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NXT Takeover: New York - 4/5/2019


Dolfan in NYC

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3 hours ago, Casey said:

For people that care about this sort of thing, it's looking likely that Meltzer gives Cole/Gargano the full 5 stars (or higher) based off saying it's possibly the best WWE match ever.

After watching Cole/Gargano, I thought Dave would give the full five.

2 hours ago, maciej said:

I don't follow wrestling twitter thaaaat widely I guess, and I'm not surprised that people liked this match more than me but I am genuinely a little shocked that the range of opinions stretches THIS far in the positive range.

Agreed.

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Just finished the show.

I don't watch NXT consistently. Some of these guys I haven't seen before. I think the biggest surprise of the show was that I'm pretty sure I used to like Mauro Ranallo and I don't think I can listen to him any more. He's like the loudest version of Matt Striker where everything has some kind of reference to something else, and a lot of times they're loooooong sentences, the pay off isn't worth it, and the action has mooooved on. I was suspicious when he was doing the Joker trailer references right out of the gate, and Nigel was like "Oh great, it's going to be that kind of night," right next to him. So that kind of bummed me out, because I liked him when he started with the company, but ever since he came back form the JBL bullshit he's gotten more and more Mama Mia.

Tag Match -

I dug this, but I don't care for Ricochet/Black as a team. Kudos to them for going with this Angel/Devil theme to at least make it look like they're trying to not be just another random pairing of guys. At first I hated Ricochet smiling during the sit down - but Black stayed intense so the dichotomy kind of works. Ricochet is just a smiley dude. 

I don't like it when tag matches break down into just four guys doing spots and fuck the legal man idea. This one had some of that. I also don't like it when guys break up pin attempts but don't get the opponent off the guy being pinned OR get the shoulders of the guy getting pinned off the mat. Like the pin needs to be broken. So I hated the spot where both War Raiders are on Ricochet and the ref counts, only for Black to double stomp the guy on top. The pin was illegal so the the ref shouldn't have counted, and the pin didn't really get broken up so he shouldn't have stopped.

I'm that kinda fan sometimes. Sorry. But even with all that, this still may have been my favorite match on the show anyway, just because I dug the War Raiders.

Velveteen Dream vs. Matt Riddle

I love that he does throwback stuff. I wish he'd do lesser known stuff than just aping Macho and Hogan, I feel like that might hold him back over time. Riddle is okay.  I like his gimmick, and he was a total douche preening in his pinstripes. I've seen some of his work from the Indys and this match felt weirdly familiar to me. Like I'd seen it before but now with Velveteen's stuff plugged in.

I really loved the finish and I thought Riddle sold the finish really well. We went through a period where guys would lose and just kinda be like "oopsie, I still get paid so whatevs I guess." and seeing Riddle be so disappointed was great. Thought Dream posing like he didn't just get the shit beat out of him took me out of it.

Pete Dunn vs. Walter

I liked this. Was kinda dissapointed with Walter, who I've liked in the past. Before the match I really wanted him to be the guy to beat Dunn, but as the match went on I was less impressed with him and wanted Dunn to retain. Dunn is a rare guy that doesn't stop acting when he's on the mat. Like he's always aware that the camera might be close up on his face so he always looks like he's in the fight. Lots of wrestlers fail at this small detail.

 I love the story of the chops being able to drop early on, but as Dunn worked the hands and the match went on the less effective they were. I wasn't as mad at the second half as @Matt D, but I did think that it was very different from the beginning. Instead of being the fight that it was, it started being setups for highspots. It's like...WALTER -Fuck this top rope splash bro.  

Nigel tried to tell a long term story for this one, I wish everyone else got on board to "Yes and..." He said that Walter was looking lighter, like he trained for a longer fight, but that he still needed to put this one away early. Later when Dunn started to comeback, Nigel brought up how Walter was sucking wind. Cardio became an issue. I wish everyone else in that overstuffed booth played that game with Nigel instead of trying to figure out how to say this is kinda like BREXIT. Jeezus.

Women's title match.

Bel Air is coming along. Shayna Bazler is probably the best woman in the whole company right now. Thought this one had a more complete story than the other matches. Bazler was right, and the hungry dogs would tear each other apart so she could win. The stuff with the Sky Pirates was played right, and I thought Bel Air came out better than she did going on despite tapping out. I don't like multiman matches very much anymore, but I appreciate that all four women tried to tell stories with the match to further their characters and relationships instead of "HERE'S SOME MOOOVES AND SPOTS."

Main Event

I checked out after about 5-8 minutes. Before the first fall. Like I thought I'd be fresh with this because I watched the first three matches yesterday and the last two matches today. I've watched a lot of dance dance matches. Some I enjoyed immensely. But as soon as this started I realized that I didn't like Adam Cole and he was not going to break up some of Gargano's bad habits like Ciampa does. The 2 out of 3 falls stip exposed the flaws of the whole lay out even more. I'm impressed with their athleticism. But Marathon Runners are also impressive and watching them run isn't necessarily entertaining.

 

It may not sound like it but I enjoyed pretty much everything until the main event. Even when matches got annoying, I could still go back and say "Yeah but there was a couple of moments that felt brilliant." 

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12 minutes ago, crazypook said:

A separate issue—I feel like I must be crazy, but I don’t accept Johnny as a baby face after the way everything has played out. Am I crazy? Did I miss something? Just because he got the drop on Ciampa when he tried to turn on him again? Or because of his injury/surgery? Are we supposed to just forget about Johnny being a dickhead for 6 months? He never apologized or actually turned or anything. I don’t get it at all.

