Steve Cook’s Fave Five: January 2021

It’s not that I’ve been avoiding the Fave Five. It’s one of my favorite columns to do! It’s just that people keep asking me to do things reviewing 2020, which puts me in a dark place. Tough to go positive and rank my favorite current wrestlers after writing about the worst year we ever lived in.

Not like 2021 is off to a much better start so far, but there’s still hope for a babyface comeback! So let’s do that current Fave Five!

5. Drew McIntyre

I’ve been a fan of Drew’s run throughout 2020, and I’m also a fan of him being the first person in WWE to admit to getting the coronavirus and not getting heat for it. We’ve seen some others mention it on social media and get hushed down. Obviously, it took the WWE Champion testing positive for the company to recognize the virus. This says a lot more about WWE than it does about Drew, but he handled it like a champ.

What is it about Goldberg that makes people want to go away? I think I have an idea.

4. Oney Lorcan

With all due respect to Oney’s tag team partner Danny Burch, who is also a fine competitor, I don’t see Danny out on Twitter making videos scouting potential competition. This is the best NXT content I’ve seen in years.

#DUSTYCUP @WWEFandango @MmmGorgeous I GOT A COMPUTER pic.twitter.com/9UTeuC54o4

— ONEY LORCAN (@ONEYLORCAN) January 11, 2021

Oney with an in-depth breakdown of Breezango. The second one, which takes a look at Roderick Strong & Adam Cole, is even better, and the accuracy is something to behold.

THESE GUYS SUCK @AdamColePro @roderickstrong #DUSTYCUP pic.twitter.com/mUWPfg03NC

— ONEY LORCAN (@ONEYLORCAN) January 11, 2021

Amazing. I demand much more of this content in 2021.

3. Billie Kay

Everybody was telling me about how Peyton Royce was the strong link in the IIconics, and would surely move on to singles stardom after the team was broken up. That could still happen, but so far Peyton has only managed to become Lacey Evans’ second banana in a tag team on Raw that isn’t exactly setting the world on fire, even with a controversial win over the Women’s Tag Team Champions. It’s a team that could certainly use some advice.

Ironically enough, Billie is offering advice to tag teams on SmackDown. As her resume highlights, she’s very experienced in tag team wrestling.

Also…. @BillieKayWWE left this in the locker room on top of my bags 👀 #SmackDown pic.twitter.com/oxbedC4Xr2

— NattieByNature (@NatbyNature) November 28, 2020

After passing out her resume to everybody under the sun, Billie has targeted the Riott Squad as who she’d like to work with. Ruby Riott & Liv Morgan would be wise to take Billie on as management, as they’ve come close to being champions before but haven’t quite gotten over the hump yet. Billie’s been there before. Also, my idea to bring Rhea Ripley into the group is free for WWE to take. Won’t charge them a penny.

Anyway, Billie is hilarious and I love whenever she gets a chance to show it.

2. Kenny Omega

I know I’m supposed to dislike Kenny because I’ve been watching pro wrestling for a long time. That’s what people like Jim Cornette and his followers tell me. See, he wrestled a blow up doll many years ago. He also wrestled an eight year old girl, he apparently does weird things with his hands, and Dave Meltzer gives his matches way too many stars. All of these things should add up to him not being in this column.

Thing is, Kenny’s pretty interesting right now. Since he won the AEW Championship and officially turned heel, he’s found his proper place in the scheme of things. He’s also getting to appear on more programming, since his buddy Don Callis has been using him to bump up the Impact Wrestling show. Big 6-man on Saturday night featuring Kenny Omega & the Good Brothers! Gonna cover it for 411mania, so don’tcha dare miss it!

People complained about Kenny taking a back seat early in the AEW experiment. Even if he was pretty damn good with Adam Page in a tag team. Now, he’s taking the wheel. Gonna be an interesting year.

1. The Dark Order

I talked about this pretty recently. While everybody was sleeping on this group after their ridiculous segment to end 2019, they got better in 2020. Added some great young talent in Alan “5” Angels, Pres10 Vance & Anna “99” Jay. Alex Reynolds & John Silver got more familiar to AEW viewers and got to show more personality. Colt Cabana & Hangman Page got involved as side characters that were kinda in and kinda out. And, of course, there was the Exalted One.

Brodie Lee lended a certain amount of gravitas to Dark Order upon his arrival. Smart fans had an appreciation of his talent going in, he’d been under-utilized by WWE for years. Then he came into AEW and played a character completely opposite to what Luke Harper had been. It took some reps, but Brodie made it work. He became the singles star we knew he could be, while elevating the other members of Dark Order in the process, making us forget the joke they had been at the beginning of 2020.

The big question is what happens in 2021. There is a leadership void. Cabana is positioning himself as the group’s Dad, which lends itself to some good comedy. Anna is still trying to bring Tay Conti into the fold with assistance from Recruitment Specialists Silver & Reynolds. Page isn’t officially in, but it seems like his commitment is coming pretty soon.

Squad 💜💖 pic.twitter.com/jyoKUkksGL

— Anna Jay (@annajay___) January 7, 2021

This is gonna be a fun group to watch this year. No idea what to expect, which is part of the fun!