In surprising news today, All Elite Wrestling removed the profiles on their roster page for Malakai Black, Miro, and Ricky Starks.
It became reported that all three men had their contracts terminated and were now free agents to go wrestle wherever they wanted to go.
Miro hasn’t wrestled in AEW since World’s End in 2023 where he faced Andrade el Idolo in what was supposed to just be Andrade’s final match. Malakai Black last worked Full Gear 2024 in a four way tag team match for the AEW World Tag Team Championship, though it was his match against Adam Cole weeks prior where he lost clean in the ring and gave what felt like a goodbye after that signalled his AEW career was coming to a close. He denied this, of course.
I could write something about their careers (if you think I should hit me up) but I think it would be good to focus on Ricky Starks.
I’ll preface this by saying that I’ve never been Ricky’s biggest fan. Years ago I called him AEW’s Dolph Ziggler, the midcard wrestler never satisfied and always complaining about his position on the card. I’ve pointed out his boo boo faces when having to do a job or a segment he didn’t want to do, and generally thought AEW would be better to push someone else.
(I also shared a story on Twitter that had been going around on Reddit about Ricky Starks getting arrested during the Calgary Stampede which led to Sean Ross Sapp of Fightful and others trying to look into the validity of the story. Everyone denied it happened. Just thought to bring that up because I’m sure some people thought I had it out for him to bring up an unsubstantiated rumour. Fighting cowboys in Alberta would be the coolest thing he ever did in his career so it’s too bad it was denied.)
Stroke Daddy Debut
Starks, 34, came to All Elite Wrestling in 2020 after a short run in the National Wrestling Alliance where he was NWA World Television Champion for less than a month in real time but three months based on the airing of the taped episode he lost to Zicky Dice. Starks came in during the pandemic as a mystery challenge for Cody Rhodes and his TNT Championship. Based on the match, he was later signed to AEW.
Starks spent most of 2020 on AEW Dark but soon joined Team Taz and had a feud with Darby Allin. That feud would culminate at Revolution 2021 where Brian Cage and Ricky Starks faced Darby Allin and Sting in a street fight. Starks suffered a neck injury on a bad suplex rotation against Hangman Adam Page but returned only in a few months, eventually beating Brian Cage for the FTW Championship.
Starks would work singles matches defending the FTW Championship as well as tag matches with Powerhouse Hobbs in Team Taz. The two would face Jurassic Express and the new tag team of Swerve Strickland and Keith Lee at Double or Nothing 2022. At Fight for the Fallen 2022, Starks would beat Danhausen in an open challenge only to later be challenged by Team Taz teammate Hook and lose the FTW Championship.
Stark Elevation
Starks would have a short feud with Powerhouse Hobbs before winning the AEW Eliminator Tournament for a shot at the AEW Men’s World Champion. Starks also won the Dynamite Diamond Ring Battle Royal in 2022, meaning he wasn’t just facing Maxwell Jacob Friedman for the belt but also the Dynamite Diamond Ring. Starks would lose the match but people felt this was a good indicator of AEW wanting to move Ricky up the card.
Afterwards, Starks would feud with the Jericho Appreciation Society, where he beat Chris Jericho, Jake Hager, lost a tag match with rookie Action Andretti against Jericho and Hager, beat Daniel Garcia, then beat Jericho convincingly at Revolution 2023. Starks would then do a short feud with the Bang Bang Gang, beating Juice Robinson and losing to Jay White by DQ. In the rematch, Jay White would convincingly defeat him. It was very obvious to everyone watching that Ricky wasn’t happy with this program.
Collision would launch that year and Ricky Starks got positioned as the number two babyface behind CM Punk. Ricky would get to the final of the Owen Hart Foundation Tournament and defeated CM Punk by cheating, which the crowd was split on. Starks also got a win with Christian Cage against CM Punk and Darby Allin. Punk would get his win back beating Starks for the “Real AEW World Championship” with Ricky Steamboat as the special guest referee.
