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| Enough side dishes; we want the main course, Full Sail! Photo Credit: WWE.com |
The next episode of NXT is the 200th, and it looks to be bursting at the seams. Triple H will be making an appearance for the first time since he appointed the idea of JBL to General Manager. There'll be a Neville/Dallas rematch NXT Championship rematch with lumberjack rules. And per their survival in this week's opener, the Ascenion will be putting up their titles in an open challenge that will be met with no comeuppance whatsoever.
What? I'm serious.
Master Regal noted that teams that go in against the Darkside have this nasty habit of disappearing off of the mat, let alone the occassional breakup here and there. And so down went Hunico and Camacho, even if Camacho is opening up his offensive stash and Hunico is so good he should find some way to be on RAW every week beating formerly relevant World Champions. Even when things worked for the challengers, the Champs found a way to turn the tide; being hiptossed to the floor gave Rik Viktor the opening to drag Hunico off the apron when Camacho wanted to tag out, and the Fall of Man was a fait accompli after that. Seriously, what awesome babyface tag team is there left for the Ascension to bowl over, implode, or fissure? Is there even any at all? And is this the ceiling for the Champions, who still haven't put together a blowaway match to put on their C.V. and aren't necessary the most compelling ring generals when the lights come back up?
Say this for Full Sail--despite the problems they faced later on in the show with repetition, the Alexander Rusev project continues to move apace, and well at that. Save a competitive loss to Dolph Ziggler on his rebooting, he's looked like a land monster in swallowing up the bottom elements of the roster. This person he faced this week who bears no resemblance in any way, shape, or form to Chris Hero got pretty much squashed. Rusev had injured the back, so in the match he worked the back with only a break to get off about six or seven knee strikes to the gut when he had Oherno trapped in the ropes before he flattened him with a standing avalanche and broke his back and made him humble. Rusev seems well on his way to being a top contender for the big X, if the big roster doesn't snap him Laaaaaaanaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa! up first.
Who will stand in his way betwixt now and then is up for debate, but perhaps another big man who's riding a wave of wins will--let Mojo Rawley get in the ring with him for what'll certainly be a hoss skirmish. Rawley got a win over Scott Dawson with his Rear View/Hyperdrive combo that gave him a modicum of retribution for the upbraiding Sylvester Laforet and SD gave him last week after he refused to become a Legionnaire. But Dawson laid him out afterwards, so This Feud Must Continue (assuming, and maybe for as little as another week).
This is where NXT runs into the problem du jour, as after the main event between Leo Kruger and Sami Zayn, Kruger tried to pile on his win and Zayn ran him from the ring and tope con hiloed him for good measure. Granted, Dawson isn't going to pull off a tope con hilo...well, probably. But it's pretty indefensible to have two matches in a 41-minute show not only happen back-to-back, but to close the program. Again, it's entirely possible by ep201 these will all be things of the past and the four participants involved will have moved onto other dance partners. But jeez, you have one of the three best wrestlers in the world. Maybe you want to have him go in for more than five minutes against a guy he hates enough to not chain wrestle at any point and would rather go out there and start punching about the head and face. At least in the Beat The Clock challenge there was a logical reason for the brevity.
So after Regal informed Cesaro his problem was with the former villain and not Byron Saxton in the most concise way possible, it turned out the Women's division took best match of the show honors for a second consecutive week. Bayley teamed up with Natalya to take on the Biffles, and it was a master class in character development with a damn good match to boot. NattieKat thought Bay was cray, but clearly in an acceptable fashion and liked getting the love. Bayley was supermegapsyched per usual to have someone from the main roster have her back and like her. And as it should be, Sasha played Gretchen to Summer's Regina.
Even more fun was the fact that Bayley came out fighting, just as Zayn would. The lines of nicety have been eradicated, so the need for decorum was kaput, and in slamming Sasha's face into the mat repeatedly noises of surprise, but pleasantly so went out from the announcers and the viewers. Think of it as a variant on the Eugene Corollary, or the Festivus Modifier, the Cruise Theorem: don't make Bayley angry. You won't like her when she's angry. Sadly, her instincts were on point (see her tagging in when Natalya had gotten laid out by Summer and sprawled by their corner) but she fell victim to Sasha's straightjacket neckbreaker.
Just as on every non-get-and-stay-hyped match on the evening, the black hats got the final bows. And while BayKat commiserated over their loss, Summer continued to be the best worst person in the arena, taunting all the way to the back "WHAT ARE ARE YOU GONNA DO ABOUT IT, HUH?NOTHING! NOT A DAAAAMN THING!" This after she and Sasha checked each other's faces for lasting damage. They're so vain they should be friends with Tyler Breeze.
[note: THIS TOTALLY NEEDS TO HAPPEN]
For nearly 200 shows, NXT's been seen as a quasi-utopia to the bigger, popular shows the E does. But it's easy to forget the point of the show--to develop the future. From Camacho to Rusev, Bayley to Sasha, and Dawson to Kruger, even if the results were sometimes mystifying or not infused with the excitement of the higher-end Zayn matches, it showed a roster literally improving by the week and adding the little touches that make a character stick--and that's the purpose; what it's for.
