AEW Scrapped Major Plans For Darby Allin

Big plans for Darby Allin were dropped.

Back in July, Darby Allin won a Royal Rampage Battle Royal to earn a shot at the AEW World Champion at Grand Slam.

However, with then-champion Danielson’s status for the event unclear, Jon Moxley challenged him to put his number-one contender status on the line at the show against him instead. Although Danielson was fit for the event and faced Nigel McGuinness, Allin lost out to a newly-heel Moxley.

This set up a match between Moxley and Danielson at WrestleDream where the American Dragon lost the World Title and his full-time career came to an end.

Darby Allin Was Moved Aside

Reporting in the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Dave Meltzer confirmed earlier suggestions that Allin was due to win the World Title before Moxley turned heel. The switch was made in order to put as much heat on Moxley and the new version of the Blackpool Combat Club as possible.

As noted many times, the original plan when he won the title at Wembley Stadium was to lose it to Allin on the 10/12 WrestleDream show in Tacoma, WA, since Allin grew up in Seattle (35 miles away) and Danielson in Aberdeen, WA (about 80 miles away).

But the Moxley turn on Danielson after his title defense over Jack Perry at All Out in Chicago, changed the direction with the idea of putting as much heat as possible on Moxley and the BCC in an attempt to jump-start interest in the promotion.

At WrestleDream, Allin ended up facing Brody King after issuing an open challenge ahead of the event. The face-painted star went on to grab the win before trying to come to Danielson’s aid as he was attacked by the BCC following the main event.