It led to Ricky Starks getting a strange in program suspension (the Owen final was in Calgary) due to attacking Steamboat that the time shifted on so he’d be free to wrestle at All Out and also allowed him to still go on TV and be a manager. He would work as Big Bill’s manager, which killed the organic tag team Bill had been forming with Brian Cage.
Starks was supposed to compete in the main event of All Out to finish his feud with CM Punk, but CM Punk decided to punch his pink slip and go back to the WWE like the independent rebel he is. Starks would instead wrestle a returning Bryan Danielson in a strap match, which was the best match of Ricky Starks career. Danielson even credited him for much of the match due to Danielson’s health at the time. Starks would wrestle Danielson again in a Texas Death match and despite losing looked back on track to a push to the top.
Ricky Boo Boo
It’s here that Ricky Starks got on WrestleDream 2023 to face Wheeler Yuta, Danielson’s young boy in the Blackpool Combat Club. Their match got scheduled between Swerve Strickland versus Hangman Adam Page and Zack Sabre Jr. versus Bryan Danielson. It’s a tough spot to be in, but it’s the kind of spot that separates the midcarders from the superstars. A great performance in this match would prove that Starks isn’t just getting carried by Danielson and Punk and MJF. He’s able to perform like a top wrestler against a wrestler positioned under him on pay per view.
Instead, the match was completely forgettable, would have been forgotten on Dynamite, and most would forget it had ever happened had Jon Moxley not saved it on commentary. It was bland, it was mediocre, and it’s likely the match that took Ricky Starks from a path to the Men’s World Championship (the real one, not the “real one” CM Punk carried around) to moving outside the top of the card and in a different position.
Maybe some people don’t understand the importance of such a match. It’s a step down from what he was doing against Punk and Danielson, but the purpose is to show this is an undeniable, unquestionable star. This is a guy All Elite Wrestling can rely on in the future to be the star of the show. Instead? He took it easy. House show match. Floated through it. Two months later, Swerve Strickland was supposed to face Keith Lee at World’s End 2023 but instead had to work Dustin Rhodes. Swerve did what he could on short notice, and made everyone remember him that pay per view at the post show. Swerve Strickland took the spot Ricky Starks thought he was in line for. Swerve ran with that spot all the way to the AEW Men’s World Championship.
Starks would instead pivot to the AEW World Tag Team Division when Big Bill and Ricky won the titles from FTR in an under five minute destruction. The Tag Championship was still a good spot to be in, and they defended the titles on Collision while building up a program against FTR.
Cope and Seethe
On the October 14th, 2023 episode of Collision, Starks would have a promo battle with Adam Copeland which led to the two shooting barbs at each other in the build up to Christian Cage versus Bryan Danielson. A lot of the remarks referred to The Rock and Copeland’s former name Edge. All reports indicated it didn’t bother either man and it was just what happens when wrestling isn’t scripted, though in my viewpoint neither guy should feel good about it. Copeland shouldn’t be calling an opponent a vanilla version of a wrestler not in the company and Ricky should be hitting harder than bug eyes and, “Sent me over the Edge” when confronted by a veteran on the microphone. Neither man looked good out of it, and I honestly felt bad for Ricky afterwards.
People think that promo was the beginning of the end for Starks, but he was still an AEW World Tag Team Champion for almost four months after with Big Bill. Starks and Big Bill would lose the tag titles to Sting and Darby Allin, a surprise since most expected FTR to get their win back after getting crushed for the championship.
Prior to that loss, Ricky Starks lost a singles match to Sammy Guevara on the Homecoming Edition of Dynamite. It was another match with Ricky coming out with a sour look on his face, and giving a half effort against a returning Sammy Guevara. The finish was flat and the match just didn’t work. If Starks was trying to get an opportunity to go back to singles competition he was failing every opportunity he got.
