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Best NXT Matches Ever.


The Natural

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I can pinpoint the exact moment I went from "these guys are good" to "holy fucking shit" during their Chicago match. Tyler hit that corkscrew 450 flush full on and made a cool flashy high spot also look painful as fuck and made me feel really dumb for not watching the uk tourny.

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On 2/6/2018 at 5:00 AM, Brian Fowler said:

Thinking... I'm not sure it makes my top five women's title matches, against the two Bayley/Banks, the two Bayley/Asuka and two Asuka/Moon matches.

Which is crazy because at the time it had a legit case for being the best WWE women's match ever.

If I TakeOver the top five women's matches from my original list, I get:

13. Sasha Banks vs. Becky Lynch. NXT TakeOver: Unstoppable 2015.

12. Charlotte vs. Sasha Banks vs. Bayley vs. Becky Lynch. NXT TakeOver: Rival 2015.

9. Asuka vs. Ember Moon. NXT TakeOver: Brooklyn III 2017.

7. Sasha Banks vs. Bayley. NXT TakeOver: Brooklyn 2015.

6. Bayley vs. Sasha Banks. NXT TakeOver: Respect 2015.

5 hours ago, Niners Fan in CT said:

I can see an argument for Asuka/Moon but that would be the only Asuka match I'd place up there on the level of Sasha/Becky.  

Not enough love in here for Samoa Joe and Finn Balor.  The match where Joe gets split wide open and is a fucking maniac. The stoppages did their best to try to ruin the moment but Joe saved it and looked like a fucking killer in that match.  

I agree with you on both points. Finn Balor vs. Samoa Joe at NXT TakeOver: Dallas made my list. Joe should've won.

An underrated match is Bayley vs. Asuka from the same show. I remember people in the thread, including me saying they enjoyed Bayley vs. Asuka more the second time. Said match had difficulty going on after Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Sami Zayn.

I think NXT TakeOver: Dallas remains my favourite TakeOver.

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8 hours ago, Niners Fan in CT said:

I can see an argument for Asuka/Moon but that would be the only Asuka match I'd place up there on the level of Sasha/Becky.  

Not enough love in here for Samoa Joe and Finn Balor.  The match where Joe gets split wide open and is a fucking maniac. The stoppages did their best to try to ruin the moment but Joe saved it and looked like a fucking killer in that match.  

FYI, that match is most likely the only reason why I probably won't rank both Kevin Owens & Finn Balor's best NXT matches as being against Adrian Neville. Which is made even more crazy because the Owens/Neville & Balor/Neville matches I liked so much took pace within a week of each other.

Basically, I'm saying by the end of his NXT run Adrian Neville was very very good.

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4 hours ago, DeathyBoy said:

I'd never seen either wrestle prior to their first NXT match.

I literally ran the gauntlet from "UK guys? Cool" through to "mother of God."

I'm sure I've seen better matches, but I've never had that feeling before where I saw (from my POV) two guys go from wrestlers to superstars in one match.

By the time of the airplane spin I was marking out in my flat big time. Actual "what the fuck" after that strike exchange near fall. 

 

In hindsight, it’s kind of crazy they had Dunne and Gallagher in a CWC qualifying match, which was my first time seeing either guy.

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On 2/3/2018 at 7:50 PM, El Dragon said:

BTW, if anyone else is doing a deep dive on NXT right now, may I recommend hitting up the Neville/Kevin Owens match from 2/17/15. 

Owens' brief NXT was full of great work. It's a shame Sami got hurt and their story couldn't reach its natural conclusion. The other deep cut I'd recommend was his tv match with Finn Balor from March of 2015 (I wanna say 3/28).

I think Bayley/Sasha from Brooklyn is my favorite NXT match. The combination of both the actual work, the conclusion of a long-term story arc, and the real-life emotion and implications were just a perfect storm you can only get once in a great while. Kayfabe be damned, the curtain call homage after this match was the most emotional moment WWE has produced in a long time.

Pleny of other high-end contenders that have already been named. The ones I think that have been missed thus far are Owens/Zayn (Rival), and Revival/AA (The End).

Lastly, I don't wanna hear anyone ragging on Zayn/Nak for re-using spots from other matches (that at least Nak was involved in) and praising the DIY/Revival 2/3 falls that blatantly plagiarized the finish of the Rhodes/Bennetts mixed tag from TNA.

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13 hours ago, The Natural said:

@Go2Sleep, Sami Zayn vs. Kevin Owens from NXT TakeOver: Rival '15 placed #10 on my list. The best Owens/Zayn match in WWE. The ending is the highlight, referee stoppage via repeated powerbombs.

The highlight is the absolutely most pathetic kick out ever by Sami after powerbomb #3 I think. Just the saddest kick out ever.

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...There is too many good matches and too short of a time. Like...fuck. I can't even form a list without reaching 50 because NXT had good throwaway matches back in the beginning that did not mean anything in the grand scheme, but were great ass matches. Like I disagreed with Almas and Gargano being the best match ever because there were a few matches in nXT that were on par like Sasha vs Bayley Iron Man Match, Sasha vs Bayley NXT Brooklyn, Revival vs DIY, Sami vs Nak....

