The Phantom Rant: Was Omega vs. Ospreay better than Flair vs. Steamboat?

Greetings conversationalists all across the world wide web. It is I, the one and only “Phantom Lord” Joseph Davis and this is The Phantom Rant. As always I am coming to you from New York City. The war between the WWE and AEW had another battle over the weekend and I am confident to say that AEW won this battle in the war. The overall war will not be won with battles like this one though. It’s going to be long and bloody (well at least AEW shows blood….lol Netflix with RAW). The WWE should just concede that they won’t defeat AEW like they did with WCW. The only thing that can defeat AEW is AEW. Right now though they are riding high and the momentum is in their favor.

So yeah I thoroughly enjoyed All In. I never got around to watching NXT Heatwave or the Triple A show. There was some news coming out of that double shot over the weekend. According to Dave Meltzer on the Wrestling Observer , the WWE essentially underestimated Triple A thinking NXT would be the bigger show of the two. All I can think of that is the word stupid

Of course Triple A was going to be seen as the bigger show. The WWE is vastly underestimating the drawing power of Lucha Libre in the United States. Triple A should be seen as much more than a pawn for the WWE. Oh we need to leech off AEW again…let’s throw a Triple A show up against it. At least Triplemania 34 (which is in a couple of weeks) will get time to shine on it’s own with a huge Friday night show on September 11th in Las Vegas and night two in Mexico City on September 13th. I’m honestly more interested in the second night because that is the night we will see Dominik Mysterio defend the Triple A MEGA Championship against El Grande Americano. Americano has become almost a folk hero in Mexico so it has to be almost a lock that he would win the title.

But I want to go back to AEW today because I honestly haven’t written enough about them in a while. As I said, I thoroughly enjoyed All In: London. The match everyone is talking about is of course Will Ospreay vs. Kenny Omega. I loved everything about this match from the pre match introduction narrated by Will’s own mother and then set to “Baba O’Reily” by The Who. It just was everything I love about a “pure sports build” in pro wrestling. But as much as I loved the match, I’m not going to say something crazy and be like “Oh it was the best match ever”. Surely a match of the year candidate regardless of the promotion.

Over on twitter/X, someone randomly tweeted at Darius Rucker (country singer/formerly of Hootie & The Blowfish) that Omega vs. Ospreay was the greatest match of all time. Darius responded simply by saying “You obviously never saw Flair vs. Steamboat”. Now, it’s well known that Rucker is a Flair fanboy. I mean hell, he owns I believe two of Flair’s actual robes. But he wasn’t wrong to state that if you think Omega vs. Ospreay was great, you’ve never seen Flair vs. Steamboat. Enter Dave Meltzer into the discussion.

“I saw countless Flair-Steamboat matches. Seriously, Ospreay vs, Omega had more emotion than any Flair-Steamboat match and Flair-Steamboat was state of the art from 1977 to 1989.”

I like Dave, I really do. But Ospreay vs. Omega did not have more emotion than ANY Flair-Steamboat match. Like I said it was a really good match, but if you’re comparing it to Flair and Steamboat…that is a bridge too far. Of course it didn’t take too long for Ric Flair to chime in about it over on Twitter and it’s a doozy from Ol’ Nat’ch.

“No one has more respect for Kenny Omega and Will Ospreay than me! But to compare them to Steamboat and I is like comparing the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean! When they have a great match 300 times a year and 200-hour broadways, get back to me! Until then, there is no problem with being number two. You are great young talent, but let’s get serious, kids! You should only hope that you have people talking about your matches 37 years later! WOOOOO!”

Now, I sense a tad bit exaggerating from Ric because I’m pretty sure he and Steamboat did not wrestle each other 300 times a year. The 200 hour long broadways is probably true. But that’s over a span of decades. I honestly believe that Kenny’s matches with Okada will be discussed in the same vein as Flair and Steamboat down the line. Those were epic matches that should be talked about decades to come. But this match with Omega and Ospreay, while pretty damn good…it was not a Flair vs. Steamboat encounter.

In the end like I said, it might be a match of the year. Hell, I’ll even say it could be a top ten match of the decade. But I just don’t see people talking about this match like a Flair/Steamboat match. Right now the all time series between Kenny and Will is tied at two wins apiece. Will said on Dynamite he’s happy with being equal with Kenny Omega. But if he ever wants to go again…game on. I do hope that fifth and probable final match between Omega and Ospreay does happen. Now if that match happens, that will probably have a lot of emotion to it because it’s pretty clear right now Kenny Omega is on the last lap of his career. Does Omega go out with a win or does he fall just short one last time? That’s a story right there AEW could do.

On that note I am done for this week. I apologize for any delay with my column. The world of wrestling moves faster than I can type sometimes. As always you can leave feedback down below, over on Twitter or email me at phantomlordnyc@gmail.com