AEW set up an Eliminator World Tag Team Tournament to decide the number one contenders for Darby and Sting at Revolution 2024. In the quarter final, Ricky Starks and Big Bill would surprisingly lose an upset to Top Flight in London, Ontario, Canada. I was there live for the match and can tell you that the finish looked terrible and most in the arena didn’t even realize Ricky got hurt. Most just guess his bell got rung and they quickly went for a finish.
Of course, Ricky and Bill were supposed to face FTR in the next round in what would be a rematch from their championship match. And so you can believe Ricky Starks got hurt and it was just an accident, or it could have been someone trying to get out of returning the favour to FTR.
One can only speculate, because it ended up Ricky Starks final match in AEW, with him doing countless interviews claiming he doesn’t know why they won’t book him on television anymore and why he isn’t featured. Was it the “bell ring” and now they can’t trust him? Was it his appearances with Cody Rhodes at the Royal Rumble and WrestleMania? Was it the company knowing he tried to get out of his deal and extended his contract through the option? Everything is speculation at this point.
Taken To The Absolute Limit
All you can do is speculate on what went wrong with Ricky Starks in AEW. Him never getting that pay per view main event at All Out due to CM Punk getting fired might have extinguished whatever fire he had in his belly for the company, though there were signs of that wavering back when he had to lose to Jay White.
For me, I feel like they took a chance on a guy and it just didn’t work out. He just didn’t really have it cut out to be a top wrestler in AEW. He wasn’t one of the Top 20 best male wrestlers in the company at any point in time. Even the pandemic heavy 2020 with a thinner AEW roster you had Kenny Omega, Adam Page, Cody Rhodes, Jon Moxley, PAC, Mr. Brodie Lee, Rey Fenix, Eddie Kingston, Matt Sydal, Maxwell Jacob Friedman, the Young Bucks, Darby Allin, Orange Cassidy, Jungle Boy, Frankie Kazarian, Chris Jericho, Trent Baretta, and FTR ahead of him.
Starks chances at the top was on the microphone, and most of his best moments came either getting a shoot zinger (like mentioning MJF almost quitting AEW because CM Punk out politicked him) or doing the Dolph Ziggler super cry emotion promo that fans often fall for. I don’t take away the fact Ricky had a lot of charisma, and a lot of people loved him for it. He’s likely to be popular anywhere he goes due to it, but it’s not enough to get him to the top of the card in All Elite Wrestling.
Starks spent a lot of time complaining about his spot in promos and interviews, getting into backstage squabbles, being an obvious source to various wrestling pundits, and boo boo facing any time he was asked to do something he didn’t want to do. When put in a position to prove he can launch himself instead of expecting the company to do it for him? He failed.
There’s guys who fail to move up the card all the time. It doesn’t mean they have zero value. It just means they weren’t ready for the push yet, or they are just not that level of star. Take Sammy Guevara for example. Guevara has had a World Championship match on pay per view. He had the TNT Championship run. He’s had major feuds. He just couldn’t elevate himself. He’s now in ROH repairing his reputation and career and when he appears on Dynamite or Collision it’s to make someone else look good. Guevara is doing it the right way and he’s working hard to be a valuable part of the company, no matter how much time he gets to do it. Guevara has had his squabbles backstage as well, but he’s coming out of it looking like someone you can count on in AEW. You can’t count on Ricky Starks.
For all of my jokes (Mid Boss Ricky Rhodes) I do expect Ricky Starks to make it to WWE under Cody Rhodes recommendation and I expect him to see success he never saw in AEW. Much like Ethan Page, World Wrestling Entertainment is the right environment for them; where top wrestling ability isn’t required to be on top, promos can be scripted, and who you know matters more than who you are.
I don’t consider Ricky Starks in AEW a failure. Sometimes you try with a guy and it just doesn’t work out. I don’t think there’s any situation where Ricky Starks ends up further up the card than he ended up in AEW. If he becomes a bigger star in WWE, it won’t be a missed opportunity for AEW. It’s just a different fit.
The revolution will be televised on a different channel.
