Young Bucks aren't opposed to taking losses.
With wins and losses mattering in All Elite Wrestling, who has their hand raised at the end of the match is more under the microscope than ever. The Young Bucks are 2-1 as a tag team in AEW and 3-1 overall, having won a six-man tag team match alongside Kenny Omega. In tag team action, the Bucks have wins over The Lucha Bros (Pentagon Jr & Fenix) and Cody & Dustin Rhodes. Their only loss came in a ladder match against The Lucha Bros.
Their win-loss record might be more scrutinized than others as they are two of four co-executive vice presidents. Being in a front office position has fans questioning whether or not they are booking themselves to win.
"There's a fine line, but when it's all said and done, [AEW President] Tony [Khan] is the last call to order," Nick Jackson told Bleacher Report. "He has final say on everything. There have been two times now where Matt and I have actually said 'OK, we want to lose tonight' and it gets to Tony and he goes, 'Nope, you guys are winning.' We tried to dispute and we've failed both times. Of course, fans aren't going to see that and will probably think I'm even lying by saying it, but it's the truth."
Matt Jackson echoed his brother when it comes to the fine line of booking as both a wrestler and a member of the creative team.
"I never even wanted to tell people I was an EVP and it just kind of got out. There are other EVPs who love that. They want to talk about it. That's fine, but Nick and I have always been the type of people who say, 'No, I'm always a wrestler first and I want people to think of me as a wrestler.' We always just want to be one of the boys. It's tricky territory," said Matt. "They are going to say, 'Well, they're booking it. Of course, they're gonna go over.' Then there's the argument they are the popular act everyone wants to see so, of course, they should win. I don't think we should overthink it. A big reason we did this was to shine a spotlight on talent that isn't as well-known, and Nick and I are very unselfish in that way. We really want to get other people over.
"We don't have to win every match. We've been losing most of our career, people don't realize. We probably don't have a winning record if you looked at it. It's not that important to us, but we should keep ourselves to a point where we don't look overly weak. It's very, very tricky, and you know what? We are never going to be able to keep everybody happy."
The Young Bucks exploded in popularity for a number of reasons, but a large part of their success can be attributed to their Being The Elite YouTube show, which helped fans connect with the two brothers as they traveled the Independent scene. Over the years, Being The Elite evolved from a travel vlog to an episodic series. But don't expect AEW Dynamite to look like BTE.
"We're going to keep those things separate, and I kind of like that," Matt said. "I think BTE should live on YouTube. It can be the TV-MA version of our show. You can watch SCU do a PG-13 rant on the Turner program, and you can watch Frankie (Kazarian) drop 12 f-bombs on Being The Elite. As for the Road To program, I would love it if we kept a lot of that stuff and put it on the television show because that's a great way to develop characters and tell their stories. I think our television show will look like a lot of the stuff on Road To."
The Young Bucks will be in the main event when AEW Dynamite premieres on TNT on Oct 2, teaming with Kenny Omega to take on Chris Jericho and two mystery partners.
