In a pro wrestling world that seems to be full of veteran stars balking at the idea of putting over a younger wrestler, or in the case of WWE’s top three stars of Cody Rhodes, Roman Reigns and CM Punk, even working with them, Kenny Omega shows that the wrestling industry works best when the top stars are selfless in their pursuit of helping other stars get over.
Will Ospreay’s performance at ALL IN at Wembley Stadium, from the opening video package featuring The Who song Baba O’Reilly, to the post-match celebration, was the perfect way to get a top babyface over as the biggest star in the company, but none of that would be possible without Omega being willing to do the work on his end.
Omega bumped and bled and did everything to make Ospreay look as good as possible. While many veteran wrestlers would have bristled at the idea of putting over a younger wrestler, Omega was willing to put his neck on the line (literally!) to make sure that Ospreay’s crowning achievement was as big and memorable as it could possibly be. He even permitted Ospreay to kick out of his One Winged Angel finish, perhaps the most protected move in the history of wrestling.
When the third Wembley Stadium show was first announced, most fans could predict the event would be used as the location for Will Ospreay finally winning the AEW World Championship. What was less certain was who it would be against–and for a while it looked like it was going to be against MJF, since it would be an obvious babyface vs heel matchup that would make it easy for the fans to cheer for Ospreay.
Instead, Omega was given the role, and he excelled in it. The build to the match was not the cleanest and seemed to zigzag between babyface and heel dynamics, but that will largely be forgotten to history because of what Omega and Ospreay accomplished during the actual match; a stunning, spectacular event that was pitch-perfect from beginning to end.
The parallels between Omega and Ospreay are obvious. Omega was widely regarded as the best in-ring wrestler in the world for years, until injuries and Ospreay’s own individual brilliance allowed him to usurp that title from him in the eyes of many fans. Ospreay, like Omega, became a top star in Japan before jumping over to the United States and starring on weekly television. Despite the heaping of praise that both men have received, they have also been faced with incredible amounts of (mostly bad faith) criticism of their work in the ring, and doubts on whether they could really lead a global promotion as the top act in the company.
Countless wrestlers throughout history when put in Omega’s position would find a way to avoid putting over Ospreay in a similar manner. Omega, now 42, is likely holding the AEW World Championship for the final time. Injuries and medical issues have slowed down his in-ring pace in recent years, and as talented as he still is, the clock is clearly ticking on his chances to continue to main event major shows such as this one. He is also undoubtedly in the most lucrative position in his career, and history tells us that when wrestlers are in that position, they are unlikely to be interested in sharing it.
Across the ring is Ospreay, a full decade younger than Omega and a man who New Japan Pro Wrestling had already used to replace Omega when Omega left that company in 2019. Ospreay is the obvious heir apparent to Omega’s status in pro wrestling, and history tells us that Omega should be positively terrified by him, because Ospreay represents a business alternative to Omega.
How did Omega respond? He put his heart and soul into giving Ospreay the best possible match he could have, a thrilling conclusion to their trilogy of matches and if nothing else, gives Ospreay the best possible chance to exceed and surpass Omega’s status in AEW.
This is not the first time Omega has done this. Back in 2021, Omega put over another younger star, Adam Page, at Full Gear, giving Page his crowning achievement in AEW. If anything this shows that Omega’s accommodating attitude has made him more reliable and a steadier hand for booker Tony Khan to rely on when looking to find an opponent for Ospreay. Five years after Omega put over Page, he once again found himself working the main event of the biggest show of the year, and doing what he does best in putting on an instant classic match that seemed to push wrestling further than where it had been before.
Perhaps Bobby Lashley, a man so terrified of doing a job that he found himself on the preshow tag teaming with a meme TikTok personality and his son, could learn a thing or two about the benefits of being a flexible worker.
Omega’s second run with the AEW World Championship was relatively brief, but he did find time in one of his limited defenses to headline a PPV against Kevin Knight, another rising star much earlier along in his rise to stardom than someone like Ospreay, but someone who nonetheless was given a great opportunity to look like a future star by working a PPV main event against Omega.
While other wrestlers in similar positions are comfortable only working that kind of program with their friends, or in the case of Roman Reigns, their family members, Omega was ready and willing not just to work with the guy who will replace him in Ospreay, but perhaps the guy that will one day replace Ospreay in Kevin Knight.
Omega showed in this last run that he still has plenty of gas left in the tank, and just because he formally passed the torch to Ospreay at ALL IN, that doesn’t mean that he is going to be put out to pasture. He’s proven time and time again that AEW could do a lot worse than giving him the ball whenever they need somebody to do the work and make another top guy.
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