It seems almost reductive to just state that TakeOver New York was brilliant, because when was the last TakeOver that you thought wasn't? I mean, it's always something to behold. It's true that there's generally one that shines brightest and there's one that doesn't quite have the impact you want it to, but still; TakeOver events have become the gold standard in all of WWE. You can talk about "historic" matches that take place at Wrestlemania all you want, but TakeOver has a quality that is undeniable. It never feels like someone's just going through the motions. TakeOver is what we want to see when we watch any main roster PPV, but no match on any of these big network PPV's measure up to the sheer thrill of what they're doing at any given TakeOver. And as we're now in the thick of Wrestlemania weekend, we're about to get the biggest day of the year for WWE fans, but I guarantee you that none of the matches on this card (with maybe one exception) will have the quality of pretty much any given match we saw on Friday with TakeOver New York.
Now if we look at the Hopes and Predictions column I did last week (which you can view here), you'll see that I was strangely correct in the match order, even though that wasn't something I was even consciously thinking about when I was writing it, but I went 3 for 5 in my Predictions, and let's face it, the Hopes were attempts at humor anyway. Generally, NXT can be a little on the confounding side when it comes to booking, so that's to be expected, and that's also great. I love when WWE can surprise me. So let's run down the card and talk about these matches and what I thought about them.
So I guess it'll just be easier to go in order and start with the NXT Tag Team title match with Aleister Black and Ricochet facing off against champs War Raiders. I know that it's always a little weird to hear 13,000 people in an arena chanting "WAR WAR WAR", but that's the power of pro wrestling. Never underestimate it. I knew that this was going to be a fun match, but I didn't know how emotional it would make me. I liked that, since this was Face vs Face, they had a sign of respect towards each other at the outset, but that was going to go out the window once the match went on. You also knew that this was going to be something of a spot-fest, because Black and Ricochet are two of the fastest and most agile performers in the biz. And it's totally understandable why they booked Black and Ricochet to win the Dusty Classic and to compete in this match, especially considering they were on their way out/up to the main roster after this. It was everything you'd expect from a NXT tag title match, and with War Raiders retaining, it was outstanding. Of course, with the ending and everyone hugging it out (and I think Rowe kissed Ricochet's head), and both Aleister and Ric tearing up as they said their goodbyes to the NXT faithful really got to me. I've never had that experience of loving a workplace so much that I was sad to leave it. It was a great moment for two of the best NXT has had to offer, and you wish they could stay there forever, but bigger things are calling (and hopefully, we get a better Ricochet shirt; I don't look great in red).
Then came the title match for the North American Championship with Matt Riddle vs champ Velveteen Dream. OHMYGOD Dream's entrance was so fucking amazing. I don't know how he keeps coming up with these, but they are one of the highlights of an already highlight-heavy show. This match shocked me, though, and I mean that in a good way. I did not expect Dream to be fighting from underneath so much, because The Original Bro was just kicking the living shit out of him for so much of the match. And yeah, it's kind of weird to see the laid-back stoner dude that has the smiling mushroom tattoo to be the out-and-out aggressor in this matchup. I figured that Dream was going to be fighting heel for the match much like I thought War Raiders were going to be fighting heel, but sometimes I forget that NXT doesn't do things the way we always expect. All the submission attempts and escapes and all the knee strikes and palm strikes; Riddle never really let Dream get the upper hand for an extended period of time. I don't think that this is going to be a feud, but rather just an excellent one-off between two top performers. I've seen Riddle work in other promotions, so his abilities have been evident, but Dream just keeps putting in some of the best work I've ever seen from someone so new to the art that is pro wrestling. I thought so many times during this match that it was going to go Riddle's way, but when Dream stacked him up as a reversal of the Bro-mission for the three-count, I was really in awe of how close they played that one. And them still putting each other over; that's such a great way to keep Riddle looking strong, even after ending his undefeated streak. Also, they had the good fist-bump at the end just when you thought Dream might not do it. Sometimes, I just really like it when the match ends with a sign of respect.
