Big Boom AJ of The Costco Guys revealed on Thursday that he will be returning to the AEW ring soon — as in next weekend soon.
In a quick video posted to his Instagram account, the 50-year-old born Andrew Befumo Jr. answered a X question about “when is your next AEW wrestling show?” Lifting weights, he said he would be in the ring next Sunday at AEW Revolution.
To this point, there has been no build to any match, either on AEW TV, ROH TV or the company’s social media accounts.
AJ last competed alongside QT Marshall on a late-December 2025 edition of ROH TV, defeating The Frat House. Before that, he and Marshall defeated RPG Vice on the Full Gear pre-show last November.
The viral social media star, known for he and son Big Justice’s love of double chocolate chunk cookies and chicken bakes at the big box store, first wrestled for AEW at November 2024’s Full Gear with a win over Marshall. He then returned at the following March’s Revolution, teaming with Mark Briscoe and Orange Cassidy in a win over Johnny TV & MxM Collection.
He also was part of last July’s All In: Texas, teaming with Hologram, Tomohiro Ishii and Kyle O’Reilly in a win over Rocky Romero, Hechicero, Lance Archer and Trent Beretta.
Big Boom AJ of The Costco Guys will be in action on Saturday’s All In Zero Hour pre-show in an eight-man tag.
In a bout announced during Thursday’s AEW Collision, AJ agreed to team with Tomohiro Ishii, Hologram, and Kyle O’Reilly against The Don Callis Family unit of Trent Beretta, Rocky Romero, Lance Archer, and Hechicero.
This will be the third time that AJ has suited up for an AEW match, with both prior appearances also coming on Zero Hour pre-shows. The viral internet star and fellow internet celebrities The Rizzler and Big Justice are signed to AEW contracts and do promotional work for the brand ahead of major events. Both The Rizzler and Big Justice also appeared on Thursday’s Collision in the segment announcing Saturday’s match.
AEW All In, Saturday, July 12, 3 p.m. main card, 1 p.m. Zero Hour pre-show —
Texas death match: AEW World Champion Jon Moxley defends against Hangman Adam Page
AEW Women’s World Champion Toni Storm defends against Mercedes Mone
AEW Continental Champion Kazuchika Okada vs. AEW International Champion Kenny Omega in a winner takes all match for the AEW Unified Championship
AEW Tag Team Champions Bobby Lashley & Shelton Benjamin defend against Kevin Knight & Mike Bailey, and Christian Cage & Nick Wayne in a three-way
TNT Champion Adam Cole defends against Kyle Fletcher
AEW Trios Champions Samoa Joe, Katsuyori Shibata & Powerhouse Hobbs defend against Claudio Castagnoli, Wheeler Yuta & Gabe Kidd
Men’s Casino Gauntlet match for a future World title shot
Women’s Casino Gauntlet match for a future World title shot
Will Opsreay & Swerve Strickland vs. The Young Bucks
Zero Hour: FTR vs. The Outrunners
Zero Hour: Big Boom AJ, Tomohiro Ishii, Hologram & Kyle O’Reilly vs. Trent Beretta, Rocky Romero, Lance Archer & Hechicero
As one might expect with Sunday’s AEW Revolution being held in Los Angeles, several celebrities were in the crowd at the Crypto.com Arena.
Most were featuring during the Swerve Strickland vs. Ricochet no. 1 contender’s match including Leslie Jones, formerly of Saturday Night Live fame and who commentator Nigel McGuinness jokingly thought was Prince Nana’s mother.
Also shown during that match: actor Ken Jeong (The Hangover movies, The Masked Singer, Community), comedians Brad Williams and Ron Funches, and Los Angeles Lakers legend Michael Cooper.
Jeong notably had some WWE appearances in the past and had a feud of sorts with John Cena.
Director Ash Avildsen and actors Kelli Berglund and Damaris Lewis from the Queen of the Ring movie that debuted this weekend and features both AEW Women’s World Champion Toni Storm and Kamille were seated behind the commentary table and briefly spoke before the main event.
During the pre-show, Adam DeVine and Tony Cavalero of HBO’s The Righteous Gemstones made an appearance, delivering a double chokeslam to Mansoor. It took place after a trios match that already featured social media star Big Boom AJ returning to action, flanked by Big Justice and The Rizzler who came out with Orange Cassidy.
