Damn, that’s going to age badly. Clickbait-prone title aside, talking about current day Kenny Omega is REALLY weird. There’s this belief he doesn’t have it anymore, that he lost every bit of passion for this thing called wrestling, and I can’t stop but think about the first thing Kenny said when he returned in 2022. Those words have been stuck in my mind for a long time, and have made me wonder who’s really Kenny Omega. And I’m not talking about who’s Kenny Omega, I’m talking about who we think is Kenny Omega. I’m not the most qualified person to talk about this. I’m sure there’s many out there that have been studying Omega’s career and Omega’s lore as a wrestler more than I have, but I think that I need to get this out of my chest: I don’t think current day Kenny Omega is bad. I think it’s the other way around.
“And I thought “Hey, with the rare Main Event slot tonight I might as well take the microphone and say a couple of words to you guys because I’ve been gone for quite some time. And if I do it in this format, I don’t have to worry about how much I take, I don’t have to worry about how tired or hurt I am, I can just speak to you guys like a normal human being, because really, that’s all I am.”
-Kenny Omega, AEW Dynamite, 8/17/22
One of the things that I have always despised about the discourse surrounding Kenny is this belief of him as the best wrestler in the world. Not because I don’t believe it, but because it’s not what really matters. Going back to Kenny in 2022, I remember when he talked about what The Elite’s legacy meant for pro-wrestling, and I remember he said that it’s not about ratings or titles, it’s about changing the world of pro-wrestling. For those that know Kenny’s story as a wrestler, those words are really important. That last phrase has been the core of everything that we have seen since 2008 and beyond, and has always been relevant in this story. That last phrase has been somewhat of a mission for Kenny, and was the fuel for all the things he did. And that’s the keyword: did.
Current day Kenny Omega feels like a wrestler that has given everything to pro-wrestling and has made every single thing possible to help the industry. If we think about Kenny as a wrestler and as a name in the wrestling industry, he has made the industry grow a lot for the past 15 years. I’m not talking about AEW, or even NJPW for that matter, I’m talking about getting an indie company like DDT to a packed Nippon Budokan alongside Kota Ibushi. This thing about Kenny helping companies grow and become bigger in the eyes of the world has been the norm, and he has done it everywhere. He keeps doing it now, with the massive work he’s putting on to push Konosuke Takeshita and Will Ospreay to the moon. But everything he did for the industry led him to WEMBLEY STADIUM. We can’t understand the last 10 years of pro-wrestling without the presence of Kenny, and without that statement he lived for.
And now we’re in this situation where people are asking for more. After everything Kenny gave to pro-wrestling for the past decade, even sacrificing his own happiness, people are still asking for more. I don’t want to say that I feel disgusted, because that’s not the right word, but after studying Kenny’s career (and how the only thing we know about his personal life is the things he shared) I can’t be happier for everything he’s doing now. I don’t want to see the Belt Collector, I don’t want to see The Cleaner, I want to see the real Kenny Omega. And the real Kenny Omega is not the best wrestler in the world. I thought we learned our lesson from 2019. The second Kenny wanted to have fun with wrestling again, everyone jumped to say “he was washed”, and there’s this thing that I also hate about the discourse around Omega: No one seems to understand he’s a human being. No one seems to understand that being the best wrestler in the world means giving YOUR LIFE to pro-wrestling. No one seems to understand that wrestlers are not best bout machines that will give you everything you like just so you can rate them on Cagematch and then jump to another wrestler and repeat the process until you feel empty inside.
“Win, lose or draw. Medical devices or not, you’re going to get Kenny Omega too. Maybe I should be mad too because the reason why I’m in this state right now, the reason why I have to have three or four sessions of physical rehab every single day is because of you. Maybe I should hate each and every one of you because I come back for you guys. It’s never for me.”
-Kenny Omega, AEW Dynamite, 8/17/22
Maybe is it me and how I’m sick of the wrestling community being a massive pool of insensitive douchebags that just rate matches and don’t really enjoy them. Maybe is it me and how I’m sick of the wrestling community saying the best thing about Kenny is how he wrestles and not the stories he tells. Maybe is it me and how I’m sick of the wrestling community thinking wrestlers are like toys. Toys can be replaced if broken, but human beings cannot, and it’s a miracle Kenny didn’t break despite everything he gave us, and despite everything he sacrificed for us. I don’t expect this to open some eyes, because the machine keeps working and capitalism is sadly the norm for American pro-wrestling, but I at least hope somebody understands what I’m trying to say. Current day Kenny Omega is a wrestler that has given everything to pro-wrestling, and now he wants to have fun pushing young talents. He’s not and he was never your favorite toy. He was just a wrestler trying to tell a story and change the wrestling world. And he did. That’s why he’s doing what he’s doing now.
And we’re lucky he did what he did for us this past decade, because Kenny does not even like wrestling! He likes to tell stories. I remember a girl that said Kazuchika Okada is an uppercard wrestler that somehow ended up in the body of one of the best wrestlers of all time, and I want to borrow that but change it up a little bit: Kenny Omega is a guy that doesn’t like wrestling but he just happens to be the one that understands it the most from his generation. And just because of that, people think he’s the best wrestler of this generation and think he’s willing to go through all the things he went again. Injured or not. Hurt or not. Barely walking or not. That’s why everytime I see a guy say “Kenny’s washed” or “Where’s the best wrestler in the world?” or “Give Kenny the world title” I want to vomit, because they don’t see Kenny as a human. They see Kenny as a machine that WILL give them what they need when they need it because that’s his job and he must be part of the never-ending capitalist machine pushing wrestling to be as souless as possible. And the second Kenny does not do that, they say he lost it. That’s why I say nobody understands Kenny Omega. Not even his fans.
Kenny Omega is the guy that had to go through a whole tournament carrying injury after injury TWICE. Kenny Omega is the guy that had to recieve an Hurracanrana to the floor of the Nippon Budokan and continue a match for 20 more minutes. Kenny Omega is the guy that had to carry four fucking titles while dealing with career-shortening injuries that didn’t let him even getting them up in the air because he was HURT. Kenny Omega is the guy that had to turn heel and do “5-star matches” (if that ever mattered) because that way he was the best wrestler in the world again for the people that criticized him for having fun again. Kenny Omega is the guy that told a story about the importance of love and friendship overcoming hate and sadness for over 15 years, and the only thing y’all can think of is that time he had a 5-star match with some guy. That’s why I celebrate current day Kenny Omega. Because he’s still telling stories, he’s really pushing young stars as Takeshita, Ospreay (even Wheeler Yuta) and he’s putting more effort into an Street Fighter 6 clash streamed on Twitch that a forced program with Chris Jericho and Sammy Guevara and a live PPV.
That’s why I think current day Kenny Omega rules. Because he’s having fun, going out the way he wants to go out and focusing on the future. Because it has been able to show the true meaning of the words Kenny said in 2022:
“We’re not pretending to be somebody that we’re not. We’re not a tribute act, we’re not a parody. We’re not selfish and we’re not in this for selfish means and gains. We’re here to leave a legacy, and that legacy isn’t titles, is not even match ratings, is not even how much money we make for our families and ourselves, it is changing the world via changing the wrestling world and the way you guys consume it.”
-Kenny Omega, AEW Dynamite, 8/17/22
So yeah, fuck this idea of Kenny Omega as the best wrestler in the world.