Then we got the ultra slobber-knocker that we all deserved in the matchup for the NXT UK Championship between WALTER and long-time champ Pete Dunne. My chest hurts just thinking about this match. SO many chops to Dunne from Der Ring General that I would be absolutely 100% convinced that Dunne would have a cracked sternum. And these badass motherfuckers just went to war and I loved it. I can't tell you how many times either myself or The Manager exclaimed about how much one shot or another must have hurt. These two took each other to the absolute limit, and the reign of Dunne came to an end after so many attempts to put the other away by WALTER going to the top rope and splashing down on The Bruiserweight. Another really excellent match and I'll be really excited to see what WALTER can do with the UK title, and what kinds of rivalries he'll have for it.
Then there was the only kind of letdown of the evening with the Fatal 4-Way for the NXT Women's Championship with champ Shayna Baszler facing off against Kairi Sane, Bianca Belair and Io Shirai. And calling this a letdown is really only from the standpoint of the booking. I knew that we were going to have that moment where Shirai and Sane were going to have to square off, and it was going to be interrupted before it went on for long, but I didn't expect for Kairi to break up Io's pinning attempt on Baszler after hitting her finishing moonsault. The action was fast and furious throughout and Belair hitting that double K.O.D. on both Sane and Shirai was just awesome. Again, all stops were removed for this match, but I was really shocked that they decided to keep the strap on Baszler after she put Belair in the Kirafuda Clutch. And even moreso, I was shocked that she won without the assistance of Duke or Shafir. The best part about this, though, is that some really interesting rivalries are going to come out of this, and don't be too shocked if we get a match soon between Sane and Shirai. They've got some stuff they might need to hash out after this bout. Again, not a bad match, but not the outcome I was hoping for, or even predicting. Part of what I think is happening, though, is the hesitance to move Baszler up to the main roster. You could drop Belair, Sane or Shirai in the main roster tomorrow, and it wouldn't be shocking. They're all varying degrees of charismatic, they've got great in-ring skills, and they're all very beautiful, and since Shayna doesn't fit quite so neatly into Vince's stupid bubble of hyper-photogenic female talent, she might be in NXT for a while.
And then there was one.
Let me make this extremely clear: I wanted the NXT Championship match between Tommaso Ciampa and Johnny Gargano so badly that I audibly shouted "NO!" when I found out that Ciampa was hurt. And I felt that any matchup, no matter who they picked to go up against Gargano, would be lacking.
I was so wrong.
Let me tell you a little something about myself. As those of you who've been reading from the beginning know, I'm a son of Chicago, and a Northsider at that. I was born a Cub fan, raised a Cub fan and I'll die a Cub fan. I have always backed the underdog, and no pro sports team was a greater example of that than the Cubs. That being stated (and this comparison will make more sense later), I've been rooting for Johnny Wrestling for a very long time. He was my pick as the best male talent in all of pro wrestling in 2018 in terms of storytelling, talent and character. So when this match came up between Gargano against Adam Cole (BAY BAY) for the vacant NXT title, I was beside myself. I didn't know how this match was going to go. If there was any match that I've ever seen that felt the most, for lack of a better term, "real", I have yet to see it. At first I was a little surprised that these two amazing talents started out pretty gingerly, but of course that made sense since this was a Two out of Three Falls match; the conservation of energy was necessary because you knew that by the end of this match, it was going to be balls-out insane. But when I first saw that, I felt a little apprehensive about the potential quality of the match because it wasn't clear if these two had that in-ring chemistry that would be necessary to tear the house down.
Again, I was so wrong.
Cole and Gargano are such extraordinary talents that, despite this being the first time they faced off in NXT, it seemed like they had been fighting each other forever. Once we got to the third act of the match with the final fall, it truly seemed like it was anyone's game. When Cole hit Johnny with the Panama Sunset, I was 99.99999999% sure it was over. But he refused to stay down. When the rest of Undisputed Era got involved, and Cole caused that ref bump, I was 99.99999999999% certain that Cole was going to get the win after O'Reilly and Fish hit Johnny with the Over/Under. But he refused to stay down. And when Johnny got back into the ring after clearing out Undisputed Era and got hit with a superkick and into The Last Shot, I was 100% sure that Cole was going to win.
