Hangman Adam Page Reveals He Has Found Himself Ahead Of AEW All In: Texas Championship Match (Exclusive)

“Hangman” Adam Page’s path to the AEW World Championship the first time around was a reflection of the tenacity of the human spirit.

Early accolades lead to quick disappointment. Trust in others gives way to abandonment. Self-doubt alters your moral fiber. But ultimately, those who see you for who you are push you to overcome all that is thrown your way to succeed for the greater good.

Jump to 2025, and the “anxious millennial cowboy” finds himself in nearly the same position. Call it cyclical, call it intentional, but at a time when AEW needs its main character the most, Page is ready for the moment.

So why exactly does this keep happening to him?

“Was this a sports interview or is this therapy?” he asks The Takedown on SI. “That is a good question. And that is probably a question that I will continue to try to answer for and to myself, yeah, for the rest of my time.”

There’s a simple reason for that. The "Hangman" character is ever-evolving. He is an unsolvable equation, often puzzling in his complexion and motives, but that’s what makes him special.

To the viewer, at least.

“I’m a professional wrestler. Yeah, I go to work on Wednesdays. I do Dynamite, with pay-per-views on the weekends,” he said. “And, you know, I just do the best that I can at the job that I have."

His best makes him one of the best in the world. And at AEW All In: Texas this Saturday, he’ll face Jon Moxley in the main event, appropriately, a Texas Death Match (which happens to be their second together). The stakes are as big as the Lone Star State: the Death Riders have been the focal piece of AEW programming for most of the last year, with Moxley carrying the title belt in a briefcase the entire time. So, who better than the star the promotion ultimately revolves around playing the role of savior?

“For me, this championship represented everything good that I felt about All Elite Wrestling, and wrestling as a whole. And to have that hidden away for so long, it's disrespectful to not just the entire roster, but to all of our fans,” he said.

“I do feel a sense of responsibility to take that back out.”

That’s because when Hanger looks at the belt, he’s reminded of that journey four years ago that saw him manifest his dreams by defeating Kenny Omega at AEW Full Gear 2021 to become AEW World Champion.

Not just character dreams. Real dreams that Stephen Woltz shared in synergy with the man he portrays. He would lose the world title to CM Punk in May of 2022 in a program that would ultimately lead to a major paradigm shift in AEW’s public perception.

Page didn’t just take a backseat in storyline with the loss. He sincerely wondered if he would ever get to drive again.

“I think for a long time, there's a large part of me, very genuinely, that was afraid, deep down, that I had achieved the most that I would ever achieve in this career, in my wrestling career. And that would be it,” he said. “Certainly I'd maybe achieve some other things, but that was the highest of highs, and it was all downhill from here.”

He feared “Hangman” Adam Page would never be at the top of the bill in AEW again. Thus, he pushed himself to step outside of the arena that made him one of the company’s most beloved stars, and dared himself to be different in order to win the gold again.

“I did not lose sight of that goal. I chased it in maybe some of the more undesirable ways in the past couple years. But in the past six months, I feel like I've approached this championship match and the idea of winning this championship much like I did the first time. Same kind of attitude. And I've gotten there,” Page said.

That, of course, is the Cliff Notes version.

There was that program with Swerve Strickland that elevated the former WWE mid-carder to AEW main event glory. The house on fire. The needle in the face. It was a rare feud in modern wrestling built on truly believable hatred between two of the more layered characters in the industry. He would stop Swerve from becoming champion again, but had little to show for doing so.

“It was for something that brought me nothing,” he admitted. “I talk about having the world championship at home with my son, and how proud I was. I was proud. Once I beat Swerve, the feeling that I was chasing, I didn't get it from that. And I recognize that I got it from winning that world championship.”

Don’t call it a redemption story, though. He resents that. During his journey outside of normalcy, he also retired one of his heroes, Christopher Daniels. He’ll never wrestle again, and in AEW lore, it’s because of the “Hangman” Page character.

There are consequences to action. In an industry where so often, little matters, the ramifications of what this cowboy has done throughout his six-year tenure in AEW are perhaps the most impactful of anyone on the roster.

That’s the secret sauce to what makes the No. 1 contender so integral to everything that happens in this promotion. That’s why, after beating Will Ospreay in an all-time classic match to earn his main event spot at All In, he legitimately broke down answering questions from the press. Whether written by man or by fate, that path he has traveled mirrors something within all of us.

Don’t lose sight, though. It’s, in the end, his story. Now, he'll try and make AEW All In: Texas his masterpiece.

“My primary focus, as you know, is to be as authentically me as I can be,” he said. “And it's not with the end goal in mind of resonating to our audience. That's what I enjoy. That's what I like about this. That's what I think is ultimately best for any kind of art, right?”

“And you could consider, in many ways, wrestling an art, is to be genuine, to be authentic. I think that creates the most important art.”

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