When it comes to every broadcast week in WWE, I always have one thought: I can't wait to watch NXT. I know that the vast majority of episodes are taped and that if you look for them, you can find out what happened in the weeks ahead, but to that, I say "fuck that". I hate spoilers, for the most part. I have the WWE app on my phone and they seem to think that everyone works 9 to 5 jobs Monday through Friday and are always going to be home in time to watch everything, and that's why I had to turn off the push notifications on the app, because every once in a while, they'll spoil events that occur on NXT, and sometimes, weeks in advance, and that sucks. So I guess my point is if you get the app, do not turn on push notifications if you want to go in fresh, and for that matter, avoid the dirt sheet spoilers and just avoid Wrestling Twitter if you don't get home until after the broadcast.
On with the show.
It started with Johnny Takeover coming out and cutting a promo basically saying that success is all about wins and championships and not as much about working hard and being a nice guy, and this is another interesting turn to his character. Since his heel turn against Aleister Black, he's defined himself as being the good guy because his whole mission in the first place was to take out Ciampa. But now, in the aftermath of the cage match against Black where Ciampa got involved and helped Johnny win, even Johnny is starting to see the method to Ciampa's cruelty. It was interesting to see so many DIY shirts back in the crowd, and a DIY chant broke out, but Johnny dismissed it and said that Tommaso is still a garbage person and has a title that Johnny wants, but right now, he's focusing on the North American title. And thus enters Ricochet, and they cut a heated promo together, with "Ric" still playing pure babyface, but then Ciampa comes out like Svengali and applauds Johnny's change of heart, but Johnny tells him to shut his mouth, making it clear that he still has a beef with the champ. And then Aleister's music hit, where he was shown on the monitor, and the lights went out. Of course, when they came back up, Aleister was behind Ciampa and let loose an assault on the champ that ended with Black chasing him backstage, and with Johnny left alone in the ring with Ricochet, he simply shrugged his shoulders and superkicked Ricochet's soul right out of his body. When it comes to selling, Ricochet has clearly studied at the school of Sami Zayn and how he just lets his whole body get into it. And this time, he just trusted his body and dropped to the floor like a slab of meat. It was one of the most impressive sells I've seen of a superkick in a while, and maybe is only surpassed this week by Alicia Fox's sell of Ember Moon's Eclipse. Everything about this promo was on fucking point. It set up the next major rivalry for Johnny and a title that I could easily see him win at Takeover Phoenix, and it continued the raw intensity of the Ciampa/Black rivalry. And for the life of me, I don't understand why the main roster can't book something this well and this simply.
I know I'm talking a lot about this promo, but it just speaks volumes as to why NXT is the brand to beat when it comes to pretty much everything WWE.
Then came the rubber match between Bianca Belair and Nikki Cross. I have to say that this is the best work I've seen from Belair since she became part of the roster. It's been bizarre to see Nikki working face pretty much since she remained behind after the rest of Sanity went to the main roster. This was a very good match for what I'm presuming will be the final match for Nikki in NXT, and a really strong showing for Belair. It was booked well, with the spot on the ramp returning to potentially cause another double countout, and just the showcasing of the raw physicality of both performers. The big finish was Bianca hitting the K.O.D. for the win, and it could spell big trouble for Shayna. But there is a problem that I have with Belair that I don't think is really as big of a problem as it should be, but it feels like a big problem, so let's talk about that for a few minutes.
I'm going to say something that I think a lot of people forget about when it comes to NXT. The whole premise of NXT is that it's the developmental brand for WWE, but the talent is stacked so heavily with already-seasoned veterans who were super popular in other promotions, we forget that some of these people are brand new. Bianca Belair is very new to wrestling, and many of the others on the roster have worked for years and sometimes decades to really hone their craft. So when a newer person who is being being developed pretty much from the ground up, it tends to stand out among performers who have had all this time to develop strong characters and mic skills. I was not a huge Velveteen Dream fan when he first came to NXT; I thought he had the physical attributes, and the skill, but until he had his rivalry with Aleister Black, he wasn't getting over with me, but after that rivalry, I was 1000% ready for whatever he would do next. Now Belair has her undefeated streak going for her, but she needs a solid program with someone like Kairi Sane or Io Shirai or someone who is a seasoned pro but also a pure babyface to really help to coalesce her character and start really getting her over with the crowd. Because until she gets that, I'm afraid she's going to end up floundering in the division. But again, we do have to remember that NXT still has a lot of newbies alongside their Garganos and Ciampas and Aleisters and Riddles and Lees and Sanes and EC3s and Coles, and we have to be fair to the true development talent because, let's face it, most of these performers are very much ready for prime time and are just waiting on their moment to sink or swim on the main roster.
