Tonight marks another milestone for All Elite Wrestling as we present GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA from the Brisbane Entertainment Centre in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, coming to you starting at 10:30 p.m. ET/7:30 p.m. PT (or IMMEDIATELY following NBA All-Star Saturday Night) COAST TO COAST on TNT as well as streaming on MAX! From the United States to Canada to the United Kingdom to Australia, All Elite Wrestling is truly worldwide and bringing the absolute best in professional wrestling to our fans everywhere we travel! With this historical moment in AEW history, we are bringing three huge championship matches, as well as a pair of tag team battles, with serious animosity fueling them all!
The AEW Women's World Championship will be at stake in an ALL IN: LONDON 2024 rematch between “Timeless” Toni Storm and “The Woman from Hell” Mariah May! Theirs is a story of love and betrayal whose origins date back more than a year, and tonight in Storm's home country, it erupts once more. Fans will also witness the Gold Coast's own Harley Cameron challenge TBS Champion Mercedes Moné for her title, the first time Harley has ever vied for a championship in All Elite Wrestling! Plus Continental Champion Kazuchika Okada puts his title on the line against Hound of Hell Buddy Matthews, The Death Riders of AEW World Champion Jon Moxley and Claudio Castagnoli meet “The Rated R Superstar” Cope and “Switchblade” Jay White in a Brisbane Brawl, and Kenny Omega unites with Will Ospreay for the very first time to face The Don Callis Family's Kyle Fletcher and AEW International Champion Konosuke Takeshita!
It's going to be an exciting night in Brisbane when AEW brings GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA to the Brisbane Entertainment Centre, and fans around the world can prepare for the fights with a visit to the official AEW YouTube channel to catch-up on highlights from Wednesday night's DYNAMITE as well as previous episodes, COLLISION, Renee Paquette's CLOSE-UP with “Timeless” Toni Storm, HEY!(EW) with Glacier, and so much more! Then join us in Phoenix, AZ at the Arizona Financial Theater for an all-new DYNAMITE as we head full-steam down the road to REVOLUTION 2025!
AEW WOMEN'S WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH...
“The Woman from Hell” Mariah May(c) vs. “Timeless” Toni Storm
Where does one even begin when it comes to dissecting the gut-wrenching, heartbreaking saga of Toni Storm and Mariah May? What seemingly started as Mariah May's slavish devotion to following in Toni's footsteps eventually revealed itself to be nothing more than a long con perpetrated by the self-described “Woman from Hell”, all in an effort to (a) take the AEW Women's World Title from “Timeless” Toni Storm and (b) completely destroy the woman.
The first was accomplished at ALL IN: LONDON 2024 when Mariah defeated “The Timeless One” to end her third championship reign after 281 days. The second seemed to take place shortly thereafter when Toni wandered off into the streets around Wembley Stadium, but in truth didn't come to fruition until November 20th when, after losing efforts in Stardom and CMLL, “Timeless” Toni Storm announced to the world she was retiring from professional wrestling. It took the better part of a year from Mariah's November 8, 2023 DYNAMITE debut to accomplish both of her insidious goals, but it seemed on November 20, 2024 that she'd completely destroyed Toni Storm. Then DYNAMITE: WINTER IS COMING 2024 happened:
Toni Storm returned to the AEW stage but clearly not in a “Timeless” capacity; this was a Toni Storm who looked far more in line with the woman who arrived in All Elite Wrestling on March 30, 2022 to take part in the inaugural Owen Hart Foundation Women's Tournament. Furthermore, this Toni Storm seemingly had no recollection of the last 987 days she'd spent competing as a member of the AEW roster, much less her three reigns as AEW Women's World Champion, or the relationships/rivalries she'd cultivated with the members of the locker room! So far gone was her recall of her own life that Toni Storm didn't even recall her relationship with “The Virtuosa” Deonna Purrazzo that predated either competitors arrival in AEW!
