their own case tonight on AEW Dynamite. Omega looked ahead to locking up with Ospreay.
“There may be some tense moments between myself and Will,” Omega said. “I’d like to test him, and I’m sure he’d like to test me. I also would like to test myself and see if I’m really in a position where I can hang with the best. I’ve had one match [since returning from injury] to feel it out, which was a very unique scenario. I came back to AEW after a long hiatus and wrestled against three of the top luchador wrestlers in the world in a four-sided ring. Normally when I am testing myself against top luchadores in AAA, we’re in the six-sided ring. I’m still determining where I am, but I am going to push myself as far as I need to in order to keep up with him—and I am going to push myself hard enough to send a message to Will Ospreay that he’s just not quite there yet.”
Omega was asked what Ospreay is lacking in his quest to be a top performer.
“Will has this false sense of self,” Omega said. “That’s reinforced partly by some people in the wrestling media, like Dave Meltzer, who I believe overrates his matches just a little. I can take blame for that—I broke the [ratings] scale. Since I broke the scale, the ratings have been all over the place. It’s hard to make heads or tails of how good a match really is, and that’s creating a divide. The rating system used to be something that was prestigious. Now, should I be proud of a four-star match? Or should I be proud of a five or a six? If Will gets something that’s over a five, and I didn’t enjoy my experience watching the match, do I want a match like that? For Will to put so much stock into that is a sign of his age, his experience and his maturity level. If he focused more on where he needs to evolve and grow, he’d come closer to becoming what he wants to be in wrestling. Essentially, that’s me. He’s just not close enough yet. And I’m still here.”
For those who missed it, you can click here for recent Twitter beef with Omega, Ospreay and a WWE Hall of Famer.
Stay tuned to WrestlingHeadlines.com for more. Below is the aforementioned promo:
Kenny Omega cuts a scathing promo after #AEWDynamite on @WillOspreay. @KennyOmegamanX pic.twitter.com/cu5Aez9alr
— Paul Duncan (@TheFootPaul) August 25, 2022
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