I'm with ya. I kept feeling like I must have missed an episode of NXT that clearly re-established him as a super honorable babyface in one week somehow.

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Guest Edwin

I love this place and love you all, but I wonder if there's ever a moment where some of you just sit down and watch a show and try to just have fun without having to overanalyze and be overly critical about every single aspect of it.

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1 minute ago, Edwin said:

I love this place and love you all, but I wonder if there's ever a moment where some of you just sit down and watch a show and try to just have fun without having to overanalyze and be overly critical about every single aspect of it.

Believe it or not, my friend, thinking can be a lot of fun too. 

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Guest Edwin
37 minutes ago, Matt D said:

Believe it or not, my friend, thinking can be a lot of fun too. 

Jeezuz, what a burn. ?

I could reply with a witty comeback as that's an easy setup, but then I'll reply and you'll reply back and someone else will jump in with insults and by the end of the day the thread is locked, so I'll just take the L.

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I go into every show to enjoy myself. I never go into hate watch. That's why I stopped watching so much WWE in general. Even with this Mania having a terrible build I'm still going in optimistic that Kofi/Bryan and the women will steal the show and make it all worth it. I want to have fun.

But when I am watching something I enjoy, and I get annoyed, I actually think about why I get annoyed. 

 

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Look, if I didn't love the first half of the WALTER match so much on both an emotional and cerebral level, I wouldn't have been so frustrated by the back half on at least one of the two.

I am sitting out the main even because I don't think I'll enjoy it. I will go back for the Dream match because I think I might. I want to like the stuff I choose to watch. Trust me. 

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8 minutes ago, Matt D said:

Look, if I didn't love the first half of the WALTER match so much on both an emotional and cerebral level, I wouldn't have been so frustrated by the back half on at least one of the two.

I am sitting out the main even because I don't think I'll enjoy it. I will go back for the Dream match because I think I might. I want to like the stuff I choose to watch. Trust me. 

You might not like it. Riddle kind of falls into that Angle trap where he's clearly great at chain wrestling because of his background, but there's no real wearing down or limbwork. Instead it's a lot of just throwing bombs and fighting spirit, and the subs are put in for pops and false finishes. I think he german suplexes Dream on the floor like mid match. I may even be misremembering that, but the fact that I'm uncertain instead of going "Holy shit they did this german suplex on the floor spot" probably says more than any critique I can give.

 

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The general consensus of social media/reddit opinion re: Gargano/Cole is it was everything Meltzer says it is. Personally it wasn't my cup of tea but I'm not going to scorn anyone who did like it. I think I enjoyed the invisible man match from Spring break more, simply due to GCW ref Bryce Remsburg's masterful performance of directing traffic (seriously, go and watch it). This place generally doesn't follow a collectivist way of thinking - for the most part people like what they like without prejudice (unless you're a Randy Orton fan like me) and that's okay.

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3 minutes ago, Rick said:

 This place generally doesn't follow a collectivist way of thinking - for the most part people like what they like without prejudice (unless you're a Randy Orton fan like me) and that's okay.

I'll back you up on Randy Orton.

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12 minutes ago, Craig H said:

I'd easily give the main event *****. 

See. Craig gets it. I say it's bad. He says it's good. We go cry about the Cubs and move on.

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I liked the last fall of the main event, but also thought it was ridiculous and can totally understand the hate from some. I also occasional enjoy a good Orton match and am looking forward to AJ/Orton tonight.

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The Main Event was maybe the most Main Event Main Event that they could have Main Evented with. For better or worse, it was pretty much exactly what we all knew it was going to be going in. Plenty of kick outs, some actual drama, and the good guy winning. It was what it was, and by the sounds of it, it was what the crowd wanted. Personally, I felt it went a little long but hey ho. I knew what I was letting myself in for; and I didn't hate it.

Personally, I preferred the other two singles title matches, particularly Dunne vs. WALTER. It was simpler, a little more subtle and it had less of the stuff I didn't like out of the Main Event. I can understand the criticisms from this thread of it giving Dunne a little too much considering WALTER is supposed to be an Extinction Level Event, but on the other hand, Dunne has had this ridiculously long reign, and it would be a total gyp if he lost the belt on a glorified squash. With it being in New York, Dunne can move on to bigger and better things while WALTER goes back across the pond and obliterates Jordan Devlin some more for the first time in an NXT: UK ring.

Riddle vs. Dream was pretty good, too. I'm not totally sold on Dream's cos-play of WWE legends past, but he puts enough of his own spin on it that it doesn't suck. cf: the Bret vs. Austin finish they ran. I love shoot style, so I actually like Riddle's in ring style.

Ricochet & Black vs. War Raiders, well. I could probably C&V a lot of what I said about the Main. Ricochet doesn't do it for me, and Black probably wouldn't if he didn't boot people in the face really hard. The Black vs. Rowe sequences worked for me, way more than the Hansen vs. Ricochet bits; but it all came together well.

Love Baszler, Hate Four Ways.

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Rewatching the ppv now and I just finished everything but the main.  My quick thoughts:

-I’m sold on the War Raiders now. I think Hanson gets a little cutesy showing his agility but it’s not really a gripe. 

-Dream’s best bet is to stay in NXT lest he go the way of Tyler Breeze. 

-Matt Riddle would be a great heel. 

-Bianca Blair is strong as fuck. I think she’s gonna be great in a about a year. 

-Adam Cole would be a superstar if he had a grown man’s body. 

-I loved the last 10 minutes of the main. I agree with all the negative that was posted about what was wrong with the match, but me and my little girl were screaming at the tv at each pinfall. That memory alone made that a 5-star match for me. 

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