Toni introduced herself to everyone like it was her first day on the job, and entered every venue like it was all a totally new experience. It felt as if Toni had regressed to her earliest days competing in Australia, most evident when she arrived in New York City to compete on the Hammerstein Ballroom events that closed out 2024:
There was an absolute disconnect between who Toni Storm was and who she'd become, however any time any one came near to asking her the question about just what was going on, Storm found a way to divert the line of questioning. It happened with Tony Schiavone, and it happened with Renee Paquette, but it could no longer be avoided after Toni Storm won the first-ever Women's Casino Gauntlet to earn this championship opportunity taking place tonight and she had to meet Mariah May face-to-face for the “first” time:
Toni pushed Mariah to her absolute limit with this escape from reality, but May's violent outburst that followed only revealed the reality that “The Glamour” had fallen for Storm's shell game. It hadn't been as long and drawn out as what Mariah May perpetrated over the course of 2024's first-half, but it was effective enough to make the whole of All Elite Wrestling question whether Toni Storm was operating in a state of deep denial, was faking this whole act, or if she'd completely broken from reality. All three seemed possible, but as Storm said when she revealed herself to truly be “Timeless”, she'd stepped into the performance of a lifetime and now it was time to make Mariah May pay for her sins:
“Timeless” Toni Storm was in control now, not just of herself, but of the entire situation pertaining to Mariah May, and never was that more clear than last week on DYNAMITE and COLLISION, especially COLLISION seeing as how the Women's World Champion thought she was in control of the psychological warfare but was totally thrown off her game by the arrival of Luther and the events that cascaded from there.
Tonight at GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA it is time for Mariah May to pay the proverbial piper when she steps into the ring once again with “Timeless” Toni Storm, only this time instead of a woman reeling from betrayal, Mariah's dealing with a Toni Storm fully ready to unleash hell upon the woman claiming that as her residence. Will this “Timeless” homecoming also be a night of celebration and triumph capped off by Toni Storm hoisting her fourth World Championship high overhead, or will Mariah May show the world that she has had the upper hand on Miss Storm since day one?
TBS CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH...
“The CEO” Mercedes Moné vs. Harley Cameron
It isn't just Mariah May that Toni Storm has had an effect on since returning to All Elite Wrestling back in December. As a matter of fact it was her words to fellow Australian-native Harley Cameron that led to this match taking place tonight for the TBS Championship:
Toni Storm actually gave Harley inspiration, a belief that she too could wrestle at GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA if she put her mind to it. Not only did Harley put her mind to it, she put her singing skills, her guitar playing, and unveiled a heretofore unknown talent: puppetry!
Suffice to say Mercedes Moné was less than enthused about Harley's talent for ventriloquism, but “The CEO” made a rather relevant point around Harley's win-loss record. To be blunt, Mercedes very harshly called Harley a loser, but frankly, when it comes down to the numbers, the TBS Champion isn't wrong. Sure Cameron had scored a few wins since her AEW debut in August 2022, but her only singles victories came on AEW DARK, and her only televised win was as part of a tag team match on the 9/13/24 RAMPAGE. Harley may have grown by leaps and bounds as in-ring competitor since first arriving in AEW, but that growth hadn't parlayed into meaningful victories. So Harley made a point to change that:
It took everything she had, but Harley managed to score a victory over the highly-decorated, world-traveled Taya Valkyrie later that night. Perhaps Moné's words were as much inspiration for Harley as Toni's, and that victory led Harley to plead her case with “The CEO” once again:
Again Mercedes denied Harley her ticket to GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA, only this time she was far more insulting than merely calling Harley a loser and certainly quite denigrating about Harley's accomplishment versus Taya Valkyrie. Yet Harley is nothing if not persistent, and perhaps it was not the best idea on Mercedes' part to treat someone just a tad unhinged in such fashion:
Not only did “The CEO” feel Harley's wrath in that moment, now she's set to feel it tonight at GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA with the TBS Title on the line! Moné may have four belts and three championships, and she may be the best TBS Champion in the history of the title, her 13 successful defenses against top-tier competition certainly lend those claims credence, but in those defenses and through her 14 consecutive AEW victories, she's yet to face anyone quite like Harley Cameron. She's battled top talent from Mexico and Japan, as well as the elite women of AEW, but none have been as unpredictable and chaotic as Harley Cameron. There's no telling what this woman will do from one moment to the next, or what words will come falling out of her mouth, and that makes her one of the most dangerous threats to the TBS Title Mercedes has faced yet. Harley Cameron has nothing to lose, the sheer fact that she found a way into this title fight in her home country is a win unto itself, but Mercedes Moné has everything to lose, especially with all the negativity she's spewed in Harley's direction. She clearly doesn't respect Harley, as a person or as a competitor, so this loss would sting not only because it would be The CEO's first in AEW, but also because it would come at the hands of someone she fully expects to roll over tonight in Brisbane!
