Go2Sleep

Dream indeed shot himself way up the list. I think Ciampa probably deserves a spot the way his character arc ended up playing out. Oddly, his neck injury ended up blunting Gargano's momentum more than his.

I hope they can find room for Gulak beyond being the new Kassius Ohno. He'd be a great heel NA champ. I can't really say I'm excited to see a Forgotten Sons program/match, but I would be interested to see UE work as faces for a little bit (especially O'Reilly and Cole).

When was the last time Taker didn't make you feel bad for him during a match? Can't imagine too many people will be lining up to work with him after seeing that shoot-tombstone on Goldberg here. Yikes.

I just got around to watching Double or Nothing, and liked it. It reminded me of a better version of Good TNA. Definitely the closest thing there's been to a WCW since WCW folded. I really hope the company does well. The Cody/Dustin match was better than I expected and had a rare southern feel that I don't think any North American wrestling has had in over a decade. Lucha Bros and Young Bucks did an overkill spotfest like only they can. The main event was pretty solid with good character work by Jericho even if his new finisher sucks. The Omega/Moxley brawl was fun. Most importantly, this show brought a lot of different styles together and felt like a major league wrestling production, not a niche indy.

Riddle/Strong was great, but this should surprise no one. Riddle is the best wrestler in NXT, Roddy is probably number 2 or 3, and they were in the opener so the time constraints reduced the overkill. This type of match should be the main event style. The ladder match didn't stand out to me at all. 20 years of these multi-way ladder tags, and the only 3 worth a damn all happened before 2007 (2 of them by April 2001). A tag team turmoil with two other teams would've been way better here. Dream/Breeze was easily the most impressed I've been with Dream during his push. It's one thing to follow the lead of Black, Ciampa, or Riddle in their type of match, but having a good match with a less athletically-gifted opponent who has been ground to heatless dust under the boot of WWE writing for several years is something. Dream really worked like he was several ranks above Breeze (which he absolutely is) and his tweener character looked all the better for it. Unlike the match where he gave 90% of the offense to Buddy Murphy, this showcase works really well to balance his gritty underdog performance against Riddle in terms of rounding out his character. Women's match was fine, but even as much as I like Shayna, her reign is starting to feel less like Asuka, and more like Brock Lesnar. The main event was better than their first match I thought. Yeah, it was even more overkill-y, but the execution was cleaner in a lot of spots now that they've had more practice together. I also liked that the dueling arm and leg work played into the finishing stretch. I know the superkicks and Canadian destroyers won't be everyone's cup of tea, but the match did have some internal logic to it. Hopefully Gargano is done with NXT, I think he's really done as much as he can here. Riddle taking the title of Cole at the Summer Slam weekend show leading to the UE blow-up is fine by me.

If Luke Gallows is still under contract, he needs to make an NXT appearance as Festus with Jessie.

I really hope Kacy Catanzaro isn't held back because of her size. She's got effortless athleticism that's too good to waste. That Vince-on-a-whim name change and and NXT being pre-taped looking real good this week.

In some fairness, the article says they're donating proceeds from some merch sales, so that kind of counts even though it probably comes out of the wrestler's cut too. Still, you'd think a billion dollar company would like to avoid the press of one of their "superstars" having to set up a gofundme.

I gave up on WCW after the fingerpoke of doom, only going back to watch 1999 and beyond well after it eventually folded. I haven't given up completely on WWE, but it's been over 6 months since I've watched a full Raw or SD. Most of that is due to having a baby, but the staleness of the main roster and stunts like Saudi Arabia shows have ensured that I haven't missed it. I can catch up from the ppv video packages without the grind of watching week to week, and NXT is enough to sustain my wrestling fix. I plan on watching AEW, and hope that it injects some life into main roster WWE, though I'm not optimistic as long as Vince is alive since he's already wrapped up his big paydays for the next several years.

Did you ask him this before it happened in Lucha Underground, or do they want to do it again? If it's the same Rey that we got with Andrade a couple months ago, I'm down. I hope we'll get Ricochet/AJ as something other than a throwaway Raw match. I'd also be ok with Ricochet taking the US belt off Joe at Summer Slam. Love the potential singles programs for him on Raw, but leaving Sheamus alone on SD is like adding a second Randy Orton to that brand.

