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AEW ALL OUT 2022

Date: September 4th, 2022

Venue: Now Arena

City: Hoffman Estates, Illinois

Attendance: 10,014

PPV Buy Rate: 135,000 - 142,000

Previous PPV: AEW x NJPW Forbidden Door 2022

Next PPV: AEW Full Gear 2022

AEW ALL OUT 2022 was the fourth annual ALL OUT pay-per-view produced by All Elite Wrestling. It took place during the Labor Day weekend on September 4th, 2022 at the Now Arena in the Chicago suburb of Hoffman Estates, Illinois.

The PPV featured 15 matches with 4 of them taking place during the Zero Hour PPV Pre-Show. In the main event, CM Punk defeated Jon Moxley to win the AEW World Championship for the second time. In other matches, Chris Jericho defeated Bryan Danielson, The Elite (Kenny Omega, Matt Jackson and Nick Jackson) defeated "Hangman" Adam Page and Dark Order (Alex Reynolds and John Silver) to become the inaugural AEW World Trios Champions and in the opening match of the night, MJF made a surprise return to AEW as the disguised "joker" entrant who won the Casino Ladder Match, earning himself a future shot at the AEW World Championship.

The event is infamous for the incident backstage that happened during the post-event media scrum where new AEW World Champion CM Punk made disparaging remarks about several AEW wrestlers, including several Executive Vice Presidents of the company which led to a legitimate backstage altercation between Punk and members of The Elite, along with Punk's longtime friend and AEW Producer Ace Steel. This was the first nail in the coffin of Punk's AEW career as he would be fired a year later for a similar incident at the ALL IN: LONDON 2023 event in London, England. Following the altercation backstage at ALL OUT, Steel was released and the other four were suspended, along with four other wrestlers involved in the fight. Punk and The Elite were all stripped of their respective championships as well. All parties involved eventually would return to AEW within 10 months of the incident, although Punk would be terminated on September 2nd, 2023 - nearly one year to the day of ALL OUT after the aforementioned incident at ALL IN with Steel released shortly after Punk was.

Event Background:

ALL OUT is a yearly pay-per-view held during Labor Day weekend by AEW since 2019. It is one of AEW's "big four" shows, along with Double or Nothing, Full Gear and Revolution. On July 13th, 2022, AEW announced that ALL OUT would take place on September 4th from the Now Arena in the Chicago suburb of Hoffman Estates, Illinois. Also, as part of ALL OUT week, both of AEW's weekly TV programs - AEW Dynamite and AEW Rampage - aired live from the same arena on August 31st and September 2nd. Tickets for all 3 events went on sale July 15th with bundle packages available. There was also a fan fest on Saturday, September 3rd at the Renaissance Schaumburg Convention Center. ALL OUT itself was preceded by a 1 hour pre-show called Zero Hour which aired for FREE on AEW's social media platforms.

Storylines Heading Into Event:

On the June 3rd, 2022 episode of AEW Rampage, AEW World Champion CM Punk, who had won the title just days earlier at Double or Nothing 2022, announced that he was injured and required surgery. He initially wanted to relinquish the title but AEW President Tony Khan decided to crown an interim champion until Punk could return. Upon Punk's return he would face the interim champion to determine an undisputed champion. Jon Moxley was crowned as interim AEW World Champion at AEW x NJPW Forbidden Door 2022 on June 26th. At the Quake By The Lake special episode of AEW Dynamite on August 10th, CM Punk made his return and confronted Moxley, entering into a title dispute. A match to determine the undisputed AEW World Champion was then scheduled for ALL OUT. However, due to heated confrontations between the two, it was announced that the match would instead take place on the August 24th episode of Dynamite, where Moxley quickly defeated Punk due to the latter reaggravating an injury, becoming the undisputed AEW World Champion in the process. The following week on Dynamite, Moxley issued an open challenge for a championship match at ALL OUT, in which Punk signed the open contract for. The championship rematch was then signed for ALL OUT.

Post-Event Media Scrum Controversy:

During the post-event media scrum, CM Punk took issues with certain members of the wrestling media as he addressed backstage issues with colleagues in AEW. Punk first described Scott Colton (Colt Cabana) as someone who "didn't want to see me at the top", discussed their lawsuits against each other, and said that "he hasn't been friends with this guy since at least 2014, late 2013". Later on, Punk stated Colton "shares a bank account with his mother, which tells you all you need to know about what kind of character that is". Punk denied rumors that he had attempted to get Colton fired, which AEW President Tony Khan confirmed. Punk also criticized "irresponsible people who call themselves EVP's" (AEW's Executive Vice Presidents are Kenny Omega, Matt Jackson and Nick Jackson), saying that they "couldn't fucking manage a Target" and accused them of having "spread lies and bullshit and put into the media that I got [Colt Cabana] fired when I have fuck all to do with him, want nothing to do with him. Do not care where he works, where he doesn't work. Where he eats, where he sleeps". Punk later indicated that he was trying to "sell tickets, fill arenas", while the EVPs were acting as "stupid guys [who] think they're in Reseda", which was where Pro Wrestling Guerrilla was based.

