The Best And Worst Of WWE NXT 2/21/18: Au Revoir (Adios)

Previously on the Best and Worst of WWE NXT: We had two title matches, zero title changes, and a lot of wrestlers with metalcore theme songs.

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And now, the Best and Worst of WWE NXT for February 21, 2018. I wanna contribute to the chaos, I don’t wanna watch and then complain.

Best: The Feud

I wish WWE would have uploaded the entirety of the opening video package for this episode. Not only did it do an excellent job of recapping the Andrade “Cien” Almas/Johnny Gargano feud, it quickly and effectively summed up the past 10 months of Almas’ character growth, from a party boy on an endless losing streak to a motivated killer with a secret weapon in his corner. In short, it made him feel like a big f*cking deal, which is something he hasn’t felt like since he won the championship, save for his TakeOver: Philadelphia main event.

Supplemental Best for only including Tommaso Ciampa for a split second in that video package, making it more about Gargano being unable to best Almas, and not about the ghost of Ciampa (or Ciampa himself) stalking him. Most people probably could have guessed Ciampa would show up in the main event of this episode, but NXT did as little as possible to telegraph it, which I appreciate.

Worst: Tighten Up

Last week, Velveteen Dream was informed he was facing off against No Way Jose this week, and instead of responding to that, he immediately challenged Tyler Bate instead. If that doesn’t tell you how useless Jose is as a character in NXT’s universe, I don’t know what is.

This reeked of house show, from the dancing mimicry to… well, the lack of anything even remotely resembling actual combat. Especially cringey was Dream’s variation on the tried-and-true classic move the Jumping Nothing. That’s all this match was: nothing.

However, pretty much any time Dream gets on the mic is worth a Best, and his decision to award himself all of the NXT year-end awards was hilarious, especially when he called out the actual winners — including Asuka! — and deadpanned, “no one cares.” Actual, legitimate LOL from that one. I hope one day Asuka brings Dream a receipt for that one.

Best: Father

After taking off 2017 (presumably due to the Mae Young Classic), the Dusty Rhodes Tag Team Classic has returned! This tribute to the true father of NXT is 1-for-2 thus far: The 2015 edition introduced us in earnest to the Mechanics (now known as the Revival), American Alpha, and #DIY before being won by two of NXT’s biggest names, Samoa Joe and Finn Bálor; alternately, 2016 was plagued with injuries (sorry, Austin Aries, Hideo Itami and Shane Thorne) and a whole bunch of slapped-together cruiserweight tag teams. However, credit where credit is due: The 2016 run did give us Heavy Machinery, as well as the incredibly short-lived team Gloriously Perfect (and thus, Bobby Roode cementing himself as a heel).

I haven’t looked at this year’s brackets yet but I have to assume they’ve cut down from 16 teams, just because NXT doesn’t have anything close to that many in their tag division — not to mention this tournament has to wrap before TakeOver: New Orleans, as the victors will face the Undisputed Era for the straps at that event. This tournament doesn’t even start for another two weeks, either, so it’s gotta be pretty truncated. As long as my boys Heavy Machinery run the table, we won’t have a problem. AAAAAAASSSA!

Worst: HELP

There’s really no other way to point this out, but … Vanessa Borne walks to the ring like a stripper, dresses like a stripper and has a theme song that sounds like a B-side from a Kid Rock concept album about strip clubs. And this is not casting aspersions! Honestly, there have been worse gimmicks than “stripper, maybe?” Anything can be salvaged if she could wrestle, but she has zero in-ring acumen. She is the worst thing appearing even semi-regularly on NXT TV. Even worse than Riddick Moss, Cezar Bononi or the Ealy Brothers. Maybe even worse than all of those curtain-jerkers combined.

Need an example? Rewatch the start of this match, when Nikki Cross jumps on Borne’s back, ostensibly to give her a chance to turn it into an offensive move and begin the heat portion of the match. What does Borne do? N-O-T-H-I-N-G. Cross has to essentially throw herself over Borne’s head and initiate contact a different way to get the match back on track. Little sh*t like this is infuriating to me.

Best: Grand Finale

It would be unfair to compare this match against Almas/Gargano III from TakeOver: Philadelphia, only because that match was so spectacular that no NXT TV match, complete with commercial breaks, was going to measure up. But I’ll be goddamned if these two didn’t try their best to top themselves.

Strangely, even with the one-sided stipulation of “Johnny Gargano must win or leave NXT” hanging over the proceedings, the crowd didn’t seem to be as hot for the match early on as I expected. Luckily, that’s why you bring along Zelina Vega and Candice LeRae (or, uh, “Mrs. Johnny Wrestling,” as her shirt said — not super-into that, as she’s a whole lot more than just someone’s wife, but that’s a sidebar for another day). Once those two got into it (early, this time), the crowd got fired up and were onboard for the rest of the contest.

The nice thing about this match was even though these guys had just ostensibly wrestled the match of their NXT careers only a few nights earlier (this was taped a few days after TakeOver: Philly), this match had a life of its own, and didn’t solely rely on callbacks to that main event. For example, Almas going for a billion rollups right when the bell rings showed cracks in his cocky facade: He knows that Gargano is only going to come up an inch short against him so many times, and that his own luck may be about to run out. His rushed transition into a hammerlock DDT attempt further pushed that point forward.

My personal favorite sequence came about two-thirds of the way through, when both men attempted each other’s finishers, then attempted to roll each other up, then attempted to clothesline each other, before Almas finally got the upper hand, chucking Gargano into the turnbuckle face-first and coming in hot with a reverse Meteora. That right there is the good sh*t, my man.

Now, let’s talk about the ending. I realize ref bumps are a part of pro wrestling, but man, nothing grinds my gears more than watching Drake Wuertz get brushed by a competitor and go down in a heap. That’s Drake goddamn Younger, a Tournament Of goddamn Death champion, taking a ref bump. I get it, but still.

So Wuertz crumples and Gargano locks in the Garga-No Escape — and, unsurprisingly, F*ckface Ciampa comes in to wallop him with his crutch, to give Almas the advantage and the eventual victory. Surprisingly, though, Gargano does not get a visual submission from Almas. I re-watched it again just to make sure, and Almas never actually tapped out, even with the ref down. In a way, this makes perfect sense, as now Gargano has zero loopholes left: At the end of the day, Almas is still the better man in the win-loss column.

Of course, the big question is how the hell does Gargano get reinstated in NXT to go after Ciampa? Or does he? NXT has been surprisingly traditional with their “loser leaves NXT” matches, as that’s how both Bo Dallas or Elias Samson left the company and moved to the main roster. Could this actually be the send-off for Gargano? Would they really make us wait until Ciampa gets called up to the main roster for this feud to finally have its blow-off? Or should I just read the spoilers from the next set of TV tapings like everyone else to find out what happens? (I’m not gonna do that.)

My uninformed yet overconfident prediction is Gargano will stay off TV for the foreseeable future, Ciampa will be set up for a big return match at TakeOver: New Orleans against a tin can, and Gargano will ambush him from the crowd during the match, leading to Ciampa demanding Regal reinstate him. But man, if we really have to hold our breath until Brooklyn in August for these two guys to go at it … Tom Petty had it right: The waiting truly is the hardest part.

Next Week: Kairi Sane squares off against Shayna Baszler, and we (presumably) (hopefully) get to hear from F*ckface Ciampa.