For a brief time, Hangman Adam Page looked to be aligning with FTR. It never happened. It should have.
Role-Players Realm is where GrapPro explores the “What if?” in wrestling discussion and analysis. Fantasy booking can often be mixed up in editorial analysis and I would like to try to separate the two. What I think could have happened or what could happen isn’t always the same as what I think should have happened or what should happen.
2020 was a summer like most summers for Hangman Adam Page. In other words? It wasn’t good.
Back in 2020 I talked about how unsure I was with how All Elite Wrestling was using Hangman Page. He had been having a great 2020 by becoming AEW World Tag Team Champion with Kenny Omega and proving him and Kenny could beat the defacto “greatest tag team” in The Young Bucks at Revolution. Once the pandemic hit, there was no longer the crowds to validate the popularity of Adam Page, so his character started to get played with.
They ran an angle in which the Young Bucks were trying to get their rematch with Kenny and Adam at All Out 2020, and at one point there was a gauntlet for the shot at All Out. Bucks had been feuding with FTR, who had just come into the company to play the “other greatest tag team” role in AEW. It was clear the tag division would revolve around these two teams clashing, with the current tag champions just being sort of in the way.
Page ended up interfering in the match and helping FTR beat the Young Bucks, costing them their chance at having the big rematch. FTR would instead get the shot. Page helping the heels, seeming to like them, being chummy with FTR, and now being yelled at by the Young Bucks and questioned by Kenny Omega? It all felt like it was going to lead to Kenny Omega and Hangman Page splitting. It felt like it made sense that you’d have three men on one side (Kenny and the Bucks) and three on the other (FTR and Hangman Page.)
FTR and Page even had a bit of a nickname for themselves as The Mid-Atlantic Boys after Hangman cheers, “To the Mid-Atlantic.”
Hangman Page is from Virginia and was trained by the Boogie Woogie Man Jimmy Valiant, who spent a good chunk of the 1980s in Jim Crockett Promotions, often promoted as Mid-Atlantic Championship Wrestling.
FTR in Dax Harwood and Cash Wheeler are both North Carolina boys and in being throwbacks, a revival of 80s territory wrestling, much of their image and aesthetic is about the same Jim Crockett Promotions territory. At the time they were also spending time both with Arn Anderson and Tully Blanchard, once known as the Brainbuster in the WWF, but better known as a tag team and members of the Four Horsemen.
It was also around that time that Cody Rhodes threw up the four fingers in a promo and many wondered if Cody Rhodes, Hangman Page, and FTR were going to form a modern day Four Horsemen, but I’ll leave that be. I’m not interested in a Rhodes boy pretending to be Ric Flair. Even if that would be ironic since Ric Flair once tried to pretend to be Dusty Rhodes. Off topic.
FTR and Hangman Page made a lot of sense, and in both aesthetic and style, Hangman certainly fit FTR much better than he ever fit The Elite. From the drinking to the hard hitting, it felt like they were a match made in heaven. As the Mid-Atlantic Boys it could have been the best trios in All Elite Wrestling.
At the time I thought this was absolutely going to happen, even just once. It just felt like AEW President Tony Khan would book The Elite (Kenny Omega and the Young Bucks) versus the Mid-Atlantic Boys (Hangman Page and FTR) for at least one episode of Dynamite. The time to do it was either the Dynamite before All Out (The Bucks had this weird random four way tag match instead) or soon after All Out (The September 10th, 2020 episode of Dynamite featured *three* tag matches. You’re telling me one couldn’t have been a trios instead?) and essentially they killed the angle at All Out.
At All Out, FTR won the AEW World Tag Team Championship from Kenny and Hangman. And Kenny essentially blamed Hangman. He didn’t say that, but when Hangman tried to use Kenny to rest, Kenny let him fall. It was the beginning of Kenny Omega’s heel turn. Kenny would defeat Hangman Page in the AEW World Title Eliminator Tournament final at Full Gear and go on to beat Jon Moxley for the AEW Men’s World Championship at Winter is Fallen. Hangman would spend months having to build himself back up to eventually face Kenny and beat him at Full Gear 2021.
FTR on the other hand would form their own little crew in The Pinnacle, basically an AEW Horsemen with MJF, Wardlow, Shawn Spears, and FTR. MJF definitely fit the Ric Flair bill. FTR could be Arn and Tully. Wardlow essentially fit that Lex Luger/Sid Vicious powerhouse role that had been used over the years with the Four Horsemen. Shawn Spears? I liked The Chairman, but he wasn’t really Horsemen material.
That said, I was a big fan of Pinnacle. I actually pushed for it to be reformed a few times, much to the chagrin of all AEW fans near me. I still have to wonder, what if we didn’t get The Pinnacle and instead got The Mid-Atlantic Boys?
What if Hangman Page and FTR formed the Mid-Atlantic Boys?
Originally, FTR were heels against the babyface Elite, but the Elite would eventually be heels in AEW. First Kenny Omega would turn and team with Don Callis. Eventually the Young Bucks would go along with them, as would Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson fresh off a run in WWE and now working for TNA Wrestling.
While FTR went heel for Pinnacle, I think with Adam Page they’d work more babyface. I don’t see anyone really booing those three having hard hitting matches.
At the time you had crews like Team Taz with Ricky Starks, Brian Cage, and Powerhouse Hobbs who would be perfect to face the Mid-Atlantic Boys. It would have been nice to have Mr. Brodie Lee and the Dark Order take them on but we know that couldn’t have happened sadly (I do believe Page was supposed to feud with Brodie Lee after Full Gear 2020 but I can’t confirm it), but this trios does mean the Hangman Page flirtation with Dark Order doesn’t really go anywhere. He’s got the Mid-Atlantic to represent instead.
