10 Biggest Booking Mistakes AEW Made With Jade Cargill

Jade Cargill is the latest high-profile AEW exit, parting ways with the promotion that brought her into the professional wrestling world. She looks headed for WWE, with PWInsider reporting that she was at the WWE Performance Center as recently as this past week, as her deal with AEW didn’t have any non-compete clause to it.

This gives a good opportunity to look back at her AEW career as a whole, and while there were several positives such as her extended winning record and TBS Title reign, her run in AEW will always feel underwhelming. Over the course of her time in the company, there were a fair few booking mistakes.

10 The Mess With Bow Wow

Jade Cargill was someone who felt very much like a potential crossover star for AEW, but the closest we ever really got to seeing that was her “feud” with Bow Wow which went absolutely nowhere. The pair clashed on Twitter and in real life and even had a short promo interaction on TV.

However, this was dropped, and the whole thing felt like a complete mess. Cargill didn’t even seem to know why it was dropped, speaking on the Bootleg Kev podcast, "I don't know what happened with it. Something was supposed to happen, it didn't happen, and we moved on from the situation." (H/T Digital Spy)

9 Lack Of Proper Feuds

Jade Cargill and Taya Valkyrie staredown Cropped

The amount of properly extended feuds Jade Cargill had in AEW can be counted on one hand. Taya Valkyrie lasted a little while, her rivalry with Nyla Rose had some substance but was still not really good, and her debut feud with Cody Rhodes & Brandi Rhodes was probably the best.

The rest of her time in AEW saw short-term feuds which meant very little, and in truth, she had so few proper rivalries that had depth, progression, and intrigue. This was a major problem with her run as it led to her doing nothing too memorable.

8 Extended Partnership With Mark Sterling

Mark Sterling is a decent character on AEW programming, but Jade Cargill was someone who did not need any sort of mouthpiece. Sterling got too much of the spotlight in the Cargill act, and it would’ve been better had she stood on her own and taken all the spotlight.

Sterling wasn’t necessarily bad in his role, and neither was her previous manager Stokely Hathaway, but neither man should’ve been doing Cargill’s promos for her, that’s for sure. Cargill and Sterling remained together for far too long as well, which was a mistake.

7 Inconsistently Featured On Television

Jade Cargill was still green throughout much of her AEW run, and what she really needed was a lot of ring time - something she often did not get. In fact, Cargill would sometimes have just one match per month - even during her reign as TBS Champion.

Being a TV champ, Cargill should have been on TV every week, and she often spent weeks on the sidelines doing nothing, or else getting 30 seconds of promo time. It was not enough, and it led to her momentum being very stop-start, which damaged her in the long run.

6 Not Being Presented Like A Larger-Than-Life Star

One thing that AEW has sometimes had some trouble with is establishing larger-than-life stars, and if anyone on the roster had the potential to really become that sort of star, it was Jade Cargill.

She has an incredible physique, unteachable aura, and chemistry to the brim. Even without being completely polished in the ring, she had everything else needed to feel like a major player. However, instead of putting all the production and effort into her presentation, it was very lackluster overall. Tony Khan should have gambled and pumped a lot of money into her.

5 Breaking Up The Baddies

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Jade Cargill looked to finally be doing something significant when she formed The Baddies faction with Kiera Hogan and Red Velvet, who were each doing very little at the time. They were both elevated when working with Cargill, and they had the potential to lead the AEW women’s division.

Before they had any sort of proper feuds or made any form of change to the division, the group was disbanded several times with members leaving. The group became a shell of its former self very quickly, which was a huge shame as it was massively wasted potential.

4 Poor Feuds With Former Baddies Members

Following up on the previous point of The Baddies being disbanded, AEW also made a major booking error with how they did it. The likes of Hogan and Velvet leaving weren’t really built up too much, and when it happened, it didn’t feel like a big deal.

Cargill feuding with either woman should’ve led to a big PPV match, but instead, it was rushed through every time and resulted in quick glorified squash matches in which Cargill quickly plowed through them.

3 No AEW Women’s World Title Push

Jade Cargill had the longest title reign out of any AEW wrestler in history to date, and in that time of dominance over the women’s division, it would have been nice to see her set her sights higher.

Whether it be a case of wanting to become a double champion or relinquishing the TBS Title for a shot at the AEW Women’s World Title, strapping the rocket to her for a world title push would have been the correct call. Instead, she spent a lot of time with little change to what she was trying to accomplish on-screen.

2 Squashing Athena

Athena’s AEW debut in which she targeted Jade Cargill made it seem as though the company had big plans for her. For someone so talented, she should have been a focal point of the women’s division in the company, but instead, she lost her challenge against Cargill in under five minutes.

It was a glorified squash match that sent Athena down to AEW Dark for several months. Sure, she’s reigning as the ROH Women’s World Champion right now, but many fans don’t watch the show, so for a lot of people she may as well not even be there. This was a massive waste of Athena.

1 No Build To Her First Loss

Jade Cargill’s first defeat should have been a massive deal. Instead, she lost cheaply to Kris Statlander, who took advantage of a weakened Cargill and won the TBS Title. If AEW had instead built up a feud between Statlander and Cargill, and her win came cleanly down the line, it would have been far better.

Had Cargill’s last match been her first loss, it would have given Statlander such a bigger rub. Instead, her clean victory over Cargill recently on Rampage had very little buzz.