Swerve Strickland Beats Samoa Joe to Win AEW Title at Dynasty 2024

Swerve Strickland defeated Samoa Joe at AEW Dynasty on Sunday to become AEW world champion for the first time.

Strickland ended the hard-hitting match with his Swerve Stomp finisher to become AEW's first male African American world champion

Sunday marked Swerve's second shot at the AEW world title, as he previously competed in a three-way match against Joe and "Hangman" Adam Page at Revolution last month.

While Strickland did not take the fall in that match, he also fell short of becoming world champion since Joe made Page tap out to the Coquina Clutch.

Given that Joe did not technically beat Strickland himself, Swerve had a gripe and there was plenty of reason on AEW's part to grant him another title opportunity.

Since Joe is one of the toughest wrestlers in the business, he did not object to Swerve getting another shot, and he was very much up for the challenge.

In an apparent effort to get inside Joe's head leading up to their match, Strickland pulled a wild and unexpected stunt during the contract signing for Dynasty.

After Joe quickly signed the contract, Swerve pulled out a chain an tried to attack Joe with it, but the Samoan Submission Machine got the upper hand and used the chain to leave Swerve a bloody mess.

Undeterred by what had happened, Swerve used his own blood to sign the contract for their Dynasty bout, perhaps giving him a bit of a mental edge.

Still, Swerve was at a physical disadvantage at Dynasty due to the considerable size and strength edge possessed by Joe.

Even so, Strickland laid it all on the line in the biggest match of his career and came through by beating Joe to win his first major world title.

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