The road not taken in AEW's mid-card

Pro wrestling is built on the foundation of what might have been. We spend our time dissecting booking sheets and speculating on why a specific angle never made it to television. Recently, Cash Wheeler opened up about a concrete plan that never saw the light of day. He was slated for a high-profile singles match against CM Punk.

Instead of the FTR dynamo locking horns with the veteran, the wheels turned in a different direction. Punk shifted his target to Penta. While that encounter offered its own high-impact spots, the omission of Wheeler leaves a technical hole in the 2022 timeline. Fans were deprived of a contrast in styles that could have defined a segment of the weekly broadcast.

Missing the technical mark

Wheeler’s work rate is grounded in a classic, methodical British-influenced style. He chains grapple exchanges with a level of precision that few on the current roster can match. Pairing that with the cerebral volatility of Punk presented a distinct opportunity for a 15-minute showcase. We ended up with a trade-off that favored high-flying spectacle over methodical psychological warfare.

This is a critique of the booking process, not the talent involved. The pivot to Penta was essentially a decision to prioritize flashy, international appeal over the grounded, technical narrative that FTR specializes in. It speaks to a recurring struggle in promotion strategy: choosing the immediate pop of a dream match over the long-term benefit of a technical clinic.

The cost of the pivot

We saw the results of that shift in real-time. Where a Wheeler match would have demanded a deep focus on limb work and transitions, the Penta match relied on crowd-pleasing sequences. It highlights a common trap where the spectacle of a name-value opponent overrides the logic of a developing rivalry. When you look at the scrapped plans for CM Punk, you see the internal tension between different wrestling philosophies.

The fans eventually got a series of contests that defined that year, but the absence of this specific pairing feels like a missed beat in the record books. It serves as a reminder that even when a promotion follows a trajectory, the best laid plans are subject to the whims of momentum and external variables. My prediction? Had that match happened in the summer of 2022, we would have seen a crisp, 18-minute technical masterclass that moved Wheeler further up the card than the eventual trajectory allowed.