Previously on the Best and Worst of WWE NXT: Ruby Riot and Nikki Cross couldn’t keep their hands off each other, Tyler Bate continued to wave uncomfortably, and we were forced to care about Roderick Strong.
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And now, the Best and Worst of WWE NXT for May 3, 2017.
Worst: Dain, Daniel! Back At It Again With The Squash Matches
This week’s episode of NXT kicks off with a reminder that despite Tye Dillinger’s best efforts, SAnitY is still a faction — though strangely, Killian Dain is only accompanied to the ring by leader Eric Young. Alexander Wolfe is nowhere to be found. (Maybe he’s too busy doing awful hardcore dancing to the latest batch of TakeOver themes.) So we get Dain one-on-one with Jason Statham Danny Burch, and it lasts all of three minutes before Burch is felled by Dain’s Ulster Plantation (aka a one-armed electric chair driver).
This match did a whole lot of nothing for me, only because I thought we had moved SAnitY as a unit beyond squashes, but I guess Dain still needs reps. I wonder if this faction will make it to the main roster someday or if they’ll be split up first. If they do make it up as a unit, how will it go over with crowds? Even in NXT, the group doesn’t get a pop to speak of when their music hits, and if you can’t make Full Sail respond to your entrance, then what shot does it have at succeeding on the main roster?
Worst: For F*ck’s Sake
The Patrick Clark Experience is now being morphed into something called The Velveteen Dream, and I will continue to Worst this character until there is a good enough reason to actually appreciate it and not just wonder what the hell NXT creative is thinking.
Best: Heavy By God Machinery
I am still all-the-hell-in on Heavy Machinery, and nothing they did tonight will sway that opinion. Otis Dozovic’s facial expressions are priceless — he’s like if Chris Farley had gone into pro wrestling, not sketch comedy. (I’d bet money that there is a video in the Performance Center archives of Dozovic cutting an “El Nino” promo.) Tucker Knight is no slouch, either, and carried his load on the mic after the match as Dozovic grunted and growled.
This duo is hitting everything great about wrestling nearly by accident, from their so-goofy-it’s-great matching gear to their improvised catchphrase of “Steak and weights!” which made both Full Sail and people sitting on their couch happily chant along. Give me a T-shirt with that printed in big-ass letters immediately, please and thank you.
Worst: TakeOver: Chicago’s Theme Songs
If I were a smarter man, I’d write out some sort of mathematical formula that explains my enjoyment seeing Chris Jericho in a wrestling ring in correlation to my disdain seeing Chris Jericho onstage. Go listen to Royal Republic’s “Walk” instead. As for Hacktivist? Nah, brah. Put on Enter Shikari’s “The Last Garrison” and thank me later.
Worst: No One Cares, Why Should I?
The first and only thing I wrote in my notes for Kona Reeves vs. Hideo Itami was “This match should be over in 90 seconds.” It actually went a shade over two minutes, which still felt interminably long. (The above video is actually the entire match minus the GTS and pin.) Reeves got dropped by Aleister Black just last week, and we’re trying to rebuild Itami into a legit contender for Bobby Roode’s NXT Championship, so this should have been a total steamrolling, but instead we had to go through the motions of Itami struggling to gain the upper hand. Even Itami looked a bit angry that he is still having to do this sh*t. I feel you, dogg.
Best: Strength In Weakness
I wasn’t as big on part two of “Who Is Roderick Strong?” mainly because this episode focused squarely on the fact that the dude has a semi-famous fiance in MMA fighter Marina Shafir (something I cannot relate to, although my wife could probably choke me out if she wanted to) as well as a young child (which is something dozens of other WWE Superstars can lay claim to as well, making it a pretty generic talking point). This segment just wasn’t as powerful as the first — lots of wrestlers have families, lots of wrestlers say “wrestling saved my life,” lots of wrestlers did time on the indies before getting a long-overdue look from WWE. Still, I’d be a right asshole to Worst a guy who just had a baby, so Best it goes.
One thing worth noting, though, if you’ll allow me to put on my tinfoil hat: Did anyone else notice that there was no sort of “courtesy of Ring Of Honor” credit on any the photos of Roddy competing in ROH? Usually, whenever there are videos or images of an NXT talent from anywhere outside of NXT, they are fully credited to the promotion which provided them, but these ROH stills were used as if they were an easily-accessible part of WWE’s media archive, not something for which they had to seek out permission. Maybe I’m reading into it too much; maybe not.