There is so much good shit. 

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On 2/6/2018 at 12:04 AM, El Dragon said:

I can almost promise no Asuka match will even enter my top 20, with the only one that has a shot is her match with Emma. I just really can't see an argument that any of Asuka's title matches even come close to Sasha/Becky, which is almost unquestionably to me the best technical match in NXT history. Fuck, I don't think anything else is close.

See this is what I am talking about when it comes to NXT. I vaguely remember this match and even I was astounded by it at the time. But it was just another great match on NXT. I can't possibly rank them all because NXT has consistently been a great show and Triple H may have been outshined by the likes of the rock, Stone Cold, Chris Jericho, and etc as a wrestler. But dude has an eye for talent and booking wrestling shows.

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Joe's best NXT match was his 5-minute tv match with pre-DIY Ciampa right around the time Joe turned. Stiff slugfest that put Joe over strong, but helped separate Ciampa from the pack a little bit with a tough showing.

Asuka's best NXT match was probably with Nia at The End. Her debut match against Dana was pretty perfect for what it was supposed to be as well.

Nakamura's best NXT match was obviously the debut against Sami, but his match with Aries at The End is very underrated.

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4 hours ago, Go2Sleep said:

Asuka's best NXT match was probably with Nia at The End. Her debut match against Dana was pretty perfect for what it was supposed to be as well.

Dana was fantastic putting over Asuka... and she was wrestling injured too! I really wish Dana had stayed a little longer in NXT, I had high hopes for her after that.

Joe/Ciampa straight up sold me on Ciampa; it totally believe he would hold his own vs anyone of any size.

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3 hours ago, (BP) said:

That reminds me that they incorporated the leg injury from the Revival match that hadn't even happened yet into the CWC match and how hard that ruled.  

Wasn't it they incorporated the leg injury from the CWC match they taped like a month before but then aired right before TakeOver?

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6 hours ago, El Dragon said:

The real fun part is we don't even get to count Ciampa/Gargano in this from the Cruiserweight Classic which is a matchup between NXT regulars that is fucking great. 

Also, I honestly feel like I can list like 3 different sub 5 minute Oney Lorcan matches. Oney vs. Drew & Oney vs. Hideo are fucking wars. 

Ohno vs Sullivan too.

Its to the point where Ohno vs whoever they're pushing is one of the best matches at Takeover. You know Ohno is gonna lose, but he's gonna make his opponent look like a killer in the process.

And that takes serious skill. People buy into Ohno dressier a horrific win-loss record. 

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6 hours ago, Brian Fowler said:

Wasn't it they incorporated the leg injury from the CWC match they taped like a month before but then aired right before TakeOver?

It looks like it was taped a month before and aired four days after Takeover:Brooklyn. I figured it was really clever booking, but maybe Gargano or an agent just happened to remember the match was about to air when they needed a finish for the tag match. 

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  • 1 month later...

I'm tempted to throw in the  Black/Almas(+Vega) because those two did exactly what they needed to and Vega was like the awesome icing/cherry on top of a great cake. It's a perfect example on how a manager can complement and enhance a match.

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This here is likely to be one of the most transitory lists ever due to NXT consistently finding ways to raise the bar. Gargano/Ciampa was as predictable as the Florida Marlins season, but these guys made it work. Going against a handicap like that and pulling it off is pretty impressive. I'm really not a big Ember Moon fan,  and it's not that she's bad, had she come along ten years ago, I'd be raving about her, it's just that in the line-up that WWE/NXT currently has she just doesn't seem that impressive. However, Shayna has become so good, so quickly that I'm really tempted to put their match on here somewhere. You've got two performers working right now that are able to get across the Benoit-level of believability  (Shayna and Pete Dunne) and that's just amazing as Benoit was a once-in-a-lifetime talent when it came to projecting an air of realism.

Andrade "Cien" Almas and Aleister  Black was particularly interesting due to two factors.  (1.) You had the situation of a pretty predictable outcome transcended by outstanding work from both guys. (2.) Selina Vega showed the world just how much a great manager can add to a match. Between the work she's been doing and Paul Ellering's greatness it should be sinking in to VKM that there are other people than Paul Heyman that can add a lot of value by being in the managerial role. Anyway we've got to make a spot for this one on the top twenty. Almas is so good right now that you come to expect nothing less than **** matches out of him. Add Selina to the equation and the heat factor goes through the roof.

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  • 3 months later...

Since my original ballot, there's:

Gargano vs. Ciampa. NXT TakeOver: New Orleans 2018.

Cole vs. Ricochet vs. Dream vs. EC3 vs. Dain vs. Sullivan. NXT TakeOver: New Orleans 2018.

Ciampa vs. Gargano. NXT TakeOver: Chicago II 2018.

Strong/O'Reilly vs. Lorcan/Burch. NXT TakeOver: Chicago II. 

Black vs. Ciampa. NXT TV, 25th July 2018. 

Then THAT NXT TakeOver: Brooklyn IV 2018 card!

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