But he refused to stay down.
I couldn't remain seated. This felt like the bottom of the 10th Inning in Game 7 of the 2016 World Series. The Cubs were up 8-6 over (ironically enough) the Cleveland Indians after allowing a clutch home run to lock it up 6-6 in the 8th. They allowed another run in the bottom of the 10th, making it 8-7. This was close to the same feeling I had when Johnny locked in the Garga-No Escape with Cole close to the ropes. I was, again, positive that the Cubs were going to have another "wait until next year" season much in the same way I felt Gargano would be denied his golden opportunity yet again. But when that slow grounder was hit to Kris Bryant and he hurled it over to Anthony Rizzo for the final out to give the Cubs their first World Series win in 108 years, I lost every bit of my mind. I cried and jumped up and down and cried again. This was also pretty much the same feeling I had when Johnny TakeOver rolled Cole into the middle of the ring while maintaining his grip and finally seeing Cole tap. I have never, and I mean never gotten that emotional during a pro wrestling match. I'm sure that some of you who grew up watching and saw the final Shawn Michaels/Ric Flair match might have gotten all the feels with that match, but for me personally, this might be as close to that kind of feeling as I can think of. Johnny's victory over Ciampa at the Unsanctioned match last year at TakeOver New Orleans was triumphant, but this victory for the title that had so long eluded his grasp was pure elation. When Candace joined him out in the ring, I got teary-eyed. When he joined his family in the crowd, I got teary-eyed again.
But when Tommaso came out at the end and gave his best friend and best friend's wife a big out-of-kayfabe hug, I just lost it.
When John Oliver said on last Sunday's Last Week Tonight, "Wrestling is better than the things you love," I knew exactly what he was talking about, but sometimes those things all collide in one moment, and this was that moment. This match, and I say this without hyperbole, may very well go down as my favorite match of all time.
So that's it for my recap of TakeOver New York! I'm pretty excited about Mania and how the stories going forward from that will affect the landscape of the main roster, but hoo boy, am I glad that no matter what, I'll still be glowing from this show. I'm sure that some time Monday, you'll see a recap of Wrestlemania XXXV here as well, and of course my recaps of the Raw and Smackdown After Mania on Wednesday, as well as a recap of the pre-show matches from TakeOver that'll be televised on the next episode of NXT.
So keep your eyes out for those as they come, and I hope you've enjoyed reading this almost as much as you enjoyed watching TakeOver and as much as you'll enjoy Mania!
And enjoy this image! Until next time, kids...
Now if we look at the Hopes and Predictions column I did last week (which you can view here), you'll see that I was strangely correct in the match order, even though that wasn't something I was even consciously thinking about when I was writing it, but I went 3 for 5 in my Predictions, and let's face it, the Hopes were attempts at humor anyway. Generally, NXT can be a little on the confounding side when it comes to booking, so that's to be expected, and that's also great. I love when WWE can surprise me. So let's run down the card and talk about these matches and what I thought about them.
So I guess it'll just be easier to go in order and start with the NXT Tag Team title match with Aleister Black and Ricochet facing off against champs War Raiders. I know that it's always a little weird to hear 13,000 people in an arena chanting "WAR WAR WAR", but that's the power of pro wrestling. Never underestimate it. I knew that this was going to be a fun match, but I didn't know how emotional it would make me. I liked that, since this was Face vs Face, they had a sign of respect towards each other at the outset, but that was going to go out the window once the match went on. You also knew that this was going to be something of a spot-fest, because Black and Ricochet are two of the fastest and most agile performers in the biz. And it's totally understandable why they booked Black and Ricochet to win the Dusty Classic and to compete in this match, especially considering they were on their way out/up to the main roster after this. It was everything you'd expect from a NXT tag title match, and with War Raiders retaining, it was outstanding. Of course, with the ending and everyone hugging it out (and I think Rowe kissed Ricochet's head), and both Aleister and Ric tearing up as they said their goodbyes to the NXT faithful really got to me. I've never had that experience of loving a workplace so much that I was sad to leave it. It was a great moment for two of the best NXT has had to offer, and you wish they could stay there forever, but bigger things are calling (and hopefully, we get a better Ricochet shirt; I don't look great in red).