And then we had the NXT debut of former enhancement talents Fabian Aichner and Marcel Barthel as a tag team against the extremely solid pairing of Harvey Kunsman and Stanley Watts, who did a fantastic job of jobbing out to Aichner and Barthel. They made them look strong, but also gave them a solid match where it wasn't just a new badass heel squash that we've seem a million times before. Our jobbers clearly understood their roles, and even got us cheering for them for a hot minute. Who knows? After a showing like this, Aichner and Barthel could easily become the next Oney Lorcan/Danny Burch. Apparently, they're going to be featured somewhat exclusively on NXT UK, but I'd say, based on their work together (and I kind of love the arrogant charm of Barthel), they should be a formidable team with a finisher that starts as a powerbomb into a bridge German suplex. Goddamn, even the jobbers on NXT are given better showings than the main roster jobbers.
And to wrap it all up, we got EC3 vs Adam Cole. Again, this is likely to be EC3's final match in NXT, and he and Cole had terrific chemistry together all throughout. NXT has done a great job of building this match as being the last rung of the Undisputed Era ladder that the Top One Percenter had to climb after he was put on the shelf by Bobby Fish. And of course, the entirety of the UE came out with Cole and both competitors looked super-solid throughout the match. Cole is such a great smarmy asshole who has the skills to back it up when necessary. While he didn't totally hit the Last Ride, whether it was an out-of-position issue with either of them, it still was a really good match and strong sendoff for EC3. And naturally, the other members of UE came out to stomp and ground-and-pound EC3, but were rather promptly confronted by War Raiders, where Rowe and Hansen took on all four members of the Era and put a solid pounding on them. It's always a good thing to remind people when title matches are coming up, particularly at a PPV, and the post-match assault is almost always a really great way to keep us invested in the rivalry. I'm not 100% on-board with War Raiders yet, only because they just don't have the lightning-in-a-bottle talent, charisma and energy of Undisputed Era, but if they can take them to the limit at Takeover Phoenix, their stock will definitely shoot up.
So it's currently 16 days until Takeover and I am fucking pumped. Not just because I'm going, but NXT has been so good at creating the matches we really want to see. Speaking of Takeover, I might very well do a column on NXT UK Takeover Blackpool which I'll be watching on Saturday even though I haven't been keeping up with the product. But it does have a few matches I'm really looking forward to with Pete Dunne vs Joe Coffey for the UK title and Rhea Ripley vs Toni Storm for the UK Women's title.
Until next time, kids...
On with the show.
It started with Johnny Takeover coming out and cutting a promo basically saying that success is all about wins and championships and not as much about working hard and being a nice guy, and this is another interesting turn to his character. Since his heel turn against Aleister Black, he's defined himself as being the good guy because his whole mission in the first place was to take out Ciampa. But now, in the aftermath of the cage match against Black where Ciampa got involved and helped Johnny win, even Johnny is starting to see the method to Ciampa's cruelty. It was interesting to see so many DIY shirts back in the crowd, and a DIY chant broke out, but Johnny dismissed it and said that Tommaso is still a garbage person and has a title that Johnny wants, but right now, he's focusing on the North American title. And thus enters Ricochet, and they cut a heated promo together, with "Ric" still playing pure babyface, but then Ciampa comes out like Svengali and applauds Johnny's change of heart, but Johnny tells him to shut his mouth, making it clear that he still has a beef with the champ. And then Aleister's music hit, where he was shown on the monitor, and the lights went out. Of course, when they came back up, Aleister was behind Ciampa and let loose an assault on the champ that ended with Black chasing him backstage, and with Johnny left alone in the ring with Ricochet, he simply shrugged his shoulders and superkicked Ricochet's soul right out of his body. When it comes to selling, Ricochet has clearly studied at the school of Sami Zayn and how he just lets his whole body get into it. And this time, he just trusted his body and dropped to the floor like a slab of meat. It was one of the most impressive sells I've seen of a superkick in a while, and maybe is only surpassed this week by Alicia Fox's sell of Ember Moon's Eclipse. Everything about this promo was on fucking point. It set up the next major rivalry for Johnny and a title that I could easily see him win at Takeover Phoenix, and it continued the raw intensity of the Ciampa/Black rivalry. And for the life of me, I don't understand why the main roster can't book something this well and this simply.
I know I'm talking a lot about this promo, but it just speaks volumes as to why NXT is the brand to beat when it comes to pretty much everything WWE.