Will we witness Harley Cameron pull off one of the biggest upsets in All Elite Wrestling history tonight at GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA?
AEW CONTINENTAL CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH...
“The Rainmaker” Kazuchika Okada vs. Hounds of Hell's Buddy Matthews
There's something quite scary about the way Buddy Matthews operated ahead of this AEW Continental Championship match begin signed for tonight in Brisbane. It's not as if he assaulted Okada backstage or interfered in a match of his or anything like that. He simply, calmly, stepped to “The Rainmaker” and spoke his mind. Clearly Okada was shook by having his personal favorite insult thrown back in his face after denying Buddy's challenge, but that didn't stop him from sliding into the ring with ROH World TV Champion Komander. Though neither man's title was on the line in the bout, both fought as if they were defending their respective crowns, and it was Okada who ultimately came away with the victory. Sadly Okada showed his true colors when he assaulted Komander after the bout, but at this point in his AEW career, that's just who “The Rainmaker” has shown himself to be. Of course, after laying down the challenge and being denied, Buddy had his eyes on this one:
While Buddy had done nothing more than call out Okada for his cowardice, “The Rainmaker” conspired to distract his rival during The Hounds of Hell versus Don Callis Family tag match on DYNAMITE last week, a costly distraction that unraveled the advantage Buddy and Brody King had at the moment, and ultimately led to their loss. Just a few days later on COLLISION, with the match set in stone for GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA, the two competitors were set for a face-to-face interview with Lexy Nair but the Continental Champion couldn't be bothered to show up as scheduled:
The question that has hovered over Okada's head since the day he signed on the dotted line with All Elite Wrestling is which version of this man is going to show up on any given day. Everyone wants to test themselves against “The Rainmaker” who won five IWGP Heavyweight Championships, 2 IWGP World Heavyweight Championships, four G1 Climax Tournaments, and two New Japan Cup Tournaments. They want the Okada who went 65-minutes with Kenny Omega in just one of their landscape-shifting NJPW battles, the one who created magic with Hiroshi Tanahashi, the one who helped redefine New Japan Pro Wrestling for a new generation, but what many may not realize is that that's who Kazuchika Okada always is once the bell rings. Everything else is just game. He knows what he's doing, he knows what this front he puts up looks like, and his performance in the 2024 Continental Classic is all one needs to look at to see that once the bell rings, this is the same Okada who accomplished all those accolades before he joined the AEW locker room. There's a reason he's held the AEW Continental Championship for almost a year since beating Eddie Kingston, and retained it against foes such as PAC, Claudio Castagnoli, Kyle Fletcher, Will Ospreay, and even in a Four-Way at ALL OUT 2024. He is “The Rainmaker”, he will always be “The Rainmaker”, everything else seems like a front to ease his opponents into a false sense of security.
Yet Buddy Matthews seems to see through the facade, he knows that the “real” Okada is still right there, and he wants that fight more than anything else in the world right now. “The Rainmaker” seems, at the very least, shaken by the challenge Buddy represents. As mentioned, Buddy has done nothing physical to the champion ahead of this fight, yet Okada recoiled when Matthews raised his hand, and that was most certainly not part of Okada's antics. Can Buddy, with AEW's first excursion to his home country, claim his first singles championship in All Elite Wrestling and end Okada's reign before he hits that one-year mark? We will find out tonight when GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA drops on TNT and MAX!
BRISBANE BRAWL...
The Death Riders (AEW World Champion Jon Moxley & Claudio Castagnoli)
vs.
“The Rated R Superstar” Cope & “Switchblade” Jay White
It is official; on March 9th at REVOLUTION 2025 in Los Angeles, Jon Moxley will put his AEW World Title on the line against “The Rated R Superstar” Cope. However, before that championship clash comes to pass, there's the not so little matter of tonight's Brisbane Brawl tag team battle pitting those competitors against each other, with AEW World Trios Champion Claudio Castagnoli on Moxley's side while “Switchblade” Jay White stands beside Cope!
