AEW: 9/23/2020 Results and Grades: Late Night Dynamite

Matt Sydal vs. Shawn Spears

Result: Shawn Spears pins Matt Sydal

Before the match, as Scorpio Sky was being interviewed backstage, Matt Sydal decided to join in, and this strangely enough didn’t end with a minor fight breaking out. Sky was putting Benjamin Carter over, Sydal was putting Sky over, and Sky in turn put Sydal over. I don’t think this is the start of a new faction or anything, but it was nice to have a good positive interview.

As for the match, the setup was that at All Out’s Battle Royale, Sydal not only attacked Spears before entering the ring, but he also eliminated Spears. As the match progressed, you can’t help but root for Sydal after his painful botch at that Battle Royale.

As expected, Spears went for an aggressive and violent approach, while Sydal worked with agility and speed, leading to some neat spots when the two styles clashed. Spears already has a reputation for being ruthless in the ring, and this match was sort of a revenge match for him after being eliminated by Sydal, but it didn’t feel like he had much of an opportunity to get really ruthless during the match beyond putting the weight in his glove at the end to get the upper-hand as he usually does. However, the finish itself was well done.

Grade: B

I’m very glad this match happened, as it gave Sydal the opportunity to really show his stuff in one-one-one action without any botches or multi-man mishaps, and the match itself was still great to watch. However, it just didn’t quite have as much of an excitement factor as the first match nor the compelling storyline of the second. An attempted post math beatdown by Spears was interrupted by Scorpio Sky, no doubt building to an eventual Sky/Spears match. Both are trying to keep their respective momentums going, so it should be a fun matchup.

Overall, this was a great extra hour of Dynamite. Other than the inclusion of Jericho on commentary – a move AEW does tend to make when they want to draw ratings – it was interesting to see them choose to do a card that doesn’t have any big name vs big name matches to try and draw viewers, and even including two wrestlers that have yet to be officially signed.

Perhaps this was a bit of a testing ground for Carter and Sydal – and if so, both passed with flying colors – and the focus was more on just having some solid matches for those who decided to stay up. And solid matches they were.

Late Night Dynamite also proved to be a really good template for what a third hour of AEW programming could look like: strong matches that shine a needed spotlight on other members of the roster with some sparse but good interview/promo work mixed in. So if you decided to DVR this instead of watching it live, well, sorry to have the results spoiled, but I’d say you have a lot to look forward to.