Sure wouldn't mind another 199 episodes, I can tell you that much.
What? I'm serious.
Master Regal noted that teams that go in against the Darkside have this nasty habit of disappearing off of the mat, let alone the occassional breakup here and there. And so down went Hunico and Camacho, even if Camacho is opening up his offensive stash and Hunico is so good he should find some way to be on RAW every week beating formerly relevant World Champions. Even when things worked for the challengers, the Champs found a way to turn the tide; being hiptossed to the floor gave Rik Viktor the opening to drag Hunico off the apron when Camacho wanted to tag out, and the Fall of Man was a fait accompli after that. Seriously, what awesome babyface tag team is there left for the Ascension to bowl over, implode, or fissure? Is there even any at all? And is this the ceiling for the Champions, who still haven't put together a blowaway match to put on their C.V. and aren't necessary the most compelling ring generals when the lights come back up?
Say this for Full Sail--despite the problems they faced later on in the show with repetition, the Alexander Rusev project continues to move apace, and well at that. Save a competitive loss to Dolph Ziggler on his rebooting, he's looked like a land monster in swallowing up the bottom elements of the roster. This person he faced this week who bears no resemblance in any way, shape, or form to Chris Hero got pretty much squashed. Rusev had injured the back, so in the match he worked the back with only a break to get off about six or seven knee strikes to the gut when he had Oherno trapped in the ropes before he flattened him with a standing avalanche and broke his back and made him humble. Rusev seems well on his way to being a top contender for the big X, if the big roster doesn't snap him Laaaaaaanaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa! up first.
Who will stand in his way betwixt now and then is up for debate, but perhaps another big man who's riding a wave of wins will--let Mojo Rawley get in the ring with him for what'll certainly be a hoss skirmish. Rawley got a win over Scott Dawson with his Rear View/Hyperdrive combo that gave him a modicum of retribution for the upbraiding Sylvester Laforet and SD gave him last week after he refused to become a Legionnaire. But Dawson laid him out afterwards, so This Feud Must Continue (assuming, and maybe for as little as another week).
This is where NXT runs into the problem du jour, as after the main event between Leo Kruger and Sami Zayn, Kruger tried to pile on his win and Zayn ran him from the ring and tope con hiloed him for good measure. Granted, Dawson isn't going to pull off a tope con hilo...well, probably. But it's pretty indefensible to have two matches in a 41-minute show not only happen back-to-back, but to close the program. Again, it's entirely possible by ep201 these will all be things of the past and the four participants involved will have moved onto other dance partners. But jeez, you have one of the three best wrestlers in the world. Maybe you want to have him go in for more than five minutes against a guy he hates enough to not chain wrestle at any point and would rather go out there and start punching about the head and face. At least in the Beat The Clock challenge there was a logical reason for the brevity.
So after Regal informed Cesaro his problem was with the former villain and not Byron Saxton in the most concise way possible, it turned out the Women's division took best match of the show honors for a second consecutive week. Bayley teamed up with Natalya to take on the Biffles, and it was a master class in character development with a damn good match to boot. NattieKat thought Bay was cray, but clearly in an acceptable fashion and liked getting the love. Bayley was supermegapsyched per usual to have someone from the main roster have her back and like her. And as it should be, Sasha played Gretchen to Summer's Regina.
Even more fun was the fact that Bayley came out fighting, just as Zayn would. The lines of nicety have been eradicated, so the need for decorum was kaput, and in slamming Sasha's face into the mat repeatedly noises of surprise, but pleasantly so went out from the announcers and the viewers. Think of it as a variant on the Eugene Corollary, or the Festivus Modifier, the Cruise Theorem: don't make Bayley angry. You won't like her when she's angry. Sadly, her instincts were on point (see her tagging in when Natalya had gotten laid out by Summer and sprawled by their corner) but she fell victim to Sasha's straightjacket neckbreaker.
Just as on every non-get-and-stay-hyped match on the evening, the black hats got the final bows. And while BayKat commiserated over their loss, Summer continued to be the best worst person in the arena, taunting all the way to the back "WHAT ARE ARE YOU GONNA DO ABOUT IT, HUH?NOTHING! NOT A DAAAAMN THING!" This after she and Sasha checked each other's faces for lasting damage. They're so vain they should be friends with Tyler Breeze.
[note: THIS TOTALLY NEEDS TO HAPPEN]
For nearly 200 shows, NXT's been seen as a quasi-utopia to the bigger, popular shows the E does. But it's easy to forget the point of the show--to develop the future. From Camacho to Rusev, Bayley to Sasha, and Dawson to Kruger, even if the results were sometimes mystifying or not infused with the excitement of the higher-end Zayn matches, it showed a roster literally improving by the week and adding the little touches that make a character stick--and that's the purpose; what it's for.
Sure wouldn't mind another 199 episodes, I can tell you that much.