Before I get into this column, I want to make it clear that I like MJF. I think he is immensely talented, a prodigy in the true sense of the term. His promos can be excellent. He’s had some of the best matches in AEW history, including my frontrunner for Match of the Year against Bryan Danielson at Revolution. He is the biggest homegrown star AEW has ever built, and he’s earned his spot at the top of any AEW cards now and in the future with the great work he’s done in the past.
The problem is what he’s done in the past is so far removed from what he’s doing now.
He’s just so fucking lame.
The skits with Adam Cole are lame. His story about making his first real friend is lame. His jokes about his heel-of-the-month challenger are lame. Maxwell Jacob Friedman, AEW’s top star and World Champion, is a lame person.
The Adam Cole story makes sense when you write it down on paper. This career heel, who literally calls himself the Devil while quoting The Usual Suspects, gets into a close-knit friendship with a high-tier babyface. The tension grows as the audience wonders how things will play out.
Will MJF stab Cole in the back like he’s done to so many others in the past?
Does Cole see the turn coming and string MJF along?
Is Cole the actual villain of the story, using this friendship to steal the World Title from around MJF’s waist?
In the buildup to All In Wembley, I was bought into the feud because there was genuine anticipation of who would turn on the other. I was bought in because while the story had silly elements, I felt like I knew a deadly serious side would come.
That didn’t happen.
Adam Cole and MJF are friends, feuding with Roderick Strong and The Kingdom, who have all become cartoon characters in the process. It’s all a joke, a joke clogging up the World Championship. Meanwhile, there are more serious feuds in the undercard – Swerve Strickland vs. Hangman Page, Bryan Danielson vs. Ricky Starks, Kenny Omega vs. Konosuke Takeshita – that are just as over on TV and PPV. There are no sing-a-longs and skits, just pro wrestling logic and great professional wrestling. Yet the crowd cares all the same. Huh, how about that?
There’s also the fact that MJF’s comedy has been painfully unfunny. These skits have the comedy stylings of a middling mid-aughts Ryan Reynolds movie that you burn two hours watching on Comedy Central. All the worse, these skits remind me of NXT. If you didn’t know any better, you would think they were a part of the same show.
If you disagree, go ahead and tell me this. What is the difference between this skit of Adam Cole and MJF at a Chinese restaurant:
https://youtu.be/j2Pj-4DcHng?si=Z1Z8MpGhB7cRAcJA
And this skit of Io Shirai and Zoey Stark eating sushi?
What’s the difference between this skit of Cole and MJF playing dodgeball with kids:
https://youtu.be/QO6O-bc98g8?si=fD_tJ_anh8ryCbA_
And this skit of Jacy Jayne giving Thea Hail a makeover?
Nothing to do with wrestling. You can barely call it comedy.
His in-ring promos have also gotten hard to watch. MJF’s recent attempts to get nicknames like “Tofu” for Jay White and “Talentless Taint” for Juice Robinson over feel like The Rock post-peak. It reeks of the Jerry Lawler Joke Book. For a guy who has been witty and cutting in the past, his current work feels mailed in and lazy.
The worst part of all of this is that this seems to be MJF’s preferred direction. There was a comment he made at the WrestleDream press conference – after he beat The Righteous in a handicap comedy match – that made it so clear what the issue was.
MJF immediately calls out a reporter who praised his match but called it a "gimmick" match. Max thinks wrestling went south and he is trying to bring back a flavor of ice cream he loves that is not a gimmick, to get people to care about a kangaroo kick or a headlock.
— Trevor Dame (@TrevorDame) October 2, 2023
The problem with Max’s logic is that the flavor of ice cream he’s serving has been served by WWE for over 20 years, with very few alternative options on a mainstream level. AEW was the different flavor of ice cream. AEW was the alternative. But in his heart of hearts, Max doesn’t want the alternative. He doesn’t want the flavor to change, he just wants to be the one serving it.
MJF has talked in the past about being Piper in Portland. However, he’s acting like Mizanin in Stamford.
Mystic Max? More like Monday Night Max.
Instead of working to beat NXT, he’s trying to BE NXT.
But if this lazy, unfunny nonsense is what he wants to use his immense talent to create, then I hope WWE wins the War of 2024. I hope he gets his WrestleMania Moment™ and does all his schtick to massive approval. Go hit Dominik with a Kangaroo Kick. Go call Austin Theory a talentless taint. They’ll love it over there. They’ll eat that ice cream seven days a week and twice on Sundays. Go have your fun over there.
I don’t want him to leave, though. I want him to be better. I want him to try harder. I want him to continue reaching his almost limitless potential as a 27-year-old megastar in pro wrestling. But it seems like I want that more than he does. It’s infuriating. It’s frustrating to watch. But most of all, it’s disappointing. MJF shouldn’t be trying to do what WWE does because he’s capable of so much more. He’s done work that is so much better than anything WWE regularly churns out. He’s better than them, and I know it.
Well, at least I thought he was.
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