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Darby Allin is the jack of all trades in All Elite Wrestling (AEW).
He won the TNT Championship twice, won tag team gold with Sting, climbed Mount Everest and shocked the professional wrestling world last month by defeating Maxwell Jacob Friedman (MJF) to win the AEW World Championship for the first time.
Allin will put the championship on the line Sunday when he faces MJF in a hair vs. title match at Double or Nothing. If Allin loses, MJF will regain the belt for the third time in his career. If MJF suffers a defeat, he will be forced to shave his head.
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Darby Allin arrives at Sports Illustrated’s SI The Party at the Cow Palace Arena and Event Center in Daly City, California on February 8, 2026. (Miikka Skaffari/Getty Images)
It’s this type of fearlessness that Allin has brought with him to AEW since the company’s inception in 2019.
“It’s a determination to live life to the fullest,” Allin told PK Press Club Digital when asked where his fearlessness comes from. “I have such a lust for life and I feel like the crazier I get, the more mental barriers I have and the more confidence in myself. That’s where it comes from. It’s just determination and lust for life.
“I feel like I’ve lived a hundred lives in my lifetime. I’ve done so much and a lot of that comes from not being afraid. I have no regrets. I’ve made the most of life. I could die tomorrow and be completely at peace.”
Allin takes this mindset to New York. Since winning the AEW World Championship, he has been on a tear knocking down any challenger that has come near him trying to knock him off his pedestal.
While he has certainly proven himself worthy of holding the title, he said there is still more to do.
“There’s always something to prove,” he said. “The biggest thing I have to prove this Sunday is that the match against Max in Seattle wasn’t a fluke win. This Sunday at Double or Nothing, that’s the biggest thing I have to prove right now: that it wasn’t a fluke win.”
AEW Champion Maxwell Jacob Friedman appears during AEW Dynamite at the Footprint Center in Phoenix, Arizona on February 22, 2023. (Joe Camporeale/USA TODAY Sports)
Allin is confident he can beat MJF – in his home state – and take home a lock of hair too.
“Make a voodoo doll and torture him for the rest of his life,” he said.
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Double or Nothing will take place at Louis Armstrong Stadium in Queens, and it promises to be a card filled with hard-hitting action.
The map looks like this:
Thekla enters the ring during the Stardom women’s professional wrestling event at the Yokohama Budokan in Yokohama, Kanagawa, Japan on March 8, 2025. (Etsuo Hara/Getty Images)
- Megan Bayne and Lena Kross vs. Zayda Steel and Vita Van in a 5-minute tag team title elimination match.
- “Big Boom” AJ, QT Marshall, Mark Briscoe, Orange Cassidy and Roderick Strong vs. Shane Taylor, Anthony Ogogo, Captain Shawn Dean, Carlie Bravo and Lee Moriarty in a 10-man tag team match.
- Claudio Castagnoli, Daniel Garcia, Wheeler Yuta vs. Anthony Bowens, Hook and Katsuyori Shibata in a trios match.
- Kazuchika Okada (c) vs. Konosuke Takeshita for the AEW International Championship.
- Dax Harwood and Cash Wheeler (c) vs. Adam Copeland and Christian Cage in an I Quit Match for the AEW World Tag Team Championship. If Cope and Cage lose, they must retire as a team.
- Chris Jericho, Bobby Lashley, Shelton Benjamin, Kenny Omega, Jack Perry, Matt Jackson and Nick Jackson vs. Ricochet, Bishop Kaun, Toa Liona, Mark Davis, Andrade El Idolo, Clark Connors and David Finlay in a Stadium Stampede Match.
- Thekla (c) vs. Hikaru Shida vs. Jamie Hayter vs. Kris Statlander for the AEW Women’s World Championship.
- Samoa Joe vs. Will Ospreay in a quarterfinal match at the Owen Hart men’s tournament.
- Bandido vs. Swerve Strickland in a quarterfinal match at the Owen Hart men’s tournament.
- Athena vs. Mina Shirakawa in a quarterfinal match at the Owen Hart Women’s Tournament.
- Jon Moxley (c) vs. Kyle O’Reilly for the AEW Continental Championship.
Allin said pro wrestling fans who have never seen an AEW show before are in for a treat.
Darby Allin competes in the ring during AEW Collision on October 3, 2024, at the Huntington Center in Toledo, Ohio. (Frank Jansky/Icon Sportswire)
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“The unpredictability of what AEW is,” Allin told PK Press Club Digital when asked what new AEW watchers can expect. “You can watch any Wednesday, you can watch any Saturday, pay-per-views, whatever night it is, it’s going to be unpredictable and totally off-kilter.
“That’s how I like it. That’s how I like to live my life and that’s how I like to do my wrestling. Yeah, it’s just total craziness. That’s what they can expect.”