Then came the rubber match between Bianca Belair and Nikki Cross. I have to say that this is the best work I've seen from Belair since she became part of the roster. It's been bizarre to see Nikki working face pretty much since she remained behind after the rest of Sanity went to the main roster. This was a very good match for what I'm presuming will be the final match for Nikki in NXT, and a really strong showing for Belair. It was booked well, with the spot on the ramp returning to potentially cause another double countout, and just the showcasing of the raw physicality of both performers. The big finish was Bianca hitting the K.O.D. for the win, and it could spell big trouble for Shayna. But there is a problem that I have with Belair that I don't think is really as big of a problem as it should be, but it feels like a big problem, so let's talk about that for a few minutes.
I'm going to say something that I think a lot of people forget about when it comes to NXT. The whole premise of NXT is that it's the developmental brand for WWE, but the talent is stacked so heavily with already-seasoned veterans who were super popular in other promotions, we forget that some of these people are brand new. Bianca Belair is very new to wrestling, and many of the others on the roster have worked for years and sometimes decades to really hone their craft. So when a newer person who is being being developed pretty much from the ground up, it tends to stand out among performers who have had all this time to develop strong characters and mic skills. I was not a huge Velveteen Dream fan when he first came to NXT; I thought he had the physical attributes, and the skill, but until he had his rivalry with Aleister Black, he wasn't getting over with me, but after that rivalry, I was 1000% ready for whatever he would do next. Now Belair has her undefeated streak going for her, but she needs a solid program with someone like Kairi Sane or Io Shirai or someone who is a seasoned pro but also a pure babyface to really help to coalesce her character and start really getting her over with the crowd. Because until she gets that, I'm afraid she's going to end up floundering in the division. But again, we do have to remember that NXT still has a lot of newbies alongside their Garganos and Ciampas and Aleisters and Riddles and Lees and Sanes and EC3s and Coles, and we have to be fair to the true development talent because, let's face it, most of these performers are very much ready for prime time and are just waiting on their moment to sink or swim on the main roster.
And then we had the NXT debut of former enhancement talents Fabian Aichner and Marcel Barthel as a tag team against the extremely solid pairing of Harvey Kunsman and Stanley Watts, who did a fantastic job of jobbing out to Aichner and Barthel. They made them look strong, but also gave them a solid match where it wasn't just a new badass heel squash that we've seem a million times before. Our jobbers clearly understood their roles, and even got us cheering for them for a hot minute. Who knows? After a showing like this, Aichner and Barthel could easily become the next Oney Lorcan/Danny Burch. Apparently, they're going to be featured somewhat exclusively on NXT UK, but I'd say, based on their work together (and I kind of love the arrogant charm of Barthel), they should be a formidable team with a finisher that starts as a powerbomb into a bridge German suplex. Goddamn, even the jobbers on NXT are given better showings than the main roster jobbers.
And to wrap it all up, we got EC3 vs Adam Cole. Again, this is likely to be EC3's final match in NXT, and he and Cole had terrific chemistry together all throughout. NXT has done a great job of building this match as being the last rung of the Undisputed Era ladder that the Top One Percenter had to climb after he was put on the shelf by Bobby Fish. And of course, the entirety of the UE came out with Cole and both competitors looked super-solid throughout the match. Cole is such a great smarmy asshole who has the skills to back it up when necessary. While he didn't totally hit the Last Ride, whether it was an out-of-position issue with either of them, it still was a really good match and strong sendoff for EC3. And naturally, the other members of UE came out to stomp and ground-and-pound EC3, but were rather promptly confronted by War Raiders, where Rowe and Hansen took on all four members of the Era and put a solid pounding on them. It's always a good thing to remind people when title matches are coming up, particularly at a PPV, and the post-match assault is almost always a really great way to keep us invested in the rivalry. I'm not 100% on-board with War Raiders yet, only because they just don't have the lightning-in-a-bottle talent, charisma and energy of Undisputed Era, but if they can take them to the limit at Takeover Phoenix, their stock will definitely shoot up.
So it's currently 16 days until Takeover and I am fucking pumped. Not just because I'm going, but NXT has been so good at creating the matches we really want to see. Speaking of Takeover, I might very well do a column on NXT UK Takeover Blackpool which I'll be watching on Saturday even though I haven't been keeping up with the product. But it does have a few matches I'm really looking forward to with Pete Dunne vs Joe Coffey for the UK title and Rhea Ripley vs Toni Storm for the UK Women's title.
Until next time, kids...
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