Another seven days down in professional wrestling, and that means it's time for WrestlingInc. to pick some winners and losers from the week was!Last week was eventfully from start to finish, kicking off with Carmelo Hayes joining the 946 on "WWE Raw" and concluding with AEW WrestleDream 2026, an event that has its own winners and losers article. Now, will that fact prevent us from naming a few more winners and losers from WrestleDream? Of course not we have more to say on AEW's latest PPV! We also have more to say about Max Caster, who was named in this column last week, but whose subsequent actions have prompted a bit of a reassessment from the WINC staff.Who gets the green light from the WINC crew this week, and who is in the red? That's what we're here today to find out.Here are your WINC winners and losers for the week of 10/19/2026!
Carmelo Hayes had a huge week, both personally with his wedding to NXT Women's Champion Kelani Jordan taking place over the weekend and professionally, with the star getting added to one of WWE's hottest stories in the main event angle of "WWE Raw." Just days before tying the knot with Jordan, "'Melo" was revealed to the be fifth member of 946.Hayes had been through a rough few months basically riding the bench, for seemingly no reason. Despite the near-constant fan support for him on social media, the star was rarely featured on WWE programming. He missed both WrestleMania and SummerSlam this year, and his most recent televised match came on a mid-August edition of "WWE SmackDown," where he lost a United States Championship opportunity to Baron Corbin. Even before his SummerSlam snub, Hayes kicked off the season by being eliminated from the King of the Ring tournament quickly in a loss to Oba Femi alongside Penta and Solo Sikoa.In the days before his jump to "Raw" alongside Royce Keys, who reportedly asked for his longtime friend to be in the faction, Bronco Nima, Lucien Price, and Jaida Parker, Hayes blacked out his X (formerly Twitter) account and got fans speculating. With how poorly he was being used in WWE, many fans thought this spelled the end for "HIM" inWWE.When Hayes pulled down the bandana covering his face after hitting Sikoa with a crowbar to assist 946 in a beatdown of Sikoa and the Usos in the main event of "Raw," fans both in the arena and online went crazy. So many have been clamoring for Hayes to be used on TV, it didn't matter that he was brought to the red brand as a heel.Hayes made for an excellent heel during his days in "WWE NXT," so he's no stranger to the role. After a few months of not even featuring on WWE programming, and an even longer time period of being irrelevant following his successful reign with the US title that was ended by Sami Zayn in March, "'Melo" in the main event scene is good for everyone, besides maybe the Bloodline. The obvious direction for 946 and the Bloodline is Survivor Series: WarGames coming up next month, and after missing numerous big events this year, that's got to feel good for Hayes.Written by DaisyRuth
WWE Women's Champion Chelsea Green is now the full-fledged champion, after initially scaling a ladder at SummerSlam to become interim champion due to an injury to Rhea Ripley, but her title reign hasn't exactly set the world on fire in the way many fans were hoping. Since winning the gold, Green has defended it only once, in a less-than-stellar match against Nia Jax on "SmackDown."On Monday, Green appeared on "Raw" to go face-to-face with Women's World Champion Liv Morgan, as the pair will face off, as of right now, for the Women's Crown Jewel Championship on November 7. Morgan basically laughed in Green's face and called her a pathetic "placeholder" champion who she just couldn't take seriously, and things didn't get much better from there. Green tried to get her lick back in the promo with a line about Morgan being a "placeholder girlfriend" for Dominik Mysterio, which just didn't cut in the same way, and Roxanne Perez stepped up to her to demand a match.Green didn't look bad at all in the bout and was able to hang with "The Prodigy" throughout, but in the end, she took the loss to the Judgment Day member. Of course, there was interference, but Green still took a Pop Rox and ate the pin. It wasn't a good look for the star, especially after Morgan's scathing words, even if it was a non-title match. To add even further insult, Morgan hit Green with the Oblivion, and stood took with her Women's World Championship to end the segment.Perez is now demanding yet another match against Green, this time on "SmackDown" for the WWE Women's Championship. If things didn't already look bleak for Green's title reign, Green also has Nikki Bella breathing down her neck. The pair will be facing off for the title on October 30.If there's anything worse for Green than how the feud against Morgan has gotten started, it's her "SmackDown" feud with Bella. The WWE Hall of Famer has reverted a portion of the blue brand's women's division back to a dark point of the Divas Era in her feud with Paige, at least. It's no secret that Green fancies herself a Diva and is a big fan of Bella, so while the match is going to be huge for her, personally, it's likely to fall flat amongst fans. It might take a miracle for Green to get back in the "winners" column after all of this.Written byDaisy Ruth
