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Please click through to enjoy the Best and Worst of WWE NXT for June 19, 2013.
Best: Dusty Rhodes Is The Best Possible Teddy Long
This week’s edition of NXT begins (and ends, but we’ll get to that) like an episode of Smackdown. Two of the bigger stars open the show out of nowhere, mess around for a few minutes, CHAOS ENSUES~ and then the general manager/assistant to the general manager/CEO/COO/COO’s Wife or whoever interrupts to make it a tag match. You may know this formula best as every time you have ever seen Teddy Long ever.
That should get a Worst from me for a lot of reasons — the interruption of a straight-up Adrian Neville/Bray Wyatt match, reminding me of Peanuthead, etc. — but I’m giving it a Best because NXT’s Teddy Long is Dusty Rhodes, the American By God Dream, and that’s the best-ever upgrade. Dusty Rhodes speaking will get a Best from me no matter what. Guy could talk about nothing and make me feel wonderful. Guy HAS talked about nothing for at least the last 20 years. Did you ever watch WCW Saturday Night? He’d spend an entire Mr. JL match talking about spaceships and shit and I’d just sit there clapping my hands.
Impromptu tag matches are the worst, though. Thanks a lot, The Last Ten Years Of WWE.
Best: LOL ANGELO DAWKINS
THIS GUY
Sami Zayn got to wrestle again (which is enjoyable, and included below), but the highlight for me is ANGELO DAWKINS, aka BLACK SWAGGER, a guy who seems to have never been in a wrestling match before. He might’ve not even existed before this match. He just blipped into our lives. He’s hilariously ineffectual, looks like he got dressed in the WWE wardrobe department’s discount bin and sorta has the charisma of one of those guys Tommy would beat up in a bar in Best Of The Best. The one who called him “Shitbird.”
Here’s a random portion of the match:
Sami shows up again later to challenge Antonio Cesaro to a rubber match (and did so without mentioning purses), and I am absolutely on board.
Worst: This NXT Women’s Championship Tournament Really Isn’t Going Well
I love
1. Women’s wrestling
2. NXT
3. several NXT Divas
4. tournaments
…and somehow I’m not enjoying this NXT Women’s Championship tournament. The first week featured Tamina Snuka dragging Paige down to the depths of developmental hell, week two featured a perfectly cromulent but not special Alicia Fox match, and this week was Summer Rae vs. Sasha Banks. You may know Sasha Banks best as … well, you probably don’t know her as anything, but she’s Snoop Dogg’s cousin, so she has a job. She has a last name, which is good. Although it should be “Dogg.” Sasha Dogg. You may know Summer Rae best as NOT FANDANGO’S REAL DANCE PARTNER GTFO.
I’ve said several times that Summer Rae is Kelly Kelly and Stacy Keibler digivolved into one lady, and while some of that works to her advantage (being tall, blonde and pretty) the wrestling parts are not great. The highlight of the match was Sasha’s big comeback, which involved her slapping Summer repeatedly in her extraneous Power Girl boob window. Summer Rae won and moves on to round two, where she will (hopefully) steamrolled by the joyful locomotive that is Emma.
Worst: Xavier Woods Is Back
hold on, I need a page break or I’m gonna hang myself
Worst: But No, Seriously, Xavier Woods Is Back
I didn’t like Consequences Creed when he was in TNA pretending to be Cruiserweight Apollo Creed, so of course I don’t like him as Xavier Woods. He’s been gone for a while and this was his big return, wrestling Son Of Vader, and if you need his gimmick explained to you, here you go: WWE Black Guy.
That sounds horrible, but he’s sincerely WWE’s idea of a black guy you’re supposed to cheer. He’s got an afro, he does flips, he has ridiculous hand taunts and, most importantly, he does the James Brown split. I’m guessing he got his developmental deal in a Vince-and-Droz-He’s-Gonna-Puke moment when Norman Smiley cornered him in an office and was all DO THE SPLITS, DO THE SPLITS.
Woods got the win with either (depending on your level of pro wrestling fandom) Gail Kim or Chuck Taylor’s move and his push begins, because I guess JTG can’t keep that main roster spot forever.
Best, Unbelievably: Bo Dallas Makes Good On His Promise
don’t make me like Bo Dallas, you assholes
Believe it or not, my favorite moment on this week’s show was Bo Dallas sending in a video from the road, apologizing for not being at the show to entertain his fans, but sending in a photo of HIM AT DISNEY WORLD to make good on his championship win promo promise. And there he is, wearing Mickey Mouse ears and carrying the NXT title around Disney World.
It is very easy to make me love someone it is so easy to hate. If I start sticking up for Bo Dallas and it doesn’t make sense, I apologize.
Best/Worst: The Main-Event
Hold on, this video is more appropriate:
Sarah Michelle Gellar singing “Going Through the Motions” in Buffy from Vinicius Kartnaller on Vimeo.
That’s pretty much it. Top NXT guys going through the motions. With the exception of Corey Graves (I’m hoping), these guys will all be on Raw by the end of the year, so they’re just doing their thing and having an acceptable six man tag. That’s it. Daniel Bryan’s last two months have sorta reinvented what I think a WWE six-man tag is capable of, so when they just do a match they’d do in practice, I can’t really get excited about it. It’s just a match.
And that’s not really a condemnation. A lot of fun stuff happens, and I like the finish of Neville simply missing his wacky corkscrew dive and crashing and burning, which should be the consequence of big high flying moves like that. If you hit it, it’s an instant win. If you don’t, there’s a big chance you’re gonna lose unless you have time to get away and recover. Imagine jumping from five feet in the air, spinning vertically three of four times and then hitting a giant square of planks. You’d be dead, right? So that was good.
So yeah, hopefully next week’s NXT brings back some of the things I love to get excited about, and goes light on the What Would Teddy Long Do storytelling. Also, keep Bo Dallas at Disney World forever.
