Previously on the Best and Worst of NXT: All you need to know is that Shinsuke Nakamura sent in a selfie iPhone video to challenge Sami Zayn for a match at NXT TakeOver: Dallas, and that it’s probably going to be the best match ever. Keep that in your hearts forever, kids.
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And now, the Best and Worst of WWE NXT for March 23, 2016. We’re almost to the Fireworks Factory!
Worst: Drift Away
I’ve been trying to figure out why my enthusiasm for NXT has been waning this year, and I think I figured it out. They stopped showing their work.
The version of NXT most of us fell in love with was a unique, singular thing. It wasn’t quite WWE, it wasn’t quite the indies. It was somewhere in-between, taking the best parts of every world and combining them in a show that applied WWE talent and production values to independent pride, fellowship and passion. It reminded us that shows from one building in front of one crowd could be important. See also: Lucha Underground. More than anything, the show made sure to tell us who these people were and why they were doing what they were doing before they did it.
There’s still a lot of that on the show, don’t get me wrong, but there’s way too much happening we’re just supposed to trust them on. Take the opening match of this week’s show for example. Here’s Elias Samson. What’s his character? You can say he’s “a drifter,” but still, what does that mean? It’s so ill-defined that the announce team’s been making fun of it for months. He plays guitar, but not really, and he wanders, but not really, and he’s … crazy? Kind of? His character, as far as I can tell, is “boring wrestler with hobbies.” He’s facing Johnny Gargano. Removing what you know about Gargano from other promotions, what’s his character? What’s his WWE character? That he’s good at wrestling, but from somewhere else? What’s Ciampa’s character? He’s good at wrestling, but from somewhere else. What’s Apollo Crews’ character? He’s good at wrestling, but from somewhere else. And he wants to be a champion? What’s Austin Aries’ character? He’s good at wrestling, but from somewhere else.
It’s honestly causing NXT to feel like an indie supplementary show, like I’ve ordered a Best Of compilation from Highspots and I’m watching good matches without any context. I miss the character development, whether it was good or bad, as it extended beyond how good guys are at wrestling. That’s why I’m not a huge Ring of Honor fan. So much of ROH is just built around guys proving they’re the best, and the stupid fun of wrestling gets kinda shuffled over to the side. That’s why guys like Dalton Castle are so great, because they drag it back to the center.
Think about what made feuds like Bayley vs. Sasha, or even Breeze vs. Neville work. They were characters, with observable histories and interpersonal relationships. Bayley wanted to be the best wrestler, sure, but she also had this and this and this and this. Sasha had a huge inferiority complex we could justify with two years of material. Breeze was one kind of person, Neville was another. And all of that was done on the show, in the NXT universe, on its own merits. Neville was PAC, but we were never asked to like and keep liking him because we remember how cool PAC was. Does that make sense?
I just want these guys to become actual WWE characters. I don’t want to sleep through another Elias Samson match, watch him get pinned by a guy who has zero in-house character development, be asked to care, and then try to relate to a bored Apollo Crews standing off with a Joker-faced Samson. It doesn’t work. It can, and it should, and I have faith that it probably eventually will, but I’m gonna need to see it.
Best: BABY GABLE AND BABY JORDAN
Want a great example of how valuable all that stuff I just typed is? Watch homegrown characters Jason Jordan and Chad Gable not only put themselves over as the biggest babyfaces on the show, but explain every moment we’ve ever shared with them from a pure-sports and psychological point of view.
This is probably the best video package NXT’s done since those “Finn really loves LEGOs and his family” pieces. Remember when Jordan and Gable got together? Jordan was trying to find a tag team partner but convinced he was never gonna, and that he’d have to carry teams on his own. Chad Gable wanted to prove himself, but he was little and weird, and didn’t look like he should be able to wristlock dudes to death. They begrudgingly agreed to team up, and magic happened. Legitimate magic.
That’s explained in this video, wherein Gable and Jordan share stories of how they got into amateur wrestling. There’s so much here, from the stories of how they’d tried their hardest and failed, to how lonely it is to be an amateur wrestler. You’re by yourself, and you fail, you carry it on your back. Now that they’ve found their twin flames they’re not alone anymore, and they know for a damn fact that they’re going to rely on each other and succeed at NXT TakeOver. That’s so, so beautiful. Instead of just having them continue to be cool guys we’re told are great, they’ve taken a second to actually dig into their histories and personalities to make them heroes we have real reasons to cheer for. “They do cool moves” is one thing, but lots of people do cool moves. Not everyone has stories that show how infinitely connected to this ridiculous sport they are, and not everyone can make your eyes well up at the POWER OF WRESTLING FRIENDSHIP.
If Gable and Jordan don’t win in Dallas, I’m putting NXT on a table and flipping it.
Best: For A Few Minutes During The Night
I liked Finn Bálor vs. Rich Swann a lot. Probably more than I should’ve.
