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AEW Star Says Continental Classic Is What Wrestling Needed

By James Holder • Published 27th December 2023

A major AEW star is a major fan of the Continental Classic.

On November 11th, Tony Khan and Bryan Danielson announced the launch of a new round-robin tournament to serve as AEW’s answer to New Japan’s G1 Climax Tournament.

Fast forward to December 27th and the business end of the tournament has very much arrived. On Dynamite, Jon Moxley takes on Swerve Strickland and Jay White to determine the winner of Gold League, while Bryan Danielson meets Eddie Kingston to decide the winner of Blue League, and the victors will meet at Worlds End to determine the first-ever tournament champion.

Speaking to Jimmy Varsallone of the Miami Herald ahead of Dynamite, Swerve Strickland broke down the importance of the tournament.

“The Classic has been a shot in the arm of what the pro wrestling industry needed. Introducing a new style of tournament bracketing with the classic round-robin style of blocks and scoring points.
The usual tournament, you see (the seeding) and sometimes those guys don’t cross paths and they don’t face each other. In round robin, everyone has to face everyone, and that’s what made it so special.
Everyone in the block was like, ‘I get to see these matchups. That’s going to be cool. I don’t know who is going to win here, this could be a draw.’
A lot of fans had a lot of fun with the scoring. Whoever is truly a wrestling connoisseur can have a lot of fun with those things. Me being part of the first one, we had to set the tone for the first-ever Continental Classic.
Me being a finalist and going against Jay White and Jon Moxley, who is going to go down as a Hall of Famer and all-time great, being able to not face him once, but face him twice, means a lot. I get redemption for myself.”