Quite frankly, it's an odd sight to see Jay White standing on the side of the angels, but ever since the Four-Way World Title fight at WORLDS END 2024, we've seen his stance shift from a purely selfish drive to claim the World Title to something more...altruistic. The man has recognized this himself, he certainly never thought he'd be standing on the same side of history as men like Cope, Orange Cassidy, and even Hangman Page at that year-end pay-per-view extravaganza. Yet here “Switchblade” is, heading to Australia, and working right alongside “The Rated R Superstar” as both hope to end the reign of tyranny that has been The Death Riders' death grip on All Elite Wrestling.
It's not that Jay White has completely abandoned all hope of claiming that AEW World Championship for his own, frankly every competitor should hold that as their ultimately goal, but perhaps the best way to get there is by uniting with the others who standing in opposition to the... “D-Riders”...as Jay referred to the group. So in that, White has tied his future to that of Cope's, and this shared path takes them to Brisbane and GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA for this fight with Moxley and Claudio! The fact that this Brisbane Brawl came together prior to Moxley acquiescing to Cope's championship demands paints the fight in a whole different light.
However the outcome of this battle sways, it will inevitably have an effect on what takes place come March 9th. It could be a night where Cope asserts his dominance over Moxley by pinning the World Champion's shoulders to the mat, or where the champion shows his impending challenger why he calls himself the one true king of All Elite Wrestling. It could be the night “Switchblade” Jay White actually puts Moxley down with a Bladerunner to reinsert his own name in the championship hunt, or where Moxley smashes Switchblade's aspirations to dust.
Then there's the Claudio factor, and the fact that he represents the AEW World Trios Champions, meaning a victory over him could give either Jay White or Cope a reasonable claim at challenging for those titles as well. There's a reasonable bit of familiarity here between the four men involved after all; Cope has been on the winning side of two multi-man matches that included Claudio and Moxley, specifically at DYNAMITE: FIGHT FOR THE FALLEN 2025 and COLLISION: MAXIMUM CARNAGE, Claudio was on the victorious side of the 8-Man tag at WORLDS END 2023 that featured participants from the inaugural 2023 Continental Classic, including Jay White, while White and Mox have tangled multiple times over the last 5+ years, across both NJPW and AEW. He pinned Mox during the 2019 G1 Climax, as well as during the 2023 C2, and they had multiple encounters in December 2024 during the lead up to WORLDS END 2024, in addition to that Four-Way Title bout.
Suffice to say there are plenty of threads tying these men together, but all four will be doing their best at GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA to tear those threads asunder! Will Brisbane be able to contain this brawl?
TAG TEAM GRUDGE MATCH...
The Don Callis Family (AEW International Champion Konosuke Takeshita & Kyle Fletcher)
vs.
“The Cleaner” Kenny Omega & “The Aerial Assassin” Will Ospreay
Don Callis has brought AEW International Champion Konosuke Takeshita and “The Protostar” Kyle Fletcher together to form one of those devastating tandems in All Elite Wrestling. Fletcher has had a breakout year in 2024, particularly in terms of the Continental Classic where he scored victories over AEW Continental Champion Kazuchika Okada, Shelton Benjamin, The Beast Mortos, and TNT Champion Daniel Garcia, not to mention his win over Will Ospreay at FULL GEAR 2024.
As for Takeshita, not only is he the current AEW International Champion, he's also NJPW's NEVER Openweight Champion, as well as in the midst of a 14-Match win streak in AEW-centric bouts saying nothing of his tremendous successes in NJPW, DDT, and other contests across the wrestling landscape. “The Alpha” hasn't been beaten in a singles match since an 8/15/24 bout loss to Yota Tsuji in the G1 Climax that stopped Takeshita's remarkable run to matches shy of the tournament Finals.
All that success each has experienced since joining The Don Callis Family has been remarkable, and there's no question their alliance with Callis has raised their stock immeasurably, but what's unfortunate is that each man's allegiance to The DCF came at the price of betrayal. Takeshita turned his back on Kenny Omega, a man whom he'd been connected to since 2012 and who was in fact responsible for Takeshita even getting his foot in the door with AEW in the first place. Kyle Fletcher stabbed Will Ospreay in the back at WRESTLEDREAM 2024 to solidify his position within The DCF, a man who'd been akin to Kyle's brother for several years now, and who he fought alongside as part of United Empire in NJPW.
