[8.0] "A good match! Great TV showing for these two amazing wrestlers. I knew they would have chemistry. I do want to see a longer match in the future, but this was entertaining and hard hitting enough for now. Both are living legends in women wrestling."
"Possibly the best match Mercedes has had in AEW, which is not high praise. They worked a WWE match where they got heat on the babyface. Unfortunately, the babyface was Emi Sakura, a heel that isn't over. Mercedes needs more steps in this direction, even if it bores the fans. Anything that gets her heat. She has no interest or enthusiasm in her current state. Props to Emi for being smart enough to work a match like this to help Mercedes. I wish more of these foreign workers brought in to lose understood that they can do less and still come off just as good to the fans."
[7.0] "I may be overrating this slightly because of my love of Emi Sakura, but I really liked this match. I do wish that Emi was treated as more of a bigger threat and given some regular TV time in AEW though as it was very obvious where this match was gonna go."
[4.0] "Predictable and very basic match, which is what is to be expected from Mercedes. The crowd never got invested in it, just like myself. Mercedes isnt going to lose anytime soon, so any match that doesnt have a strong build leading up to it isnt going to raise the stakes enough to make her chances of winning seem any less than 100%"
[8.0] "This was Mercedes best tv match since shes been back, and maybe her second best match overall in AEW, I dont what went wrong with Britt and shida, but its great to see the real Mercedes Moné, I dont want to overrate this match which I tend to do when it comes to her but this was legitimately good and glad the wider audience saw it !"
[8.0] "Yeahhhh mercedes lfggggggg. This was imo her best tv match since coming to aew. Pretty nice back and forth between Sakura and Mercedes and the story that they carried over from their Twitter exchanges that showed in the match was pretty beast. Sakura is a hell of a striker. She needs to be in the rotation more for aew now that shes back from japan? My apologies if I got that wrong but I believe thats what I heard from the commentary team. Incoming mercedes and kamille vs Sakura and Stat tag match? We will be there. Love this match. My kind of tv match right here"
[9.0] "Great match for both Ladies, Mercedes showing that she can actually wrestle, and Emi who is absolutne goat in womens wrestling, i really enjoyed that match, spots where awesome i cant say anything more beacouse it was just good match at dynamite they could but that match at wrestledream or something"
[4.0] "[4.0] This was a borefest. Nothing bad or sloppy but all around very bland match. I couldn't give less of a shit about these New Japan geriatric senior citizens like Ishii, Suzuki and now Sakura that AEW keeps bringing and so does most of the audience. They never win. They are hollow shell of their past. They don't cut any promos to build up their match. I don't want to watch two random bums trading moves in the ring. There has to be some semblance of story to make a match interesting. This was an average match. But that's it."
[4.0] "An alright match with minor flaws. Just not a lot to this with the basic 9:20 (or I guess 10:20? ) women's division match formula. Heel controls match through break. Babyface shine before losing. Rinse repeat. Commentary trying to build up Sakura but AEW using her as nothing more than a jobber is pretty emblematic of the bad booking."
[5.0] "[2.5*] Decent match, it was very predictable and heatless but the action was cool, both of them looked good. Emi should be built more instead of just appearing for title matches and losing."
[6.0] "I felt like this match set the standard of quality for what I would like to see out of the AEW women's division. Sakura using social media to explain her relationship with Mercedes and set up the whole chop battle situation really helped out due to the limitations of TV time. The chemistry between the two wasn't all there but Mercedes sold like hell, plus all the spots on the outside were great. Sure, this thing worked as a stepping stone to the next Mercedes feud, but just listen to the crowd's when Emi taps out. That's real graps."
"I actually really enjoyed this match. Of course Emi had no chance of winning, but she must be one of the few contenders during Moné's title run that has pulled her into a great dynamic in the ring. I was excited about this match not because the only thing that was truly at stake was Moné's credibility: If she couldn't get a great match with Emi, she was truly done and in need of rethinking her approach. However this match gave me hope that she can still light the fire of this match when facing competent opponents, and sometimes that's the best thing one can get."
[2.0] "Complete waste of time. Not sure why anyone would think Emi had even a slight chance at winning, and if that issue was apparent to AEW then I'm not sure why this even happened. Mediocre offense, lazy selling, and at no point was suspense built before the awful bank statement that finished off this pointless endeavor."
[7.0] "A really good match limited by the constraints of weak booking. 10 minutes but 3 minutes of it is in PIP. The only TV buildup is a 30 second promo where Mone says Emi has been wrestling longer than she's been alive (a good heel promo that helps build up her opponent) but it happens right before the match. Emi hasn't been booked to wrestle in AEW for months, she's been doing good work in Japan but is unfamilar to the TV audience. Despite these issues in the build limiting emotional investment it's still a really good match. Solid action throughout, they had a good flow to their offense, Emi's comeback was believable, Mone used a submission finisher. I really would like a rematch with a bit more build to it. It's the kind of match Mone needs more of to really solidify herself as a big deal in AEW."
[4.0] "The way Emi Sakura built this up in her promo on Collision and twitter I was expecting a lot more of a show. This wasn't a bad match but it was just an average TV match and I think Mone has been fine despite the criticism of her AEW run, but here she had some questionable stuff."
[4.0] "This was similar to the first women's match in terms of level, but this was more boring, I couldn't understand the appeal this generated into some people, they couldn't drive any interest in me whatsoever during the entire stuff, very painful to watch, but obviously the technicality wasn't so bad - {*3/4}"
[8.0] "Crowd was pretty dead for most of the show, outside of the lucha match, and they actually perked up for this match which showed how good it was. Mone has been a bit of uneven as a performer but this showed what she could pull off on TV, even with a PiP commercial break. Just a really good performance from both wrestlers with a lot of hard hitting moves and good chemistry. The barricade spots worked well with Kamille's interference and didn't hurt the flow of the match too much for once. Hoping for a rematch somewhere down the line where they get more time."
