For the upper part of two years, “Hangman” Adam Net web page has been in a tailspin of destruction and self-loathing, nevertheless All Elite Wrestling‘s once-“anxious millennial cowboy” is ready to write a model new chapter. As a founding member of the AEW roster and a former World Champion, Net web page isn’t any stranger to holding gold, nevertheless this 12 months his path to victory inside the Owen Hart Foundation Occasion (culminating in a main-event match at Double or Nothing for a future title shot) is blocked by an opponent he’s in no way met one-on-one inside the ring.

“That’s the second 12 months in a row I’ve made the finals. I’m happy with it this 12 months, as I was ultimate 12 months. I’ll be wrestling Will Ospreay at Double or Nothing, and it’s a kind of matches I’ve been prepared for. Plenty of individuals would ponder Ospreay to be the perfect wrestler alive, and I wouldn’t argue with them an extreme quantity of. He’s unimaginable, distinctive. Notably since he’s been proper right here in AEW, I see his opponents working and combating extra sturdy than they ever have sooner than, nonetheless to lose to him.”

“Best wrestler alive” may seem like hyperbole, nevertheless Net web page’s Double or Nothing opponent has the file to once more it up. Nicknamed “The Aerial Assasin,” 32-year-old Will Ospreay is 8-0 in singles rivals for 2025, was awarded Sports activities actions Illustrated’s match of the 12 months in 2024 (with Bryan Danielson), and ranked third on the newest model of Skilled Wrestling Illustrated’s annual “Prime 500 Wrestlers” guidelines.

“He’s any individual the followers have fallen in love with, understandably so,” Net web page says. “It appears to be like like two fan-favorites lastly having to face off. The stakes, aside from the winner getting a shot on the World Championship itself, couldn’t be better. It’s a bit nerve-racking, however it feels good.”

Ahead of their bout inside the Owen Hart Foundation Occasion Finals, Net web page and Ospreay formed a brief lived alliance to downside the Don Callis Family (Josh Alexander and Konosuke Takeshita) in a tag match on a weekly episode of “AEW Dynamite”. Was Net web page scouting Ospreay by way of the tag?

“In any case I was,” he says. “I’ve scouted him since he acquired proper right here. It’s inevitable that I’d end up going in the direction of any individual as gifted as him. I’ve watched him since he’s acquired proper right here, not merely as a person, nevertheless as educated wrestler. I’m watching his matches, noticing what he excels in, which is usually each half, nevertheless noticing the little flaws and holes in his sport that current up on occasion. Subconsciously, it’s one factor I’ve been getting ready for for a really very long time.”

Net web page and Ospreay’s match at Double or Nothing isn’t merely the long-awaited battle of two AEW titans; the match is the tip results of this 12 months’s Owen Hart Foundation Occasion (the Owen), an annual match held in honor of the Canadian grappler whose lack of life at a WWF pay-per-view in 1999 rocked wrestling world.

“I’m more than happy with the Owen Hart Foundation match and AEW — I really feel it’s among the many greatest points AEW has put collectively,” Net web page says. “To honor Owen Hart, as a wrestler and as a human being, yearly — and with this 12 months’s finals being on the pay-per-view, and the winner taking place to most necessary event the most important current of the 12 months — it’s given such weight, such significance, in what the match is for and the timing of it. I’m really proud AEW has been able to honor Owen in that strategy.”

Though All Elite Wrestling continues to be in its relative infancy as a wrestling promotion (the company was primarily based in 2019), followers have been following Net web page for a few years by “Being The Elite.” Created by Nick and Matt Jackson (The Youthful Bucks), “Being The Elite” chronicled the exploits of The Elite, an influential group of wrestlers along with Net web page, the Bucks and Kenny Omega.

“As soon as I start talking about my career and what I’ve been by, I can’t discuss it with out mentioning Being the Elite, what it meant for wrestling, and the way in which really, AEW wouldn’t have existed with out it. That was the precise car that created a reference to followers, and commenced a movement, a following.”

“For me personally, ‘BTE,’ in its entirety, was perhaps most likely essentially the most pleasurable I’ve ever had in wrestling. It’s arduous to consider that on the end of the day, it might on a regular basis be most likely essentially the most pleasurable I’ve ever had in expert wrestling, because of these guys are my most interesting associates, the oldsters that I’m spending as quite a bit or additional time with every week than I’m with my family.”

“All of us love the equivalent issue. We’re all creative people. Getting to do this collectively in no way felt like work. I assume it wasn’t work, however it in no way felt want it each, it was on a regular basis pleasurable. And it was one factor we now have been obsessive about. Various events we may be up in the middle of the night time time. For the cruise Halloween episode, I didn’t sleep for a pair days making an attempt to do it, and that was in no way a burden.”

“It was much like ‘Wow, I haven’t slept the least bit, I’ve been working,’ however it was such a pleasurable issue to do, such a privilege. The longer it went on, the additional we started to acknowledge the fruits of our labor; we would do Ring of Honor or New Japan [Pro Wrestling] reveals, and it felt just like the group was there to see ‘BTE’ various events.”

“The crowds have been bigger, the viewership was bigger, and at last it ended up being All Elite Wrestling. Nonetheless on the same time, you had the sense that us goofing off, us having pleasurable, is altering the panorama of wrestling and in a very optimistic strategy. It’s such a cool issue to be a part of.”

Nonetheless whereas Net web page, Omega, and the Youthful Bucks’ mutual friendship may need led to the creation of AEW, “The Elite” have since imploded. All three males will take part in Anarchy inside the Enviornment, a 6-on-6 tag workforce match the sees The Youthful Bucks changing into a member of forces with Jon Moxley’s villainous Dying Riders regular to deal with Kenny Omega and an all-star lineup of AEW babyfaces.

“Yeah, the Bucks have been assholes as of late, huh? I’ll be careful with how I say this. I actually really feel like I’ve on a regular basis tried to be careful with how I technique talking about them, because of I do owe loads of my career to them, on a regular basis will, and I’ll on a regular basis take note of that. Nonetheless I do assume they maybe have misunderstood the place my ideas is presently at.”

“I don’t know whether or not or to not take that as a slight and intentional, or as an honest mistake, nevertheless they’ve fully been assholes to Kenny, I’ll say that. I haven’t adopted up with Kenny since he’s been once more, maybe in the way in which through which that I should. Maybe that’s one factor I can do, and I do know that I should do it sooner considerably than later. I don’t know why I haven’t.”

Though victory at Double or Nothing would set Net web page once more on a path in the direction of the AEW World Championship, his earlier 12 months inside the agency has been a tumultuous one, concerned a lot much less with title pursuits and further with exacting personal revenge on Swerve Strickland. Now that their hatred-fueled blood feud has cooled to a simmer, Net web page admits he overpassed himself in his quest for revenge and says he struggles to know why followers nonetheless help him.

“I ask myself regularly. When wrestling followers watch us every week, they watch an precise part of our lives unfold in entrance of them. They don’t get to know us on a personal diploma, nevertheless it would most likely actually really feel that strategy,” Net web page says. “It’s a extraordinarily weird one, and it’s one which, in its private uncommon strategy that I can’t describe, is important.”

“After they’re watching AEW every week, they’re able to see in all of us points that we aren’t able to, because of they’re watching it unfold in entrance of them,” Net web page continues. “They’re able to contemplate inside the parts of us that maybe we don’t, and that’s what that has been for me. In all the points that I’ve carried out beforehand few years, the people who watch AEW every week believed in a better me than I did. It’s one factor I don’t level out terribly normally, nevertheless it’s extraordinarily vital.”

This interview has been edited and condensed.