— Bryan and I will be back tonight talking the weekend shows and the latest wrestling news as well as taking questions that you can send to [email protected].
— Ed Wiskoski, who wrestled regularly from 1972 to 1996 under a number of names, including Easy Ed Wiskowski, Col. Ed DeBeers, Derek Draper, and others, passed away within the last few days at the age of 80. His daughter confirmed he had passed away. He was a decent level star coming out of the Central States and being a protege of Harley Race as a big former college football player. He was pushed well in a lot of territories and I always thought of him as a very good wrestler, and a strong promo guy. He wound up in Oregon as the tag team partner of Buddy Rose. He later gained national attention as Col. DeBeers from South Africa in the AWA. He got a ton of heat playing a racist who outright hated blacks and Jimmy Snuka. It was a gimmick that was controversial and people will argue whether it was or wasn’t successful, or was or wasn’t tasteless. Well, it was definitely tasteless. He lived in Oregon late in his career and after his career although it has been reported he was living in Arizona.
— I didn’t hear a lot about great matches this weekend other than Gunther vs. Jey Uso and Konosuke Takeshita vs. Katsuyori Shibata last night on SNME and Collision. The Chris Brookes vs. Shuji Ishikawa KO-D title match at Korakuen Hall we were told was excellent as well as Jeff Cobb vs. Daisuke Sekimoto from Big Japan.
— The biggest Bare Knuckle event in history took place last night in Philadelphia with Jeremy Stephens beating Eddie Alvarez in the main event before more than 17,000 fans at the Wells Fargo Arena in Philadelphia. Conor McGregor, who is a co-owner of the promotion, cut a promo saying he wanted to fight Stephens and wanted to make a date for them to fight under Bare Knuckle rules. Of course, McGregor is still under a fight contract with UFC and can only do so if they allow it, which it’s highly doubtful they would.
— Terry Funk vs. Jumbo Tsuruta in an NWA title match from Sumo Hall in Tokyo in 1976 is a match I didn’t realize was available, but this was a classic match for its time.
— Bloodsport is coming to the Electric Ballroom in London on 9/29.
— Rhino’s Insane Wrestling Revolution promotion will stream live on Triller starting with its 2/6 show in Monroe, MI. The shows usually start at 6:30 p.m. local time on Thursday nights and use a lot of TNA talent.
— GCW results from today at the Electric Ballroom in London: Alec Price & Cole Radrick retained the GCW tag titles over Kid Lykos I & II, Sidney Akeem b Aigie Blanc, Maki Itoh b Man Like DeReiss, Luke Jacobs b One Called Manders, Leon Slater b Jimmy Lloyd, Joey Janela b Big F’n Joe, Masha Slamovich d Megan Bayne with a double pin finish to keep the JCW title, Mance Warner b Drew Parker, Effy b Cara Noir to keep the GCW title. Slamovich vs. Bayne matched the TNA champion vs. an AEW wrestler.
–The Fulton (Hines) family on the World Class Professional Big Time Wrestling Facebook page posted that they were canceling the 3/8 show and convention and temporarily not running anything but Bobby Fulton will return with something bigger and better than before. In Friday’s update there was a link to a local news story about Bobby’s son, Dillon Hines. The family said that Dillon is now out of the wrestling business for good. The story was an extremely negative portrayal of Dillon who several wrestlers, most notably Rob Van Dam, had issues with.
–The new back issue of the Observer from 2007 is up on the site covering the Chris Benoit murder/suicide including the toxicology report and a number of very embarrasing (and even more embarrassing in hindsight) WWE media reactions from that report (basically Benoit had a 59-to-1 TE ratio, one of the highest you’ll ever see, and then John Cena cited the results as saying that Benoit hadn’t taken any muscle building steroids).
— The New York Times Magazine has a story on The Rizzler who is part of the AJ entourage, which does mention AEW in it. AJ & Big Justice were on last night’s Collision.
— House of Glory results from last night in the New York City Aena before a packed house: Raheem Royal & Jay Armani b Jay Lyon & Midas Black-DQ, Phumi Nkuta b KC Navarro, Darren Richardson b Mighty Mantew, J Boujii won over Jarrett Diaz, JJ Doze, Dante Griffith Jodi Aura and Joey Silva to get a cruiserweight title match, Idris Jackson b Rhino, Ricky Starks b Charles Mason, Mike Santana b KENTA to keep the HOG title in what was said to be one of the best matches in the history of the company (thanks to Samuel Rosenthal)
— Jun Saito retained the Triple Crown over Yma Anzai on today’s show and will next defend the title against Yuma Aoyagi.