Never doubt the power of a good video package, though, because after it finishes airing, William Regal tells Bobby Roode he was impressed by Strong’s story and will give him a shot at becoming No. 1 contender. All he has to do is beat Hideo Itami next week. I’m really interested to see where they go with this match, because you just turned a previously personality-free warm body into a sympathetic babyface but you also just brought back one of your most-hyped NXT signings in recent years and a crowd favorite who has had his push derailed by injuries multiple times. So who goes over? I don’t know, and I look forward to finding out.
Best: NXT’s Women’s Division Is Deeper Than Raw And Smackdown’s Combined
Finally, we get a 15-woman battle royale to determine a new No. 1 contender for Asuka’s NXT Women’s Championship. I think it is important to note that when counting Asuka, this division currently stands at 16 competitors (17 if you count Mandy Rose, who wasn’t in this battle royale but still an NXT talent). Wanna know how many active competitors there are on Raw? Eight. Smackdown? Six. (Seven, once Lana debuts.) Hopefully this results in an influx of women to the main roster in coming years, and not the alternate option of a whole bunch of female talent battling it out for a very limited amount of main roster spots.
I love a good battle royale, and this one didn’t disappoint. Half the competitors got televised entrances, and two competitors got brand new names — Macey Estrella is now Lacey Evans, and Daria Berenato has become Sonya Deville. Furthermore, we see the first NXT appearance of Candice LeRae, one of the finest wrestlers of any gender currently on the indie circuit (and also the wife of Johnny Gargano). Here’s to hoping this turns into more than a one-shot appearance, because she deserves to be on TV all the damn time.
After some healthy competition, we eventually end up with a final three of Nikki Cross (who previously eliminated Liv Morgan and Aliyah, thank christ), Ember Moon (who eliminated Billie Kay and Peyton Royce) and Ruby Riot (who didn’t eliminate anyone, to the best of my knowledge [but keep in mind I watched this episode at 12:30 in the morning after getting home from seeing Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes so if she was the person who took out Lacey or something, please don’t crucify me in the comments]).
The ad hoc triple threat gets fun really quick when Nikki just chucks herself at Ruby Riot — technically, it was a crossbody, but really, it was more like whipping a sandbag into someone’s gut as hard as possible. Everything Nikki does is with force and with purpose, and she’s probably the best all-around female competitor in NXT right now aside from Asuka.
Ember Moon stupidly goes up to the top rope (literally anyone who does this in a battle royale is an idiot) but manages to hit the Eclipse on Cross, who turns right back into that sandbag, making it impossible for Moon to toss her. She instead goes back to the top rope again only to have Asuka run down and throw her off, then attack all three women, which results in a disqualification for some bizarre reason. It’s a battle royale, refs! You didn’t see the Royal Rumble called off when Kai En Tai ran in, like, four times, did you?
But I’ll forgive that moment of bad refereeing because it results in an absolutely incredible moment when Asuka hurls Ember Moon through the ropes, resulting in her landing square on her goddamn head right on the goddamn concrete. This looked (and probably felt) brutal, and it was made even better by the camera cutting back to Asuka, sadistically grinning and waving. It then got even better when a post-beatdown Nikki Cross began to roll out of the ring, only to spot Ember still crumpled up on the concrete and laugh at her. Like, holy sh*t, that’s some Kevin-Owens-stepping-on-Alex-Riley-level ring awareness right there. A+++++.
My only big complaint is now we’re getting another fatal four-way for the Women’s Championship, when we just had one two TakeOvers ago. However, I think this is being booked in such a way where Ember will win the belt by pinning Nikki or Ruby, allowing Asuka to have a legitimate gripe and demand a one-on-one rematch, which will presumably happen at TakeOver: Brooklyn III, and will finally be Ember Moon’s time to, uh, shine.
Next Week: Roderick Strong battles Hideo Itami to determine who gets on the TakeOver: Chicago card and who ends up on the pre-show fighting Oney Lorcan or something. Also, Aleister Black sacrifices another developmental talent!