My favorite Bálor matches tend to be the ones where we can step away from the pageantry and melodrama of “Finn Bálor” and remember that sh*t, the man is a great professional wrestler. Most of this match is built around Bálor out-wrestling Swann and eventually putting him away with not only the Coup de Grace, but the Bloody Sunday, now known as “1916.” I read a lot of comments asking why Finn was wrestling “as a heel,” and I don’t think he was. He was being confident. He should be, because he’s Finn f*cking Bálor. He should be able to straight-up wreck anyone who isn’t in the upper echelon the company, and that’s believably like, five people.
Great stuff, though. I’m happy Swann’s here. He rules, and him doing a ‘Thriller’ dance is more character development than most of his peers have gotten lately.
Worst: Woof
I hate when I have to just type “yeah, this didn’t work for me,” but yeah, this didn’t work for me.
Maybe I’m being too hard on it, but this is one of the worst NXT matches of the year. Alex Riley wrestles next week so I’m sure it won’t stay at the top of the list very long, but I can’t remember a non-Eva Marie match in recent NXT history that made me cringe this hard. I dig Alexa and her character work is still A+ throughout — I particularly loved her angry-faced “EXCUSE ME” when Sarah Dobson did an extraneous forward roll before she was ready to tie up — but one or both of them was having an off night. Dobson looks like a baby deer trying to get on her feet throughout most of the match. That high crossbody that turns into a knee to the face was bad, and the cartwheel into nothing into INJURED SELL was even worse.
It wasn’t so bad that I’ve gotta write 10 paragraphs about it or anything, but yeah, this was … not good. Alexa’s a talent worth nurturing and preserving, but I don’t think she’s ready to carry people in matches yet. I’d put Athena on TV, give me a new Four Horsewomen group with Athena, Asuka and like, Emma, and just have Bliss run with them until she goes from Debut Sasha Banks to Actual Sasha Banks.
Worst: No Way Jose
“Will I cheer for this guy?”
Best: Thank You Joe
1. Bull Dempsey is STILL HERE? And he’s wrestling again NEXT WEEK? I know I can’t complain because I’m a homer for a show that just started taping its third season like 18 months in advance, but damn, how far back do these tapings go? I keep expecting Oliver Grey to show up. Next week’s Kassius Ohno vs. Richie Steamboat match is set to be a classic!
2. I love Joe for saving us from a Bull vs. Danny Burch match, but that “thank you Joe” chant is curious. Does WWE realize nobody wants to see matches like this, and have they started expecting this kind of response? One of the things that always set the NXT crowd apart is that even when things were kinda bad (with a few notable exceptions) they at least tried to play along for a while. Now they’re just openly like, “ugh, I don’t want to see this.” If this is a controlled, meta babyface move from Joe on the same show where Finn “wrestled as a heel” against very babyface Rich Swann? Who do I have to bribe to get a double turn at TakeOver?
3. Joe’s super short promo after the attack is aces. It’s everything it needs to be. Romey Rome needs to watch that and learn how to sound like he believes what he’s saying.
Best: Emma Vs. Asuka Again
First of all, Corey Graves had an incredible night on commentary. I love his theory about Emma wearing aviator sunglasses and leather gloves to the ring because you never know when you’re gonna have to fly a plane. I hope that pays off one day.
If you remember Asuka vs. Emma from TakeOver London, you know how good this is. I don’t think this one’s as good as that one, but it’s very, very good, and any opportunity to elevate Emma to Super Worker is appreciated. I don’t think there’s a more undervalued person on the NXT roster, and maybe the WWE roster as a whole. She looks great, she’s got personality, she has a thorough history with the promotion, she’s a main roster cautionary tale, the works. The character work with Dana is perfect (Dana saying she’s hurt but still giving Emma fitness tips is great). Everything about her is top shelf right now. I hope she gets another shot at the big time after Mania.
Asuka, of course, is Asuka. I’m not sure how Asuka vs. Bayley’s gonna play out, but here’s how I’d do it. We saw Bayley vs. Nia Jax, right? That was Bayley vs. an unstoppable monster, and Bayley used her guts and brains to get through it. Nia underestimated her somehow, and Bayley just kept moving forward until she won. I like to think that Asuka’s a lot smarter than that, but she’s still relatively “new” in the WWE sense, and you could tell a similar story. Have Asuka go into the match with a weird half-friendship thing and get a little overconfident, and let Bayley pull out a miraculous surprise victory. Then, you have Asuka snap and go full apesh*t on her. Set up a title change for the next TakeOver, which you could use to give Bayley a real goodbye. Sami and Bayley are the NXT characters that deserve real endings before they go on to something else, and I think even the most selfish and jaded of us want Bayley to go off and be rich and famous. Richer, famouser. Whatever. She deserves it, and I’d hate to see her just kinda lose and slink off in the middle of WrestleMania weekend.
Also, I want more than one Bayley vs. Asuka match. Sue me!
