Match Point is an ongoing series at Last Word on Pro Wrestling, where we look at intriguing matchups. They may be dream matches, first-time matchups, or hotly anticipated rematches. In this edition, we focus on the match between “Timeless” Toni Storm and Mercedes Moné for the AEW World Women’s Championship in the main event of AEW All In: Texas
For a show as monumental as an All In show, AEW has to bring the goods. With Mercedes Mone seeking a fifth championship, she has all the confidence to make her a threat. AEW Women’s World Champion, “Timeless” Toni Storm, however, is the last domino standing.
Both women have had incredible years in AEW. They are megastars, so for them to collide on July 12 in Arlington, Texas, it’s a huge deal. The only women’s match in the company that could come close is if ROH Women’s World Champion Athena had challenged either.
Ideally, more women coming into their own to stand as huge a star as Mone and Storm would warrant a need to be in similar spots. Currently, this is the biggest match the company can run for the women’s division this year, however. I believe that both wrestlers could elevate the next person up for these positions as a winner.
History Between Mercedes Mone and Toni Storm
Championship gold is not the only thing these competitors have in common. They each controversially emigrated from WWE. Mone, then known as Sasha Banks, vacated her WWE Women’s Tag Team Championship as she and Naomi dropped their belts on John Laurinaitis’s desk and left in mid-2022. WWE tried to bury them, but they shone ever since.
Storm did much of the same after she realized that her goal of ending up on WWE’s main roster didn’t bring her the same joy wrestling had for all these years. Through this, she realized that she didn’t really love WWE. Rather, it was the art of pro wrestling itself. Fortunately, she left in December 2021.
Storm debuted in March 2022 in her punk rock aesthetic, while Mercedes Mone took the long way around, after beginning tenures in both NJPW and Stardom. She’d at last debut in AEW on March 2024’s AEW: Big Business special. In 2023, Storm had abandoned her rockstar persona for that of Hollywood’s golden era, laden with unhinged innuendos.
The pair, since Mone’s debut, had been left largely separated until 2025. Throughout that year’s Owen Hart Foundation Tournament, Mone progressed past many competitors. All the while, she’d tease Storm, who would also make her presence known. At Double or Nothing, they inched ever so closer.
Mone won the Owen Hart finals in an incredible display against Jamie Hayter. Storm, meanwhile, defended frenemy Mina Shirakawa in a bid for the AEW Women’s World Championship. Through the road to All In, the pair have been interacting ever since.
Stylistic Differences
On the surface, there’s not much that differentiates Mone from Storm, but if you look closer, their storytelling styles add to their matches, dynamic as they might be. The frame in which they convey this comes from their strengths as wrestlers and the personas they’ve carefully crafted in their image.
Mone, as many will say, excels in big match situations. I attribute this to her Sasha Banks matches in NXT Takeovers and big WWE pay-per-views. It’s hard not to be thrilled by the dramatics of Mone as her big matches ramp up. The kickouts feel earned as the chase to an end can drench the immersed in sweat. As a heel, her performances in such outings are exemplified by such theatrics.
Storm benefits from her unique ways through the hilarity and eventual dire desperation to cling to her title. She’s said in promos that she doesn’t need other belts, that the AEW Women’s World Champion is all that matters to her.
For someone who has found their love of wrestling renewed under AEW, her chase for the belt is built upon that, from her hip attacks to suggestive techniques to thunderous moves that leave an impact. Since becoming “Timeless”, Storm has added her character in each movement that feels as feral and unpredictable as each comment she makes.
Together, these qualities are likely to build an atmosphere in a match that will leave fans on the edge of their seats. It would take an unmitigated disaster to transform the star power and work rate to a level unbefitting of their portfolio. Expect this match to build and build to a rapturous, cacophanous crescendo in a remarkable climax.
The Intrigue
Mone, already draped in the AEW TBS Championship, has accrued more titles. The RevPro Undisputed British Women’s Champion in Japan, the EWA Women’s Championship in Austria, and the CMLL World Women’s Championship in Mexico.
There is nothing more threatening to Storm’s reign than someone who has proof of their dominance. Across the waist, dangling from the arms, Mone approaches like an unstoppable vessel.
Storm’s commitment to the AEW Women’s World Championship sees her valuing it as the most important thing in the world. This is the only belt she needs. Like a mother bear, she will defend it until the blood is drained from her body and her legs can stand no more. With her personality contrasting with Mone, Storm is highly ridiculous, successful only by how much she’s thrown herself into this role.
These are two characters who have reached the pinnacle of their journeys and careers. To see this match be met with the same levels of hype as other big matches on the All In card speaks to how Mone and Storm have elevated their characters and belts.
Who Should Win?
Like with Omega/Okada V and Page/Moxley, this All In bout can swing either way. There’s a wide breadth of how AEW can achieve this, and where each woman can go from there.
I’m of the belief that Storm should retain against Mone. This would open so many creative doors for the CEO. To have come this far in collecting belts like a hunter accrues pelts, to come this far, to fall to one woman?
That could either awaken her character to a possible face turn, or more compellingly, a spiral. Madness that she can do so much, but one person can stop her. Again. A wild, feral, angry Mone would make her next story have such substance.
Additionally, it would give the woman who would inevitably topple Storm afterwards a megastar if executed correctly. Imagine taking out the woman who stopped the woman who beat everyone else?
Alternatively, Mone taking the title from Storm could have a similar effect. Stripped of her title, Storm could find either a new wrinkle to her character or a different persona altogether. As for Mone, she’ll sit pretty with five new belts.
Much like Thanos at the end of Avengers: Infinity War, the CEO will look undefeatable. Unstoppable. The mountain you can’t climb. Imagine someone knocking her down and taking the beacon of AEW from her.
I think that Storm winning would fit the theme of a staunch protector of AEW’s legacy, successfully defending that symbol. A symbol of hope in a time sapped of it. The way Storm has thrown herself into her “Timeless” gimmick feels symbolic in that way. She clearly feels strongly about it, just as “Timeless” does for her belt.
Furthermore, this would cement both women’s imprint on the company.
More From LWOS Pro Wrestling
Header photo – AEW – Stay tuned to the Last Word on Pro Wrestling for more on “Timeless” Toni Storm, Mercedes Mone AEW All In: Texas, and other stories from around the world of wrestling, as they develop. You can always count on LWOPW to be on top of the major news in the wrestling world. As well as to provide you with analysis, previews, videos, interviews, and editorials on the wrestling world. You can catch AEW Dynamite on Wednesday nights at 8 PM ET on TBS. AEW Collision airs Saturday at 8pm Eastern on TNT. More AEW content available on their YouTube
