Last week on NXT: Dijakovic beat Shane Thorne in a match between two people that have zero character between them. Street Profits got an impressive win over Humberto Carrillo and Stacey Ervin Jr. Stacey really showed out taking crazy bumps and jumping higher than I’ve ever seen someone jump off the top rope. The rest of the tag divison all got beat up by the War Raiders. Kassius Ohno is crying about wanting to leave NXT and Keith Lee beat his ass for it. Aliyah and Vanessa Borne are now a team. Ricochet and Adam Cole had a fantastic match.
Cold Open-
We are seven episodes away from episode 500. Wonder if there is anything planned?
A video package hyping Velveteen Dream’s championship match against Johnny Gargano tonight.
Aleister Black vs. Roderick Strong
- Roderick is coming out alone. That doesn’t mean Undisputed Era won’t be showing up during the match. This will be interesting since Aleister was just “called up” to the main roster this week.
- These guys start off at an incredible pace, lots of counter wrestling and strikes. It’s like they started the match in 2nd gear.
- The match finally slows down after Roderick hits a backbreaker on the steps on Black.
- The story of the match is Aleister has an injured back and Roddy is relentless in attacking it.
- There is a super dangerous spot where they are fighting on the top rope in a superplex position. Both men almost fall but they end up fighting out of it with neither man taking a huge bump.
- Roderick is showing why he is called “The Messiah of The Backbreaker”, he threw Black back first into the top turnbuckle/turnbuckle post. It was gross. Black is trying to fight back but Roderick is too precise. He is surgical with this shit.
- Aleister randomly hits Black Mass and wins.
And I’m Like… That was out of no where. It’s crazy how much punishment Black took and how quickly he ended Strong. Makes me feel bad for Roderick, all that work for nothing. Undisputed Era did run down and Black was able to fight them off for a bit but then Ricochet showed up to save. The crowd reacted more to the last minute of this segment than the whole match.
A backstage video where Coach Deeb and Coach Del Ray were filming something but then commotion in the background happened and we saw some female talent stand up to Shayna Baszler, Jessamyn Duke and Marina Shafir.
Bianca Belair vignette about how she should be NXT Woman’s champion. Her mindset is Undefeated and so she still views herself as undefeated. Now she is calling out Io Shirai for beating Shayna. Belair says she will be the next champion and will make sure no one will get in her way.
Nigel called Ricochet, Alesiter Black, Tommaso Ciampa and Johnny Gargano the “NXT Elite”.
THE DUSTY CLASSIC IS BACK!!!! So far, Undisputed Era, Forgotten Sons, Aichner and Barthel and Street Profits. There will be four more teams announced.
Mia Yim vs. Xia Li
- Mia Yim has one of the best entrance songs going. I can do without all the Wu Tang references from Mauro though.
- Xia Li has a fun entrance song too, it’s just some drums and random noises but it matches her character. She even enters with a fan like she Chun-Li or Kitana.
- Some pretty good back and forth to start the match until Xia breaks out her martial arts moves and Mia’s face shows fear.
- They then go into a test of strength that leads to a lot of counter wrestling while in the Greco-Roman knuckle lock.
- The crowd is pretty dead for this but the women are doing a great job. They are both getting winded but it really adds to the match.
- Mia is able to pull out a hard fought victory after dodging a top rope kick and hitting Protect Ya Neck finisher.
- Shayna, Jessamyn and Marina run down to the ring to beat on Mia. A bunch of younger talent run out to help Mia. It’s a nice way to introduce some talent.
And I’m Like… Much like the first match, the crowd doesn’t make noise until the kerfuffle after the match. Mia was able to pull a good match out of Xia, who is progressing nicely as a talent. Shayna and company are showing why they run NXT. I’m kind of excited for Ronda to leave for a bit because Shayna needs to have her own spotlight before the Horsewomen feud.
Johnny and Candice are talking in the back and Candice is angry that Tommaso is next to Johnny. Gargano says he doesn’t need Ciampa but Ciampa seems like he knows different.
North American Championship
Velveteen Dream vs. Johnny Gargano (c)
- I like to post videos from WWE’s YouTube page on these because it’s a nice companion piece. Well color me shocked when I went over to get a link and THEY SPOILED THIS MATCH!!! Rude WWE YouTube.
- The match starts with a feeling out process. Both men know that the other man is dangerous and are taking their time to plot an attack.
- Gargano and Dream are beginning to wrestle on the ground and Johnny is beginning to gain an advantage.
- A camera cuts to the “rafters” where Ciampa is watching the match. It was a weird camera angle but I really liked it.
- Gargano was out wrestling Dream so Velveteen slapped the wrestling out of Johnny and took the match to it’s next gear.
- Dream upset Johnny with the slap, then applied a headlock and controlled Johnny. Dream is trying to anger Johnny so that Johnny makes a mistake. Like Gargano has done in matches in the past. Velveteen knows that if he gets in Johnny’s head, he has got the match won.
- Gargano hasn’t lost all of his cool yet and is proving that Velveteen is still young to this game. Johnny is a damn ring general right now.
- Gargano is changing his facial expressions during the match. He is growing meaner and more vicious. He knows what needs to be done to win, but he can’t become engulfed in anger or else he will not think his offense through and leave himself open for a mistake.
- Dream is amazing at building sympathy, especially in the spots in the match where Johnny slowly and deliberately stretches Velveteen. It’s damn near sickening.
- Johnny is now playing to the crowd as his confidence builds. He is slowly losing his laser focus. Johnny is enjoying this and Velveteen is regretting getting Gargano so upset.
- Dream hit a desperation spinebuster and that gave him enough room to get into a strike battle with Gargano.
- Velveteen won the battle and is now leading the match. That is until Johnny is able to wriggle himself out of DVD attempt and hit a spinning flatliner.
- Johnny went for a back elbow and the back of his head ran into the front of Dreams and both men are knocked down. It’s really anyone’s match now.
- This match is really good, everything is believable and makes sense. There are little things like when Dream is about to climb to the top rope but sees Johnny go to the apron, then Dream attempts to attack and gets caught. There is huge back and forth signature spots and it all makes sense. The crowd is wild for this shit too.
- They are back on the top rope and Dream is setting up for an Avalanche Dream Valley Driver. Gargano is trying to fight out of it but can’t! Dream hits the move and goes for the pin as Mauro yells “Dream On! Dream On!” but JOHNNY KICKS OUT!
- Velveteen goes for a top rope elbow, Johnny rolls to the outside, Dream decides to channel Macho Man and hit a double ax handle to the outside. Johnny catches him with a superkick. Lots more happens and it ends with Johnny hitting slingshot DDT. DREAM KICKS OUT!!!
- The crowd AND Mauro made sounds I don’t think I’ve ever heard. This match is a slobbermufuckinknocker.
- Then an outstanding sequence happened with superkicks and dodges and dramatic posing and counters. Velveteen ends up hitting two Dream Valley Drivers followed by a Purple Rainmaker for the victory.
And I’m Like… Wow. F’n Wow…. Dream is ecstatic, the crowd is elated and I am wiped out. That match was everything and then some. All that and a bag of chips. The shit, if you will. Everything clicked, made sense, crowd was into it, commentary was on point. There isn’t enough god things to say about this instant classic. Bravo to Dream and Gargano. Tremendous job.
