VIDEO: Former NWA Champion Makes AEW Debut

Nice to meet you. Like almost any other form of entertainment, one of the most exciting things that you can see in wrestling is a surprise. It is a little bit easier to present in wrestling as you can have someone show up for a match out of nowhere. If they happen to make a big impression right out of the blocks, it’s even better. That was the case on Wednesday night.

While WWE and AEW get most of the attention in the wrestling world, there are other promotions out there. However, there are only so many ways to present wrestling at the moment due to the Coronavirus. That means some of the stars from other promotions might be able to make some appearances elsewhere, which took place in a nice way during a big wrestling show.

During this week’s AEW Dynamite, former NWA Television Champion Ricky Starks debuted for the promotion, answering an open challenge from TNT Champion Cody. Cody defeated Starks to retain the title in his third successful championship defense. After Dynamite was over, AEW President Tony Khan announced that Starks had signed with the promotion.

Thank you @starkmanjones for a great effort tonight. While he didn’t win the open challenge & the TNT Title, he opened a lot of eyes on #AEWDynamite. Thank you @CodyRhodes & Arn for nominating a great challenger; I was glad to sanction the match. Now: congrats Ricky you earned it pic.twitter.com/K9dTVRlv1I

— Tony Khan (@TonyKhan) June 18, 2020

That’s how you make a star. Check out Starks’ debut:

Opinion: This worked really well and AEW did a good job of recreating the magic of John Cena’s United States Title Open Challenge back in 2015. There is something amazing about finding out who is coming through that curtain and if it is someone like Starks, who was quite the surprise, it makes things even better. Thankfully Starks is sticking around too, because he really is someone who could go somewhere on a bigger stage.

What do you think of Starks? How will he do in AEW? Let us know in the comments below.

Thomas Hall has been a wrestling fan for over thirty years and has seen over 50,000 wrestling matches. He has also been a wrestling reviewer since 2009 with over 5,000 full shows covered. You can find his work at kbwrestlingreviews.com, or check out his- Amazon author page with 30 wrestling books. Get the latest and greatest in professional wrestling news by signing up for our daily email newsletter. Just look below for “GET EXCLUSIVE UPDATES” to sign up. Thank you for reading!