It’s possible that as the Mid-Atlantic Boys they get an extra member, but I don’t know who really works for that. You could add Dustin Rhodes, who might be from Texas but actually worked in JCP/WCW, but that would take him away from The Nightmare Family. Maybe even a young lion (can I say that for AEW? Probably not) like Griff Garrison might have worked as AEW did like to put a young wrestler with veterans to build their character up. Griff is an Atlanta boy so he’d work. Frankie Kazarian was from California but he could have fit the Mid-Atlantic Boys at the time.
I just realized if Arn is managing them then Brock Anderson likely comes along. I had hope for Brock but history has shown that he really doesn’t seem to have the drive to be anything more than a less recognized but better working David Flair. Maybe it’s best to not have a young guy in the crew. How do you complain about there being no set up for young guys to learn when you have Arn Anderson to learn from?
I also would have went with Arn Anderson as the manager, have him separated from Cody Rhodes, as he would have much better much to work with this. You could also still do The Pinnacle with Tully Blanchard and have it focused on MJF, Wardlow, and Shawn Spears. Right there you would have a built in feud with the Mid-Atlantic Boys.
Mid-Atlantic versus The Elite
Eventually the focus would be to have the Mid-Atlantic Boys face off with The Elite. That’s where the story eventually goes anyway. Hangman Page faces Kenny Omega at Full Gear 2021 for the AEW Men’s World Championship. FTR were actually kept away from The Young Bucks until 2022 when Matt and Nick Jackson eliminated Dax Harwood from a number one contender battle royal. You could bump that faceoff in the schedule to the 2021 calendar year.
I wonder if you go all the way with it. All the way? You know what I’m talking about.
Blood and Guts.
If you do Blood and Guts, it replaces the 10-man elimination tag match that happened between Dark Order and The Elite which led to Hangman Page losing his title shot.
You could do it where The Elite win Blood and Guts and maybe Hangman Page and FTR lose their title shots for All Out. Then once Page and FTR return you have two massive showdowns for the Men’s World and World Tag Championships.
If you do Blood and Guts you need two more for the Mid-Atlantic Boys, and while it would be perfect to make it The Briscoe Brothers we know that WBD have trouble accepting them on television. Instead, I would go ahead and dip into the AEW/TNA relationship at the time. Willie Mack and Rich Swann fit the Mid-Atlantic flavour just fine, and Rich Swann likely wanted some revenge against Kenny Omega for taking his Impact Championship. He wouldn’t get it, but it would at least bring some Impact Wrestling flavour to AEW that was more than just the Good Brothers.
After History Changes
So you got to Full Gear 2021. FTR are the new AEW World Tag Team Champions beating the Young Bucks. Hangman Page is the new AEW Men’s World Champion after beating Kenny Omega.
You could still have them work some trios matches, which could be the jumpstart to AEW eventually doing the AEW Trios Championship. We saw The Elite with the gold. We saw the Mid-Atlantic Boys. It’s now time for real gold for a trios team to win.
FTR definitely chummied up to CM Punk in 2022 and 2023, and I don’t really know how that might work into the match Hangman Page had with CM Punk at Double or Nothing. It might be best for Hangman and FTR to go their separate way prior to that, as it might just make things confusing. CM Punk doesn’t fit the Mid-Atlantic ethos at all.
In this history, Hangman Page doesn’t really do his underdog story to the World Championship anymore, nor does he build a bond with the Dark Order and turn them into lovable dorks. Instead he stays high on the card in big time trios matches, so thankfully we probably don’t have to deal with a Matt Hardy feud. After some big time trios matchups, Hangman doesn’t need as much time to heat up. He’ll be easily looked upon as a contender for Kenny all year.
It might also make a reunion with The Elite in 2023 a bit awkward, but that was awkward anyway. It was rushed in case that ended up the last time All Elite Wrestling saw The Elite as their contracts were up.
Now in 2024, with Hangman Page now an antagonist with good reason to be (Swerve trespassing in his home, the fans choosing Swerve over Hangman) it would actually be a great time for them to revitalize the Mid-Atlantic Boys. FTR are out of the World Tag Championship hunt after losing that three way match at All In, and don’t really have a CM Punk or Adam Copeland to team up with. A heel turn for FTR to sort of be Hangman’s crew again would have been a good way to stack the odds against Swerve Strickland, especially with the upcoming cage match to try to keep everyone out.
Worth Changing The Past?
In some ways.
AEW absolutely should have ran this match once. Just once and I would have been satisfied and not written over 2,000 words on what was basically a few segments and a heel tag team messing with a conflicted alcoholic babyface.
It would have led to an interesting AEW alternate universe where they plan the trios division early, running the Mid-Atlantic Boys against the eventual Pinnacle, Team Taz, and eventually The Elite. They also could have worked The Inner Circle before they turned babyface. Maybe Hangman gets his win back against Jericho around then? That still hasn’t happened.
I don’t know how well FTR and Hangman Page actually get along in real life, and we know that in AEW, storylines often die because two sides don’t want to work together. That’s just the nature of their business. So maybe none of this happened because none of them wanted it to happen.
I just think there was a real missed opportunity to do this, even just once, and I would have liked a history in which Kenny Omega and the Young Bucks went balls to the wall against Hangman Page and FTR in a 20+ minute trios showdown.
We probably would have got a much better Blood and Guts out of it as well.
And anything to get Arn away from the Cody/Nightmare Family/Factory vortex that looked to take years off of his life. Then again we’d miss out on The Glock.
Guess it’s best to just leave some history be.