[7.0] "Mercedes' best match in months. Match was so good that even this crowd, which had been ice cold all night, woke up for it. This saw a genuinely really good heel performance from Mercedes, managing to pretty savage and mean in her control segments, making the moments when Emi wipes the floor with her even better. Emi was of course great here too. I haven't seen much of her stuff but whenever she pops up, she's always a joy to watch. Is this enough to undo how stagnant Mercedes has become? No, but it's certainly a step in the right direction. ***1/2"
[4.0] "Only so much you can do when eaten up by a commercial and with a cold challenger. There was some solid stuff and some wonky stuff alike but this was fine ultimately. It didn't really do anything to build up the Statlander feud which is happening on short notice so this seemed pretty random."
"[1.0] This was a slugfest. I have seen greater Mercedes matches than this, it was nothing special she has yet to find herself in aew. Hope to see more from her thou."
[7.0] "There's a consistency and reliability to Emi's matches that mean you're going to at least get something entertaining. Her last match with Yuka had an unfortunate injury but she managed to delay the match and give time to the ref to check on Yuka. That takes a lot of professionalism and hard won experience. That hard won experience is shown here as well where Emi makes little adjustments throughout to keep everything flowing well. Mercedes Mone has her best AEW non-PPV match, one I think is on par with the first Shida match, and it's done with zero build. They took a cold crowd and got them invested and that's hard to do."
[6.0] "Look up perfunctory in the dictionary and you'll find a link to this match. It was fine. Other ratings seem tribalist in that they're panning it with 4s or praising it with 8s. Neither fairly represents what we saw. Mone is capable of 5-star classics, although its admittedly been years since we've gotten that kind of match from her. When someone of her caliber gives us a 3-star special, it feels like a dud. Sakura was an okay opponent but it was still a match where the outcome was never in question. The flow of the match worked for the most part, but we never hit the highs that we shouldve. If Mone is going to come close to earning her massive contract, its going to require a lot more than we got here."
[4.0] "An ok match that never really felt like it got going, which would be more understandable if this wasn't for not one but two titles. Instead it just served as a prelude to get Kris Statlander to make a save since she's randomly a babyface now. Not much heat either way for this segment."
[8.0] "A match that demonstrated there's still a lot of potential in Mercedes Mone's TBS reign and that she can do great work to highlight underappreciated talent like Emi Sakura. It took a few minutes to ratchet up but it certainly did, particularly during Sakura's comeback sequence with the big outside moves. Mercedes played her role as heels well and the Kamille interference spots didn't overwhelm the match. Watching Kamille get kicked by Emi wielding Mone like a club was hilarious. They had some great chemistry and I'd like them to revisit this match with more time at some point."
[4.0] "This was below average. Mercedes did a few nice athletic spots, including a very sweet dropkick, but the flaws in her game were glaring here. It is physically painful to watch her try to lock up - she looks like a T-Rex when she does so. Also, her dancing is so, so stupid. Emi Sakura was decent here, but nowhere near the level of her best bouts. Frankly, the wear and tear finally started showing for Emi earlier this year, as her great performances are gradually becoming less frequent, although she still occasionally will surprise you. ** or **1/4"
[8.0] "A nice good old fun time with great performances from both Mone and Sakura. I haven't been the biggest fan of Mone so far, I've felt her televion showings to be a little too forced and character heavy when it was never her strength. Here she gets to display some of the athleticism and timing that gave her so many strong performances. They managed to pack a lot into 10 minutes to really have a satisfying bout with plenty of hope spots for Emi. It's surprising to see Sakura working as a face for once but it's done well.and with a few strong chops the audience gets into it."
[7.0] "This was a hastily put together TV match so I was never expecting anything really long or full force. However it's probably one of Mone's best TV matches since joining AEW. Her PPV matches against Willow and Vaquer are better but they got time and a strong build. This is high quality for a TV match, even with the interference, and my second favorite match of the night. I just wish the ending was a bit more satisfying and it got a few more minutes so they could lay in some more elbows and chops to have a bit more of a war."
[5.0] "Solid match, if a bit safe and not trying to do much, which is maybe a good idea for Mone as she tends to get overly ambitious in the ring sometimes. There was obviously very little heat to this one, even with a double title stip (seems like a waste, no? ) but it's in the vein of one of the top paychecks on the roster just requesting to work with someone because they want to which is fine but not very compelling television. Mone seems to have gotten rid of her finisher after much criticism but the problem now is she's using a submission where she doesn't seem to know how to apply leverage."
[8.0] "A really good match for the time it was allotted. Mercedes had Emi looking strong throughout and they had good chemistry with some fun spots like the barricade drop. Mercedes seems to work really well with joshi able to make it into a hard hitting affair and that showed here. I'd say it's Mone's 2nd or 3rd best match in AEW and she seems to really be putting it together in terms of her character and letting it dictate match pacing. Emi is fantastic as usual. I thought the ending was a bit weak but a submission finish seems to work better than Mone's usual mone maker finisher that only lands sometimes."
[9.0] "Now this! This is what I've been wanting from Mercedes in her AEW run. It's been crazy seeing the difference between her Njpw Strong matches and her AEW matches, although I'm not suggesting that's all on Mercedes herself (Looking at you Britt). Also great to have Emi back in the states been waiting for her to be given the chance to showout like that amazing match she had with Jamie Hayter back on Rampage. Great match, easily Mercedes best AEW TV match so far (And some PPV ones looking at you again Briit)."
