Technically speaking, this match shouldn’t really be on this list as it was billed as a straight singles match for the AEW Men’s World Championship between Jon Moxley and Adam Copeland, who by this point had shortened his name to Cope. The two men main evented the 2025 Revolution pay-per-view, and after a night of action that saw “The Hollywood Ending” between Toni Storm and Mariah May, a steel cage match between Will Ospreay and Kyle Fletcher, and Kenny Omega’s first AEW pay-per-view match in 16 months, it’s safe to say that the Los Angeles faithful were a little tired by the time Moxley and Cope got things going.

So if it started as a singles match, where does Christian Cage fit into things? Back at AEW All In London 2024, Cage earned an AEW Men’s World Championship match by winning a Casino Gauntlet match, and he could execute his contract at any point he wanted within one year of winning it. That rule has since been modified so that the contract must be executed ahead of time to avoid a situation like the Revolution 2025 main event happening again, but there were a number of fans who thought that Cage had picked his spot perfectly.

At the time, Cage hated his former tag team partner more than Cope hated the Death Riders, meaning that much like the Revolution 2024 title match, the champion was dealing with two men whose burning hatred for each other got in the way of either man walking away with the gold. Cage hadn’t forgotten about the fact that his reign as the AEW TNT Champion came to an end because of Cope, and he wasn’t going to let his former partner one-up him by having one more run as a world champion in a major company, so he decided to insert himself into the Revolution 2025 main event, and it almost worked out for him.

Due to how long Cage had held onto the contract, some fans had actually forgotten about it, but given the history of wrestlers having title shots that they could cash in at any time, those same fans all of a sudden thought that Moxley’s reign of terror as the AEW Men’s World Champion was about to come to an end. However, just as Cage landed the Killswitch on his former partner, Moxley grabbed a quick Bulldog Choke and squeezed the life out of Cage and forced him to pass out. With Cope already taken out of the equation, Moxley was able to once again escape with the title in hand, much to the disdain of the fans in attendance who at this point were begging for someone to come along and take the title from the leader of the Death Riders.

Moxley entered 2025 as the AEW Men’s World Champion, and the question of who will enter 2026 as champion will be answered on December 27.