Adam Cole hasn’t appeared on AEW television in over 160 days due to suffering a concussion during Forbidden Door. This seemingly occurred when Kazuchika Okada dropkicked Cole before attempting to hit the Rainmaker, with Cole collapsing after ducking the clothesline showing he was hurt. At this point, Jay White, who’d been outside the ring, recognizing Cole was hurt, called an audible by hitting Okada with a Bladerunner and stealing the pin on Cole.
Straight afterward, Cole took a break from Twitch streaming but later resumed his hobby and claimed during an interview that his recovery was on track. Subsequently, Dave Meltzer would state that the former NXT Champion still needs to be cleared to return to the ring. Worryingly, saying he may never be due to the severity of the concussion. Now though he has confirmed on Twitter that he’s heard, he is doing much better, but AEW is remaining cautious.
With Cole being banged up going into Forbidden Door, specifically dealing with a shoulder injury, if any positives from this situation can be found, it’s that he’ll hopefully have had time to heal up by the time he hopefully does get cleared. Right now, though, the most severe issue remains his concussion and considering brain injuries took years off Bryan Danielson, and Christian’s careers and ultimately ended Bret Hart’s, Corey Graves’, and Christopher Nowinski’s, the seriousness of what Cole is dealing with shouldn’t be downplayed.
