Joseph Staszewski AEW’s Swerve Strickland is becoming pro wrestling’s greatest villain By Joseph Staszewski Published Nov. 8, 2026, 5:00 p.m. ET See more of our coverage in your search results.
Make New York Post a Preferred Source Swerve Strickland and Prince Nana AEW There may not be a better pure villain in pro wrestling than Swerve Strickland. Maybe because for the slightest of seconds he can make you believe he’s one of the good guys.
But we should know better by now. We should know all the feel-good energy around him, Kofi and Austin Creed wasn’t going to last long, especially when “Hangman” Adam Page is involved.
AEW’s resident cowboy tried to warn the audience and the former WWE stars in this storyline about the character they were dealing with. Creed and Kofi thought they could control it — but there is no such thing with Strickland and possibly Page in any story they are in together.
Strickland took his request for a Texas Death Match for the AEW Trios championships at Full Gear pay-per-view on Nov. 14 a step further last week, giving us a scene straight out of a movie. Even Prince Nana’s dance hits different — the slowness of its intent foreshadowing the carnage that is to come — when the former AEW World champion is at his worst.