Late to name-chat, but Samoa Joe works solely because it rhymes. If he was Samoa Mike, it would be different. And "American Terry" absolutely should've been Hogan's name when he worked in Japan. I feel like there a dozen other cool-sounding names you could've re-branded the War Raiders if you wanted to lean into psuedo-Viking culture for whatever reason. The Beserkers (yes, I know there was already a beserker) Stockholm Syndrome Warriors of Odin Hell, even "American Vikings" (which likely would've gotten shit on if it was the name they got) sounds way better in retrospect.

He worked a lot more even with Gargano and Ciampa. He controlled most of his match against Ricochet. Even in his matches with Black and Riddle, he got more offense than he did on Murphy. Dream worked Murphy like Murphy was Lars Sullivan.

Actually good = Someone who can consistently win at the main event level in fair/convincing ways Overachiever = Someone who can only occasionally win at the main event level in less than convincing ways (Ogawa being the all time example, someone like Adam Cole now) Totally disagree about the relative ranks. NXT is a way bigger deal than 205 Live at this point. Dream holds the secondary title and pinned the current main champ clean a month ago. No way he should be giving the whole match to anyone who's fringe main roster (which all of 205 is), especially when he has a very noticeable size advantage against a guy who by definition hasn't competed against a significantly larger opponent in months. Dream got more offense on Riddle and the story of that match was that Riddle was an undefeated buzzsaw who everyone expected to out-class Dream once the bell rang. I'm not saying Dream should've squashed Murphy, but not showing more offensive ability here was a disservice to his own belt. And while we're talking about the NA title... Dijak's promo, woof.

I was totally underwhelmed by Dream/Murphy. Dream gave up way too much control and both guys looked worse as a result. Dream's got the right idea outside the ring, but once the bell rings, I don't get the impression that he knows what his character is at all. Is he a face or a heel? Is he supposed to be actually good, or an overachiever? Is he supposed to be tough? Crafty? Arrogant? Who the hell knows? At Takeover, he's taking a vicious beating from a guy with indy/MMA cred and pulls out a gutsy win despite being out-classed. A few months ago, he was working even with the NXT champ. This week, he's giving 90% of the match to a smaller guy who should be well below him in status. Riddle/Gulak was right there a few weeks ago as a template for a 205/NXT special attraction match where both guys look good, but the NXT star is put over strong in front of the NXT audience. Dream/Murphy went for the "worst matches of John Cena's 2015 open challenge series" layout, where the champ looks worse because he can only hit 5 moves in a 15-minute match and the challenger looks worse because he actually lost to the only 5 moves he took and his 13 minutes of offense did jack shit.

I know the match was like 15 minutes longer than it should've been and Batista's selling and offensive stretch was bad, but god damn did HHH come to work in that match or what? I'm sure he has more leeway than everyone, but I'm impressed by how he's consistently violent he's able to get staying within PG guidelines. His opening stretch here was just nasty with the chain, the cable grips, and the nose ring extraction. The Troy-inspired sledgehammer shot at the end was a nice touch too. I guess if he had any faults here, it was that the match should've been laid out so Batista was on offense first and all of HHH's brutality led right to the finish. Batista responding with shoulder blocks in the corner 5 minutes after having his nose ring ripped out with pliers was the worst fucking thing. He should've been swinging those cable grips with his one good arm or digging a screwdriver into HHH's head or something. This was such a frustrating match because there was potential to blow everyone's expectations away and stand out as a legit WWE MOTYC, but there was way too much working against it after the awesome open. Figured Hunter at least deserved a shout since he hasn't done much of note in the ring since 30.

