Top AEW star close to breaking Samoa Joe's huge 20-year-old record

A top AEW star is closing in on breaking Samoa Joe's Ring of Honor record as the longest-reigning champion on the brand. The star in question is none other than Athena.

The War Goddess signed with AEW in 2022 and was later moved to the Ring of Honor brand. Athena won her very first ROH Women's World Championship on December 10, 2022, at the ROH: Final Battle PPV in Arlington. She has managed to hold on to her title to date.

By this weekend, she will be closing in on being the longest-reigning champion on the ROH brand. The current record is held by Samoa Joe, who won the ROH World Championship on March 22, 2003, and remained champion for 645 days.

'AllEliteWomen_', a fan account on X (fka Twitter), broke down the stats of Athena's title reign and revealed that she was set to surpass Samoa Joe's 20-year-old record this upcoming weekend.

You can check out the stats in the post below:

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AEW star Samoa Joe recalls winning the NXT Championship

Samoa Joe signed with WWE in 2015 and quickly made a huge impact on the developmental brand of the Stamford-based promotion. Interestingly, Joe won his first NXT Championship against Finn Balor at a live event.

The Samoan Submission Machine recently spoke about the unexpected move and praised WWE for booking his title win on a live event. He reiterated the importance of these occasions and how they turn into more of an attraction for the audience present when a world title changes hands.

He also noted how a massive title change at a live event helps build up a new brand, encouraging more fans to attend these shows, and thereby drawing more eyeballs to the product.

"I thought it was one of the most brilliant things that we did. When you're building a new brand and an imprint like we were in 'NXT,' you know a major thing is we want people to come to our live events. We were running live events around the nation, and if you knew if you showed up to an 'NXT' live event that a world title could change hands, I mean it just makes that event so much more exciting," said Samoa Joe. [H/T: Wrestling Inc.]

Samoa Joe is currently signed to All Elite Wrestling where he is a former AEW World Champion. It will be interesting to see if he returns to WWE one day.