The Post’s Joseph Staszewski brings you around the world of professional wrestling every Tuesday in his weekly column, the Post Match Angle.

The spectacle of the Royal Rumble and its importance to WWE for driving storylines and making new stars got me thinking about AEW. It’s been four years and the promotion is still without a true signature, drama-making and star-anointing annual match like other promotions out there.

WWE has the Rumble and Money in the Bank, Impact has the Call Your Shot Gauntlet, MLW has its 40-man Battle Riot and New Japan Pro-Wrestling has the whole G1 Climax tournament.

Yes, AEW has some staple and special matches, but Blood and Guts is just WarGames, the Casino Ladder match is just a ladder match done whenever they need it, MJF has won the Dynamite Diamond ring four times and the Casino Battle Royale has usually left out most of the company’s biggest stars. The Royal Rampage felt like a cool concept, but we have only seen it once. So it’s time AEW tried to get creative to produce a signature match, and I think I have a viable and intriguing idea.

The working title is Contract Chaos. (Gimmick Attorney Mike Dockins will be hearing from me soon.) The premise is Money on the Bank meets “Deal or No Deal” in a five-to-six-person ladder match. You could go to eight if you want to really create chaos, but it might be a bit much.

Instead of one briefcase hanging over the ring there are three, with each containing a different length of time to cash in for an AEW world championship match. You can vary the times if you’d like, but the idea would be a week, six months and year. It can only have one winner, but feel free every five-to-10 years having two people come down with briefcases at the same time to put the champion in double jeopardy and set up the possibility of the very rare cash-in right after a cash-in.

By having multiple time limits, which the wrestler does not have to reveal, you add drama to the match as the participants will have to make a decision on which case to go after because a week and a year are a big difference. It also will eliminate the issue WWE runs into every year of either having the Money in the Bank winner cash-in right away to create that shocking moment like they have way too many times with the women to avoid trying to book the winner for months and months. WWE has run into issues like that with Otis and Austin Theory, as both were never winning the world title. Here, a wrestler would be forced to cash in quickly without complaints from fans.

I’d stage it at the Revolution pay-per-view for the men and the women to start the year and set up potential big moments at Double or Nothing, All Out or Grand Slam. Or they can do it as a network special on TNT instead of Battle of the Belts VIII. 

This is just one idea. Kazuchika Okada has thrown around doing a wrestling world cup and that could certainly be done and culminate at Forbidden Door, but it would not be something exclusive to AEW. Nothing will be the Royal Rumble, but as much success as AEW has had, it’s missing that annual match that can turn things on its head, elevate a wrestler and immediately generate storylines. It feels overdue.

There was legitimate concern around the wrestling world that Cody Rhodes was going to face Batista-like backlash if he won the Royal Rumble to face — and potentially beat — Roman Reigns at WrestleMania 39, instead of Sami Zayn, who is in the middle of an organic, Daniel Bryan-like rise. I hope we can all exhale now. Rhodes’ return and win were met with joyous reaction at the Rumble, he received “You deserve it!” chants to open “Monday Night Raw” and the crowd went nuts after he delivered the Cross Rhodes three times to defeat Finn Balor in the main event.

The end to his promo, with the WrestleMania sign in the background, was also excellent, as he finally told Reigns he’s taking the Undisputed WWE Universal championship away from him. Quite possibly, Rhodes’ pec injury that kept him him away for six months has allowed him and his story to still feel fresh and not forced in the audience’s mind. Yes, it was only one crowd. But with Zayn likely getting his championship match at the Elimination Chamber in his hometown of Montreal, it won’t feel like that story with Reigns will go untold and WWE appears to have avoided a Nightmare scenario.

We are starting to see what could end up becoming the jolt needed in AEW’s women’s division. Suddenly, as the ripple effects of Saraya and Toni Storm turning heel and going after “AEW originals” are felt, we are forced to ask questions and challenge our previous feelings about talent and their allegiances.

Saraya was just a great comeback story and Storm a babyface world champ. Now they are beating down an over babyface in Willow Nightingale and garnering heat. Then last week, Dr. Britt Baker — who was medically unable to compete — helped Ruby Soho defeat Storm in a match. Which side of this does she — an ally of Jamie Hayter — stand as an AEW original? Baker then flat-out asked Soho to pick a side on Rampage. There is some doubt where Hikaru Shida stands.

This is all while Hayter is starting to set the bar for AEW women’s title reigns with the whole top of the division in flux. Forcing the audience to question what they are seeing is one of the best ways to tell a story, and we are finally seeing it play out at the highest level of the women’s division.    