Then came the title match for the North American Championship with Matt Riddle vs champ Velveteen Dream. OHMYGOD Dream's entrance was so fucking amazing. I don't know how he keeps coming up with these, but they are one of the highlights of an already highlight-heavy show. This match shocked me, though, and I mean that in a good way. I did not expect Dream to be fighting from underneath so much, because The Original Bro was just kicking the living shit out of him for so much of the match. And yeah, it's kind of weird to see the laid-back stoner dude that has the smiling mushroom tattoo to be the out-and-out aggressor in this matchup. I figured that Dream was going to be fighting heel for the match much like I thought War Raiders were going to be fighting heel, but sometimes I forget that NXT doesn't do things the way we always expect. All the submission attempts and escapes and all the knee strikes and palm strikes; Riddle never really let Dream get the upper hand for an extended period of time. I don't think that this is going to be a feud, but rather just an excellent one-off between two top performers. I've seen Riddle work in other promotions, so his abilities have been evident, but Dream just keeps putting in some of the best work I've ever seen from someone so new to the art that is pro wrestling. I thought so many times during this match that it was going to go Riddle's way, but when Dream stacked him up as a reversal of the Bro-mission for the three-count, I was really in awe of how close they played that one. And them still putting each other over; that's such a great way to keep Riddle looking strong, even after ending his undefeated streak. Also, they had the good fist-bump at the end just when you thought Dream might not do it. Sometimes, I just really like it when the match ends with a sign of respect.
Then we got the ultra slobber-knocker that we all deserved in the matchup for the NXT UK Championship between WALTER and long-time champ Pete Dunne. My chest hurts just thinking about this match. SO many chops to Dunne from Der Ring General that I would be absolutely 100% convinced that Dunne would have a cracked sternum. And these badass motherfuckers just went to war and I loved it. I can't tell you how many times either myself or The Manager exclaimed about how much one shot or another must have hurt. These two took each other to the absolute limit, and the reign of Dunne came to an end after so many attempts to put the other away by WALTER going to the top rope and splashing down on The Bruiserweight. Another really excellent match and I'll be really excited to see what WALTER can do with the UK title, and what kinds of rivalries he'll have for it.
Then there was the only kind of letdown of the evening with the Fatal 4-Way for the NXT Women's Championship with champ Shayna Baszler facing off against Kairi Sane, Bianca Belair and Io Shirai. And calling this a letdown is really only from the standpoint of the booking. I knew that we were going to have that moment where Shirai and Sane were going to have to square off, and it was going to be interrupted before it went on for long, but I didn't expect for Kairi to break up Io's pinning attempt on Baszler after hitting her finishing moonsault. The action was fast and furious throughout and Belair hitting that double K.O.D. on both Sane and Shirai was just awesome. Again, all stops were removed for this match, but I was really shocked that they decided to keep the strap on Baszler after she put Belair in the Kirafuda Clutch. And even moreso, I was shocked that she won without the assistance of Duke or Shafir. The best part about this, though, is that some really interesting rivalries are going to come out of this, and don't be too shocked if we get a match soon between Sane and Shirai. They've got some stuff they might need to hash out after this bout. Again, not a bad match, but not the outcome I was hoping for, or even predicting. Part of what I think is happening, though, is the hesitance to move Baszler up to the main roster. You could drop Belair, Sane or Shirai in the main roster tomorrow, and it wouldn't be shocking. They're all varying degrees of charismatic, they've got great in-ring skills, and they're all very beautiful, and since Shayna doesn't fit quite so neatly into Vince's stupid bubble of hyper-photogenic female talent, she might be in NXT for a while.
And then there was one.
Let me make this extremely clear: I wanted the NXT Championship match between Tommaso Ciampa and Johnny Gargano so badly that I audibly shouted "NO!" when I found out that Ciampa was hurt. And I felt that any matchup, no matter who they picked to go up against Gargano, would be lacking.
I was so wrong.
