AEW needs to add more titles. Did I get your fucking attention? Yeah? Good, because this is gonna be a pretty sober and theoretical article. The real lead-in should be “AEW could add some more titles if they want”. I’m not very good at the clickbait style of writing but we keep it moving. I find titles really interesting and while I work on a more comprehensive Philosophy of Pro Wrestling, I wanted to focus a bit on titles and how they can be used. The typical wisdom with AEW is that they have too many titles floating around, they aren’t focused on them enough, and they’re getting lost in the shuffle. I don’t disagree but… is that a bad thing?
In wrestling terms, I’m a sports guy. I’m not a sports guy in my regular life but I’m interested in the sport of pro wrestling over the drama of pro wrestling. Both parts have to be there obviously, that’s what pro wrestling is, but I look at things with the eye of putting together interesting fights, not in weaving intricate storylines. I think a lot of people see all the titles floating around in AEW and think “we don’t have enough characters and/or screen time to fit in stories with all of these people!” But my thing is, why do we need everybody to have a high-level story? This is a topic for another article, but I think too much emphasis has been placed on stories laid out by the promotion. Why not just present a series of events and let us craft stories around that? But again, I don’t want to get diverted.
For now, let’s just say that if we’re thinking of this in sports terms, there is something to be said for giving more people titles. If someone from Cameroon came over as a basketball player and I didn’t know them I might be like okay whatever they’ll get killed by 3rd string NBA guys, but if you tell me that they’ve won the Cameroon championship six times in the past, I might start to think they have a chance. If someone comes up as a champion, it *can* make them seem bigger than they would have already, it can give them a bit of a boost.
Obviously, you have to be careful, and I think you have to be more careful with the more titles you add. Mainly, you need to make sure your titles aren’t stepping on one-another’s toes, or at least not doing it too much. Titles will always be compared with one another, so when you have multiple champions floating around, you might find that the title you intended (as a promoter) to be most important is actually considered second to another title. Usually, this will happen because someone who holds that other title has gotten hot; a hot (i.e. currently-compelling) character will always matter more than a prestigious title, at least as it relates to the ticket-buying public. Again, another topic that is too big for this article is the handling of titles. I want to keep this one light and I’m already doing a bad job. But hopefully you get the point I’m hinting at enough for me to move on.
In my opinion, a division with what I’ll call “full depth” will have 3 titles: a top title, a secondary title, and a sub-territory title. The top title is self-explanatory. The secondary title is one of those things that I feel trips a lot of people up when trying to explain it, and I can’t say I have a clean explanation, but I’ll give it a go. I think there’s a usefulness in having a nominal top challenger, so it always feels like the top champion has a known rival. If every other match is off the table, we’ve still got the top champ vs the secondary champ. (I cut out a digression about this here.) The sub-territory title works similarly but is geared towards that sub-territory. These titles are more well-known in fully competitive sports because the territorial boundaries mean that certain matches can’t be made unless they are at a higher level, so people transition from one tier to another and typically vacate lower titles to do so. Essentially, for wrestling, sub-territory titles allow special matches to be booked on shows where otherwise they’d miss out because the top & secondary titles are unavailable.
To build on that point, the best move for a promotion is to establish a title for each major sub-territory they have, and make sure to use that title in that territory. This can help establish a connection between the promotion and that territory, showing those who are in that territory that the promotion is investing in bringing them wrestling. As media has evolved over the years, the idea of a territory has also changed. Whereas once we only had regional titles like “Southern” or “United States” or “National”, suddenly we had “Television” championships and eventually even “Internet” championships. And this is all a valid development.
Now, am I going to suggest that AEW establish all three titles for every division they have? No, although it might work out that way mathematically (I haven’t worked out the math yet). To figure out what AEW should have, we need to think about their situation. Firstly, they have five divisions: men’s singles, women’s singles, men’s tag, women’s tag, trios (just men so far but I’m not 100% sure this will always be the case); the women’s tag division doesn’t have any titles yet but they have had a tournament in the past and it seems a natural path forward. Second, what are AEW’s sub-territories? They are a touring promotion, but I think that in this day-and-age, the concept of sub-territories is better expressed by their television shows. If we go by that, they have three: Dynamite, Collision, and Rampage.
I wanted to do a section on the naming of titles here but it’s late and I also chickened out of the gimmick that would justify it; I was going to give all the AEW titles new names but that felt like a step too far, even for a silly blog. Regardless, I bring it up because even though titles are often named after their territories, I think having a “Dynamite Championship” is a mistake; the “TNT Championship” is too branded for my taste but is leagues better than titles named after specific shows. Also, just to be clear, I don’t think every division needs to have three sub-territory titles: each full division should have at least 1 sub-territory title, and the promotion as a whole should have at least 3. Finally, to put the minds of fantasy bookers at ease, these titles don’t have to be locked to their territories, especially in a case like this.
So here is what I think AEW’s title layout should be, by division. The ranking of these might not be exactly where AEW or you see them, but you know, whatever. Also, this is not including ROH; separate promotion, separate title structure. New titles in italics.
Men’s Singles
– AEW World Championship — Top: Obviously the top title, no question about that.
– AEW International Championship — Secondary: While the titles have fluctuated a bit in the past, I’m comfortable saying that the International Championship is more important than the other men’s singles belts at this point.
– AEW Continental Championship — Accolade/Secondary: Bad title name aside, this is an interesting case of having an extra title around. I think that this belt being linked to the Continental Classic is a great way to differentiate it from the International Championship while still having an in-built rivalry with that title over who is truly in that second position.
– AEW TNT Championship — Sub-Territory: The original AEW telvision title, this has de facto slid down in ranked importance but still serves a great purpose.
– FTW Chamionship: Not a real title, doesn’t count. I respect the history but it doesn’t factor in to the list of what AEW should sanction.
Women’s Singles
– AEW Women’s World Championship — Top: Again, pretty obvious.
— AEW Women’s International Championship — Secondary: AEW’s women’s division has not been a #1 or #2 focus for the company, so it may feel like its roster here is a little thin, but having a title like this can make the division seem more prestigious and can potentially help to elevate more women to become drawing cards. With the men’s International title already having cachet, I think bringing a title in with this name would immediately make it a worthwhile prize.
– AEW TBS Championship — Sub-territory: To match it with the TNT title, the TBS title can move down to be considered the sub-territory title for the women’s division.
Men’s Tag
– AEW World Tag Team Championship — Top
– AEW Television Tag Team Championship — Sub-territory: As I said before, if you have a sub-territory title, you should make sure to use that title in that sub-territory. TV titles tell people that the champion is likely to wrestle on TV, which can make the division feel more immediate since a viewer is likely to see meaningful tag team matches for free rather than just waiting to see the world champions (who should be saved for pay-per-view if possible).
Women’s Tag
– AEW Women’s World Tag Team Championship — Top
– AEW Women’s Television Tag Team Championship — Sub-territory
Trios
– AEW World Trios Championship — Top
– AEW Television Trios Championship — Sub-territory
I think that having multiple champions in a division makes the division seem like it matters, like there’s enough competition there to recognize two different stand-outs. There are five television/sub-territory champions here, which is enough that there should be at least 1 title match on every television show. Obviously, these things have to be managed well; you do have to have enough people to make each division work. I feel that AEW does have access to that kind of talent, though. At least give us some women’s tag team titles. I think we’ve been patient enough.