Next, Punk called "Hangman" Adam Page "an empty-headed dumb fuck" who went "into business for himself" on national television, and further alluded to Page as "somebody that hasn't done a damn thing in this business [that has] jeopardized the first million dollar house that this company has drawn off of my back". Punk later said regarding Page: "Our locker room, for all the wisdom and brilliance it has, isn't worth shit when you have an empty-headed idiot, who has never done anything in the business do public interviews and say, "I don't really take advice"" Punk went on to describe MJF as a "supremely talented individual" but also said MJF "likes to shit where he eats instead of watering the grass". Punk then proclaimed to an interviewer, "I'm hurt, I'm old, I'm fuckin' tired, and I work with fucking children".

Multiple wrestling publications, including Fightful, PWInsider and the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, later reported that Punk's comments were followed by a fight backstage between Punk, Kenny Omega, The Young Bucks and Ace Steel - an AEW coach who is Punk's trainer and long-time friend. The Young Bucks and Omega were reportedly injured in the fight,.

Aftermath of Backstage Altercation:

As a result of the physical altercation following AEW ALL OUT 2022 during the post-event media scrum, AEW President Tony Khan suspended all involved, which included CM Punk, Ace Steel, Kenny Omega, Matt Jackson, Nick Jackson, Pat Buck, Christopher Daniels, Michael Nakazawa and Brandon Cutler. On September 7th, 2022, Khan opened that night's episode of AEW Dynamite with a pre-taped video, announcing that he had vacated both the AEW World and AEW World Trios Championships, effective immediately. Death Triangle (PAC, Penta El Zero Miedo and Rey Fenix) became the new AEW World Trios Champions by defeating Best Friends (Chuck Taylor and Trent Barretta) and Orange Cassidy in a previously scheduled trios match that Khan converted into a title match. The show also featured the start of a tournament to crown a new AEW World Champion, with the final taking place on September 21st, 2022 at AEW Dynamite: Grand Slam. At Grand Slam, Jon Moxley defeated Bryan Danielson in the tournament final to win the AEW World Championship for a record-setting third time.

The suspensions of Buck, Daniels, Nakazawa and Cutler were lifted about two weeks after ALL OUT, according to Dave Meltzer, an independent investigation commissioned by AEW apparently determined that those individuals were trying to break up the fight.

On October 18th, 2022, Ace Steel was released from the company. Steel was rehired in early 2023 to work in a remote capacity and to produce CM Punk's segments upon Punk's return to the promotion on the debut of AEW Collision.

On November 19th, 2022, in addition to resuming their positions as Executive Vice Presidents, The Elite (Omega and Matt and Nick Jackson) returned to AEW's next PPV, Full Gear 2022, where they faced Death Triangle for the AEW World Trios Championship in a losing effort. This was later announced to be the first match in a Best of 7 Series for the titles. The Best of Seven Series would go all the way to the seventh and final match on January 11th, 2023 at AEW Dynamite, where The Elite defeated Death Triangle in a ladder match to become two-time AEW World Trios Champions.

CM Punk suffered a torn triceps injury at the event that put him on the shelf for 9 months. During the hiatus, there had been reports that Punk and AEW were in talks regarding a buyout of his contract. In April 2023, there were reports that Punk and AEW were planning Punk's return on the June 17th debut episode of AEW Collision taking place in Chicago, which were then confirmed by Tony Khan on the May 31st episode of Dynamite. Punk appeared on the June 14th episode of Dynamite in a vignette promoting his return for the premiere of Collision. On June 17th Punk returned to AEW on the debut episode of Collision, with all parties involved in the post-event media scrum altercation having now returned to AEW. However, following another backstage altercation that would occur nearly a year after the first one. In August 2023 at AEW ALL IN: LONDON in London, England, Punk and Jack Perry got involved in another altercation. Punk was terminated from his AEW contract on September 2nd, 2023, almost exactly a year after the ALL OUT incident. A few days later, Ace Steel was also released from his AEW contract.

WATCH: Countdown to AEW ALL OUT 2022:

WATCH: AEW ALL OUT 2022 PPV Zero Hour Pre-Show:

Results:

No.

Results:

Stipulations:

Times:

1^P

The Jericho Appreciation Society (Sammy Guevara and Tay Melo) (c) defeated Ortiz and Ruby Soho by pinfall

Mixed Tag Team match for the AAA World Mixed Tag Team Championship