Let me tell you a little something about myself. As those of you who've been reading from the beginning know, I'm a son of Chicago, and a Northsider at that. I was born a Cub fan, raised a Cub fan and I'll die a Cub fan. I have always backed the underdog, and no pro sports team was a greater example of that than the Cubs. That being stated (and this comparison will make more sense later), I've been rooting for Johnny Wrestling for a very long time. He was my pick as the best male talent in all of pro wrestling in 2018 in terms of storytelling, talent and character. So when this match came up between Gargano against Adam Cole (BAY BAY) for the vacant NXT title, I was beside myself. I didn't know how this match was going to go. If there was any match that I've ever seen that felt the most, for lack of a better term, "real", I have yet to see it. At first I was a little surprised that these two amazing talents started out pretty gingerly, but of course that made sense since this was a Two out of Three Falls match; the conservation of energy was necessary because you knew that by the end of this match, it was going to be balls-out insane. But when I first saw that, I felt a little apprehensive about the potential quality of the match because it wasn't clear if these two had that in-ring chemistry that would be necessary to tear the house down.
Again, I was so wrong.
Cole and Gargano are such extraordinary talents that, despite this being the first time they faced off in NXT, it seemed like they had been fighting each other forever. Once we got to the third act of the match with the final fall, it truly seemed like it was anyone's game. When Cole hit Johnny with the Panama Sunset, I was 99.99999999% sure it was over. But he refused to stay down. When the rest of Undisputed Era got involved, and Cole caused that ref bump, I was 99.99999999999% certain that Cole was going to get the win after O'Reilly and Fish hit Johnny with the Over/Under. But he refused to stay down. And when Johnny got back into the ring after clearing out Undisputed Era and got hit with a superkick and into The Last Shot, I was 100% sure that Cole was going to win.
But he refused to stay down.
I couldn't remain seated. This felt like the bottom of the 10th Inning in Game 7 of the 2016 World Series. The Cubs were up 8-6 over (ironically enough) the Cleveland Indians after allowing a clutch home run to lock it up 6-6 in the 8th. They allowed another run in the bottom of the 10th, making it 8-7. This was close to the same feeling I had when Johnny locked in the Garga-No Escape with Cole close to the ropes. I was, again, positive that the Cubs were going to have another "wait until next year" season much in the same way I felt Gargano would be denied his golden opportunity yet again. But when that slow grounder was hit to Kris Bryant and he hurled it over to Anthony Rizzo for the final out to give the Cubs their first World Series win in 108 years, I lost every bit of my mind. I cried and jumped up and down and cried again. This was also pretty much the same feeling I had when Johnny TakeOver rolled Cole into the middle of the ring while maintaining his grip and finally seeing Cole tap. I have never, and I mean never gotten that emotional during a pro wrestling match. I'm sure that some of you who grew up watching and saw the final Shawn Michaels/Ric Flair match might have gotten all the feels with that match, but for me personally, this might be as close to that kind of feeling as I can think of. Johnny's victory over Ciampa at the Unsanctioned match last year at TakeOver New Orleans was triumphant, but this victory for the title that had so long eluded his grasp was pure elation. When Candace joined him out in the ring, I got teary-eyed. When he joined his family in the crowd, I got teary-eyed again.
But when Tommaso came out at the end and gave his best friend and best friend's wife a big out-of-kayfabe hug, I just lost it.
When John Oliver said on last Sunday's Last Week Tonight, "Wrestling is better than the things you love," I knew exactly what he was talking about, but sometimes those things all collide in one moment, and this was that moment. This match, and I say this without hyperbole, may very well go down as my favorite match of all time.
So that's it for my recap of TakeOver New York! I'm pretty excited about Mania and how the stories going forward from that will affect the landscape of the main roster, but hoo boy, am I glad that no matter what, I'll still be glowing from this show. I'm sure that some time Monday, you'll see a recap of Wrestlemania XXXV here as well, and of course my recaps of the Raw and Smackdown After Mania on Wednesday, as well as a recap of the pre-show matches from TakeOver that'll be televised on the next episode of NXT.
So keep your eyes out for those as they come, and I hope you've enjoyed reading this almost as much as you enjoyed watching TakeOver and as much as you'll enjoy Mania!
And enjoy this image! Until next time, kids...
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