–Maika was named the 2024 Starrdom MVP and Mayu Iwatani vs. Momo Watanabe on 11/17 for the IWGP women’s title was named Stardom match of the year at the awards ceremony today.
TikTok star AJ Befumo now has a 1-0 record in AEW.
With an assist from his son Big Justice, Befumo was able to defeat QT Marshall on the AEW Full Gear pre-show. The match marked a successful return to the ring for the 48-year-old Befumo, a former indie wrestler who has not regularly competed in two decades.
The closing stretch of the match saw Big Justice (Eric Befumo) get involved after Aaron Solo tried to interfere on behalf of Marshall. The younger Befumo took out Marshall with a spear, then his father hit a “Power Boom” to get the victory.
Befumo and Big Justice have become social media sensations over the past year, building a following on TikTok with their father-son channel. They are called the “Costco Guys” with their most popular videos being trips to Costco and rating food products.
For this match, Befumo went by the name Big Boom AJ and entered to “We Bring the Boom” — a song that he and Big Justice released over the summer that went viral on social media and helped their rise to fame.
Befumo and Big Justice also had their friend and fellow TikTok celebrity The Rizzler (Christian Joseph) with them. The young child served as the guest timekeeper and celebrated with Befumo and Big Justice after ringing the bell. Before the finish, there was a moment where Wight needed to protect The Rizzler when Marshall went over to the timekeeper’s area.
Paul Wight and The Rizzler will be ringside for this next match between Big Boom AJ and QT Marshall!
What comes next for Befumo in wrestling remains to be seen. He’s said that — if Full Gear went well – he’d be honored to have more matches with AEW in the future. Tony Khan has spoken highly of Befumo and Big Justice, saying he’s learned a lot about marketing from them. Befumo was able to promote Full Gear during appearances on The Tonight Show, Fox Business, and other mainstream outlets leading into the event.
Befumo was called “The American Powerchild” Eric Justice when he used to compete on the indies. He wrestled “for about 11 years” from the 1990s-2000s.
It’s Saturday afternoon and that means Wrestling Observer Live.
Two big returns are injecting even more excitement into the men’s WarGames match at Survivor Series as CM Punk and Paul Heyman returned to the fold at Friday’s WWE SmackDown.
Tonight’s AEW Full Gear looks like another solid PPV from an in-ring standpoint. The biggest match of the night looks to be on the Zero Hour pre-show as A.J. from The Costco Guys faces QT Marshall. Will AEW get the rub from The Rizzler?
As if Big Boom A.J. and Big Justice weren’t enough for this Saturday’s AEW Full Gear, the stakes were raised during Wednesday’s AEW Dynamite.
In a backstage segment, A.J. and his son revealed that “The Rizzler,” a member of their extended family and fellow social media star, will indeed be in attendance for A.J.’s match against QT Marshall.
Rizzler (a third grader named Christian Joseph from New Jersey) initially rose to fame for a viral Instagram video of him wearing a Black Panther costume. He eventually found his way to the Costco Guys crew.
RIZZLER CONFIRMED! A.J, Big Justice & The Rizzler bring the BOOM this Saturday night at #AEWFullGear ZERO HOUR!
A.J., a former indie wrestler in the New York/New Jersey scene, will take on Marshall as part of the pre-show. He said he signed a one-match deal but has also he’s open for more.
Here’s the current card for Saturday, November 23rd in Newark, New Jersey:
AEW World Champion Jon Moxley defends against Orange Cassidy
TBS Champion Mercedes Mone defends against Kris Statlander
TNT Champion Jack Perry defends against Daniel Garcia
Will Ospreay vs. Kyle Fletcher
Jay White vs. Hangman Page
Bobby Lashley vs. Swerve Strickland
MJF vs. Roderick Strong
Mariah May & Mina Shirakawa champagne celebration
Four-way match for AEW Tag Team titles: Private Party (Isiah Kassidy & Marq Quen) defends against The Outrunners (Truth Magnum & Turbo Floyd), House of Black (Malakai Black & Brody King), and The Acclaimed (Max Caster & Anthony Bowens)
