Toni Storm was not the presence she is today when she arrived in AEW in March 2022. Fresh off a sputtering WWE run, the months after her debut were characterized by a berth in the Owen Hart Cup tournament, a world title contention at Forbidden Door against Thunder Rosa, and an innocuous-yet-career-defining heel turn that would set the stage for the rise of arguably the most important wrestler in AEW’s women’s division.
This isn’t to discredit the foundation of the division that featured cornerstones like Shida, Riho, Rose or Rosa. Even Britt Baker needs to be given credit for her character work. The division is more than one person though, and over time it has evolved past those people for one reason or another via inactivity, absences or the division simply passing them by.
Giving credit to Storm as arguably the most important woman in the division is also not to say that she is a better wrestler from a technical standpoint compared to Serena Deeb, Deonna Purazzo, or Mercedes “Ultimo” Mone (still processing that egregiousness). We should also give credit to current champion Kris Statlander who has been in AEW since its early days and has battled through injury struggles to get where she is today.
That acknowledgement comes from an honest admission that being successful in wrestling and maintaining that relevance is a marriage of wrestling skill with character work. You can appreciate one or the other more than the other, but the best who have wrestled can do both and excel where others can’t. They are the wrestlers you can place as cornerstones of divisions that complement the great workers and the great characters, and that you can build divisions around in combination with those other pieces.
A “Timeless” Run
Toni Storm has been AEW’s “starting point guard” for much of the last three years. She won her first AEW Women’s World championship at All Out 2022 and defended that three times before dropping it to Jamie Hayter at Full Gear 2022. She would get her second and third reigns during a flurry of title changes between herself, Saraya and Shida between May 2023 and November 2023, with her third reign lasting 281 days. Across those three reigns she held the title for a total of 423 days with 13 successful defences. The latter of the three reigns was under her “Timeless” gimmick that led into arguably the best women’s feud in AEW history between her and the indefinitely “compromised to a permanent end” Mariah May.
Her third reign and feud with May over the championship is a division-defining story arc that cemented and validated Storm’s character, but also cemented May (now Blake Monroe) as a top-shelf performer who works hard, busts her ass, and can tell good, physical stories. May’s subsequent reign as champion is one of my favourites, and the culmination of their story moved Storm into her fourth title reign that lasted another 217 days.
There were 1,112 days between the start of Storm’s first reign and the end of her fourth run. In that time she was champion for 640 of those days, which amounts to about 58% of the period. While there’s nothing wrong with having a defining presence at the top of the card, it’s to a degree that the women’s division had revolved around her and had been defined by her exploits. It was to such a degree that any time she didn’t have the championship it felt as though it was only a matter of time before she would regain it. That’s where I feel the women’s division has somewhat stalled at the top; summarily I think once you lose that perception of unpredictability in the outcome it’s easier to disengage from the experience. That holds true for any company and any champion.
I think whatever happens next for Storm now that she has helped crown a new homegrown champion in Statlander and cemented her in Stat’s first major PPV defence, Storm needs to step away and let the world title breath to allow other names to step up and flesh out the main event scene in the division. That isn’t to say she should step away from television, but I think you have other avenues to travel down be they feuds outside a title picture, the TBS championship, time in Japan or on ROH, or even a run within the forthcoming tag team division. Regardless I think it’s important to expand the foundation of the division, compared to the sequence of her four reigns that went as follows:
- Storm
- Shida
- Saraya
- Shida
- Storm
- May
- Storm
- Statlander
Based on those title changes I don’t feel Storm should be anywhere near the title picture for a while. I think it’s a disservice to Statlander as a new champion after having already dispatched her one-on-one in Storm’s rematch. I sincerely hope Stat does come out ahead in November at Full Gear, but I think Mone as her next challenger casts a shadow over her title reign. From our perspectives as viewers when you look at Mone’s run you have to at least consider the possibility that Mone could win; I’m not sure that’s the healthiest move.
AEW’s Women’s Division Over the Next Year
Even if Statlander wins, you’re back at square one if Storm is right back in the mix even within the next six months. I think it’s important to let Statlander’s reign breathe, especially if she’s still champion after Full Gear. I think there’s a very real threat of Mone becoming the first to hold both the TBS and World titles concurrently, and if that occurs it’s even more important to keep Storm away since the Storm-Mone feud wasn’t that long ago.
No matter the outcome of the Statlander-Mone match, I think it’s important that Storm develop more as a character a part from the AEW Women’s World title. I think it’s dually important for the division to evolve and create new standouts such that when she does return to the championship picture you have a fully fleshed out, consistent and unpredictable women’s main event division complemented by the TBS title and eventually the tag team championships.
Not every member of a team’s roster is going to start. In basketball you have your starting five, your sixth man, your roleplayers and then you have end-of-bench players who are ready to step up when they are called on. Wrestling divisions are not any different. So if AEW’s women’s division has Storm as its point guard, who can you say is definitively filling out the starting lineup? Who gets that sixth spot right now? The answers to those questions is the point even if you want to say Mone is your shooting guard and Stat is your power forward. How are the other roles filled and who gets that time?
That’s a question of identity that needs to be defined within AEW. This is not the same division people ragged on three or four years ago. It’s much improved and greatly more cohesive despite still needing to fully develop. Major characters like Storm and Mone help that along, but great divisions are not built by a small, exclusive group of people. It needs main characters, secondary characters, and new blood to keep it all fresh. That’s the formula AEW needs to figure out, and as amazing and important as Storm has been for the division, I don’t think that can be accomplished with a new champion operating within the looming shadow of the “Timeless” one’s eventual fifth reign.