There is no way to spin this story: Max Caster completely f***** up. The man had been relying solely on controversy to keep the spotlight on him, and it led to him insulting coworkers like Julia Hart, making egregious references to the Duke lacrosse case, and recently making jest of deadly attacks in Saudi Arabia, which led the grand opening of his TNA career to be a grand closing. He's not the first wrestler with poor impulse control even former AEW World Champion MJF is guilty of that but he has made poor impulse control such a loadbearing part of his personality that it makes him a liability, especially to himself.Many wrestlers would simply turn into the skid, so to speak lean on being too dangerous for AEW and TNA and spend his time on the independent scene, taking bookings and hoping his bad taste gets enough attention to keep him in business. Instead, Max Caster has chosen the dignified response to the situation, announcing that he will be stepping away from wrestling for the time being to work on himself."I'm gonna go home, I'm gonna go to therapy," Caster told the crowd at Awesome Championship Wrestling. "I'm gonna get it right so that the next time I'm in the ring, it feels like I'm at home."I do not believe options are limited for Caster. I think there are plenty of feckless carny promoters who would be more than happy to have Caster poking bears and burning bridges. There is obviously time for him to prove me wrong and go the "Cancelled" firebrand route, but he seemed genuine.Strange as the words may seem, many wrestlers would be right to follow Max Caster's example.Written by Ross Berman
During Andrade El Idolo's successful defense of the AEW National Championship against Tommaso Ciampa at AEW WrestleDream 2026, we all witnessed a miracle. The bout randomly turned into a Handicap match halfway through as Ciampa decided to take liberties with Andrade's discarded pants, but those very same pants became sentient and kicked out at two when Ciampa attempted to cover them. The match itself was good-to-very good, but because people like kicking up a fuss over virtually nothing, the pants spot is the most discussed moment of the match.The fake outrage over this spot and the people who started it are the real losers this week, with the main criticism of the whole thing being that it's "tooWWE-coded." That's right ladies and gentlemen, after all these years it's finally been uncovered,WWE invented comedy in wrestling.It's totally understandable for people to find different things funny that's just the way we work as humans. However, the fact that we've reached a point where some people believe that comedy can't even exist out of the risk of looking like WWE is utterly ridiculous.Just to set the record straight, this is AEW we're talking about here All Elite Wrestling, the company that literally employs Orange Cassidy. Comedy has, and will always exist within AEW. This is also Tommaso Ciampa we're talking about here, a man who, when he was wrestling in PWG, had a signature move that was just sticking his thumb up people's a****. He's always had a stupid side to him and he's more than within his rights to do something like this when his daughter is in the front row. He's also beaten up inanimate objects for years, so there's another thing.I understand that fans have been scarred by WWE's poor attempts at comedy over the years, to the point where in AEW, some people just see anything other than super serious aggressive wrestling as "WWE-coded," which couldn't be further from the truth. PWG did tons of comedy spots and that promotion's DNA is woven into the fabric of AEW, as is DDT in Japan AEW Executive Vice President Kenny Omega made his name partially by wrestling little girls and blow-up dolls. It would only become a problem if these spots were done in every match on every show by everyone involved, which won't happen.Overall, whether you liked the pants spot or not, just remember that WWE didn't invent comedy in wrestling, and you are allowed to have fun.Written by Sam Palmer
It takes a lot to make someone like Jon Moxley crack, but these past few weeks have been more than a lot for Moxley, the Death Riders, and everyone in AEW.The death of Pac in September has naturally taken its toll on a lot of people, but Moxley has been the one person to push forward while helping everyone else and being able to keep his emotions in check both in storyline and reality. He was the unofficial MVP of the Pac tribute show for being the embodiment of a shoulder to cry on for both his colleagues and the fans, and he's remained active every week since Pac passed away. However, that will catch up to a man, and that was evident on the most recent episode of "AEW Dynamite" where you could see the emotion beneath the hard exterior.Then you get to AEW WrestleDream 2026 where he had to bandage up his emotions to take on Mark Davis in an AEW Continental Championship match, and what a match it was.Davis was the hairy brick wall of grief that Moxley was bashing his head against over and over, and as previously established by Marina Shafir, to get out of a situation like what Moxley is in mentally, you have to go through it. Not over, not under, not around through, blast it to smithereens, embody the message of the Death Riders that Pac left behind, be a professional who gives a s***. Davis wasn't going to beat himself and deep down Moxley knew that, so the only way to get the win was to grit his teeth and keep bashing down that wall of grief until it fell over. Only then could he let his emotions show, and that's exactly what happened.As for the future, no one should beat Moxley until the finals of the Continental Classic tournament which starts next month, and even then it should really be a member of the Death Riders who does beat him. Moxley is still the ace of AEW, still the Continental Champion, and one of the biggest winners in all of wrestling right now.Written by Sam Palmer