Asuka, whose blue-dripping smile freaked out a returning Carmella on Raw, finally getting a character refresh through her twisted Kana persona is going to be truly awesome. While the more cartoonish version of her kind of starred during the pandemic, Asuka at her best is an unstoppable and unbeatable killer. We may get just that as she should be the one to win the Elimination Chamber and face Bianca Belair for the Raw women’s championship at WrestleMania. She came off like a star on Monday.

Lacey Evans looks like she is in incredible shape, but her new gimmick is probably fighting an uphill battle because of how many character changes she’s had. Trying to be a heel and a member of the U.S. Marines is a tough sell, but she gave off Sgt. Slaughter vibes – which did work. I’d love to see her lean into her superiority. Doing pushups in the ring and asking for a salute was a good start.

Putting some serious storyline injuries on Bryan Danielson is smart on so many levels. Bryan is best as an underdog and this is one way to make him that in an ironman match you’d expect him to beat MJF in. It also gives AEW a way to have MJF beat Bryan that doesn’t put a drag on his standing as one of the best pure wrestlers in the world. The passion he showed going against doctor’s orders had some “Yes Movement” feel to it.

My jaw, and probably a few other people’s, dropped when Bayley told Becky Lynch (on her birthday!) that the only reason Seth Rollins married her was because he knocked her up (which the real-life timeline doesn’t even come close to.) I couldn’t tell if it was Bayley’s character just being desperate to hurt Lynch or WWE being desperate to make this more personal after cutting their cage match the first time around. Becky, however, remains undefeated on Twitter.

While not everything is perfect and some of the stuff is still predictable and cheesy, it has been really nice to see NXT put a lot of effort into telling some very different stories in unique ways and advancing them each week. Last week was a great example with the Grayson Waller-Bron Breakker brawls, Dijak and Wes Lee having a ’90s-action-movie confrontation and Fallon Henley and Kianna James’ loose friendship playing out like something out of a Netflix show. Though JD McDonough challenging Andre Chase felt very random.

Joe Hendry of Impact has continually gone out of his way to be different and do things outside the box. His hilarious “Edge’s Bitch” video to needle Matt Cardona and Brian Myers is as good, and maybe better than, all of them.

Karrion Kross is right in that 50/50 booking sweet spot isn’t he? Also, has there been a less impactful duo than Baron Corbin and JBL?

It’s always a treat to see the light start to go on for a performer and I think we saw that last week with Tiffany Stratton. She’s definitely put in some work after reportedly being injured in her “Lights Out” match with Wendy Choo in August. Her smooth moonsault was a thing of beauty.

Thankfully, compassion and Tony Khan’s spirited advocating prevailed and Mark Briscoe and Jay Lethal were able to deliver a beautiful and emotional tribute to the late Jay Briscoe on his birthday in the main event of Dynamite. The tears in both men’s eyes, the J-Driller finisher, Mark speaking into the camera to his brother and his family after it was over and the outpouring of love from the roster on the ramp was all incredibly touching. Moments like that help so much with healing when people are hurting.

Color me stunned that Rhea Ripley chose SmackDown women’s champion Charlotte Flair to face at WrestleMania after all the little teases of Ripley-Belair WWE dropped this year. It at least means Ripley is almost certain to leave with the belt and WWE still has Ripley-Belair and Belair-Flair to go to at some point.

Extra: So if WWE does the Sami Zayn vs. Roman Reigns match at the Elimination Chamber, does that free them up to still bring in The Rock for WrestleMania? Yeah, I’m being that guy.

Jon Moxley vs. “Hangman” Adam Page, Dynamite (Wednesday, 8 p.m., TBS)

The feud between Moxley and Hangman had been arguably AEW’s best story over the past month, taken to the next level by the promos with Renee Paquette. This will be the rubber match of the trilogy that has brought out an edge to Hangman we haven’t really seen before as he has vowed to knock out Moxley, who got a storyline head injury in their last match. Will he make good on his promise, what version of Hangman is left when this is over and does it kickstart a journey back to The Elite?

Gunther, WWE

The Intercontinental champion didn’t win the Royal Rumble, but he was the event’s breakout star. Gunther lasted all the way from No. 1 to the final two with winner Cody Rhodes – breaking the longevity record for the match at 71 minutes and 40 seconds. He also registered four eliminations, shared a much-anticipated moment in the ring with Brock Lesnar and did a superb job getting sympathy on Rhodes before his win. Whenever his now 230-plus day reign as champion ends, he will be on the fast track to becoming a world champion.