The part that makes these betrayals extra painful is the fact that Kenny Omega and Will Ospreay are the ones who introduced Don Callis into the lives of their former allies. It was Omega who brought Callis into AEW back in 2020, Omega who placed his trust in Callis for several years in spite of all the evidence that screamed otherwise, and Omega who put Callis in Takeshita's vicinity prior to DOUBLE OR NOTHING 2023 when “The Alpha” betrayed Omega. As for Ospreay, though he took part in the original AEW World Trios Title Tournament alongside Kyle Fletcher and Mark Davis, it was Don Callis who shepherded his permanent path into AEW and that began with FORBIDDEN DOOR 2023 when Ospreay defeated Kenny for the IWGP United States Heavyweight Championship. That rivalry created its own wild dynamics as, for a time, Omega united with Chris Jericho to fight The Don Callis Family, including Will Ospreay.
By the time Ospreay returned to AEW in March 2024 as a permanent member of the locker room, Omega had departed to deal with his injury issues, specifically his battle with diverticulitis, and Kyle Fletcher had signed on with The DCF. The two fought on the 3/6/24 DYNAMITE, some continued insistence that Callis had about pitting his family members against one another (he did it with Ospreay/Takeshita at REVOLUTION 2024 as well as on the 4/3/24 DYNAMITE with Ospreay and Powerhouse Hobbs), but their ties remained quite close even when Ospreay politely asked to be released from his obligations to The Don Callis Family. Callis acquiesced, but told Ospreay he owed a favor to Callis in return, and that favor came to pass months later when Don insisted Will join Kyle in the Casino Tag Gauntlet. They made a tremendous pairing, despite Fletcher's insistence on remaining with The DCF that stood in stark opposition to Ospreay's that he leave Don behind, but they weren't able to dethrone The Young Bucks at DYNAMITE: GRAND SLAM 2024. In fact, in the aftermath of that, it seemed Fletcher would actually choose to abandon The DCF at Ospreay's behest, but we all saw how that turned out at WRESTLEDREAM '24.
The war between Ospreay and The DCF seemed like it was finally over when “The Aerial Assassin” defeated Kyle Fletcher in the Semifinals of the 2024 Continental Classic at WORLDS END 2024, but all these roads came crashing back together when Kenny Omega returned on the January 8th DYNAMITE and it became crystal clear just how unwilling Don Callis is to let anything go.
Thus began the road that brought us to this “the enemy of my enemy...” situation unfolding tonight at GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA! In their mutual disdain for Don Callis, in the face of their mutual enemies that comprise his so-called “family”, Will Ospreay and Kenny Omega have set aside their years of animosity and unified for this tag team battle! Ospreay and Omega demonstrated on January 22nd just how effective they can be as a unit in a fight, but that was an entirely different situation against two entirely different animals. They managed to survive “The Murderhawk Monster” Lance Archer and “The Machine” Brian Cage in that arena-sprawling brawl but can they have the same success in an actual match against “The Alpha” and “The Protostar”? Can they co-exist as partners in such a high-pressure situation? The eyes of the world will be watching...
GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA hails from the Brisbane Entertainment Centre tonight on TNT, and streaming on MAX, following the NBA All-Star activities! We've got the highly-anticipated rematch between AEW Women's World Champion Mariah May and “Timeless” Toni Storm, TBS Champion Mercedes Moné defending against Harley Cameron, and AEW Continental Champion Kazuchika Okada squaring up to Buddy Matthews! In addition to those championship contests, The Death Riders of AEW World Champion Jon Moxley and AEW World Trios Champion Claudio Castagnoli will meet “The Rated R Superstar” Cope and “Switchblade” Jay White in a Brisbane Brawl while Will Ospreay and Kenny Omega take on AEW International Champion Konosuke Takeshita and Kyle Fletcher in a heated tag team contest!
Fans across the globe can get ready for the action by visiting to the official AEW YouTube channel to watch highlights from Wednesday night's DYNAMITE, as well as previous episodes, COLLISION, Renee Paquette's CLOSE-UP with “Timeless” Toni Storm, HEY!(EW) with Glacier, and so much more! Then meet us in Phoenix, AZ at the Arizona Financial Theater for an all-new DYNAMITE as we look towards Los Angeles and REVOLUTION 2025!