For being thrown together, Black and Ricochet make a really good team. War Raiders are significantly more polished version of AOP, and are victims of NXT being too stacked for its own good right now, because they're like 2 of the least interesting guys on the roster despite filling a perfect niche. Black and Ricochet make everyone look good, though. Good sendoff for those two, and hopefully the Raiders can keep some of the momentum from this match so they're not working in silence for the rest of their reign. Dream/Riddle was MOTN for me. It's tough competition for sure, but Riddle might be the best wrestler on the roster. Crisp strikes, seamless mat work, and maintains his timing at any pace. Plus his facial expressions in this match as he adapted to the crowd reactions took him up even another level. Dream hung in there and took a major beating, but it was Riddle's killer offense that made the whole thing work. He looked like a killer and Dream looked good for surviving and pulling out a crafty win. Great match where both guys came out looking better. This show was my first look at Walter. Seems like a guy that's watched a lot of 90s AJPW. He has the body of Taue and the approach of Hansen. Even though I generally like the modern style, wrestling needs guys like this more than ever. Big burly dudes who may not be the cleanest, but can generally keep up and punch/kick/lariat all these smooth operators in the mush. Just like Mil Muertes was essential to LU. Dunne is definitely one of the best in the company, and even though the chemistry wasn't as good as some of the matches, I liked the feel of this one a lot. Dunne is the longest reigning champ in forever, so I don't agree they needed to go the Sting/Vader route, even introducing Walter to majority of the audience. Vader/Kobashi was fine here. The women's match was the least of the show, but it was decent given its limitations with the format and Sane/Io obviously holding back for later. Shayna retaining is fine because there's still a fresh reservoir to tap with Io. Kinda hope they'll let Io and Kairi cut loose at the Summer Slam weekend show. The main event was what it was. You had a last-minute program with two guys who are good at the modern main event style on a show with several guys who are great at it. The match format would probably have broader appeal if it was Riddle vs. Dunne or Ricochet. They didn't really have time to set up any story other than 2 top guys go all out at the biggest show of the year. They did fine in that regard, and I will say a couple of the nearfalls at the end were really good. Johnny winning was a feel good moment that was more important than the match anyway. It was the 4th best match on the show, but both guys did as much as they could with what they had to work with. I do hope UE will turn on Cole who the crowd is dying to cheer. Roddy still has lot left offer as a heel, and I really think KOR has main event run in him too.

Ronda is in the Akiyama/Angle tier of "people who get pro wrestling right away." This was an up and down show, but had more good than bad ultimately. The Kofi stuff was really dumb and detracted from an otherwise great match. They could've set it up with him getting screwed out of title matches on consecutive episodes of SD and accomplished the same goal for him. Still, Bryan and KO showed why they're elite, and Ali showed he belonged. Charlotte also had perhaps her best heel performance ever. The Shield got a proper feel-good sendoff.

I think I prefer the 1/15 Rey/Andrade match to the 1/22 2 out of 3 falls. The falls in the second match were aces, two non-finishers that absolutely should get a 3 count, but the botch and non-finish took me out of it. The 1/15 match was like a late 90s WCW cruiserweight match slipped through a wormhole to 2019. The pacing was great, and the spots were mind-blowing. Until the finish, it felt very not-WWE-like. Still my easy #2, behind Gulak/Riddle.

This is definitely true. That match, Shield/Wyatts, the first Brock/Roman match, and Sasha/Bayley are the true "Holy shit, this is something special" feeling matches WWE has turned out this decade. All would rank highly on my list, but I would probably insert some other matches that may not have had that unique vibe, but were technically excellent (lots of NXT stuff). ADR/Ziggler from Payback 2013 is always the hidden gem of the decade.

Kemper Arena, lol. For real, though, there was a local indy that ran out of a warehouse converted to an indoor soccer field. First time I saw wrestling on field turf.

No one's talking about Drew Gulak vs. Matt Riddle?

Shayna/Dakota and Riddle/Martinez were quality tv matches where the winner and loser both came out looking better.

SD sweeps the pre-show, Raw sweeps the main show, seems fair. Decent enough show match-wise, though. Rollins/Nak is probably going to get overlooked, but it has to be Nak's best match on the main roster. Ali/Murphy was nice too. Both of those matches felt very NXT-ey. Man, that kendo stick beatdown was brutal as fuck. Usually the person with the stick will at least try to aim for the meaty parts of the body, but Charlotte was just swinging wildly and hitting Ronda all over the shins and elbows. Not sure if this reflects positively on her, but I was cringing the whole time. Ronda not doing a stretcher job was some bullshit, though. The Brock/Bryan match was alright. Really good when Bryan was in control, and mediocre when he wasn't. The finish was pretty bad too if they were actually trying to elevate Bryan in defeat, which the announcers seemed like they were trying to do. A pass-out finish would've been way better for that.

What would the hypothetical endgame be if there were to be another season? Pentagon/Aerostar/Drago/reformed Fenix vs. Strong/Barrett/Hexagon (?)/Matanza's replacement in a Wargames style match? I'd say Team Dario vs. Team Antonio, but I don't think they'd have the SFX budget to pull that off.

Totally agree. All of those guys look too good to be on permanent job duty, but this NXT roster is brutal if you're trying to break in. I love the way the Wargames card is shaping up. The Wargames match itself is a perfect throwback. It's Horsemen vs. Road Warriors/Luger/Sting 30 years later. Dream/Ciampa is a perfect non-ME title match, where both guys can come out looking better despite the obvious result. Heel Gargano will be fun to see, and then we get some kind of Shayna Baszler match and Ohno/Riddle to round out the card.