Paid Members LaGoosh Posted January 9, 2015 Paid Members Share Posted January 9, 2015 Dempsey is too cuddly to seem like a threat. I'm not sure if it's his face, ring gear, tubby physique or all three. Cuddly? Dempsey is pure A-grade tough son of a bitch. I take it you haven't seen the photos of him grimacing while lifting a car tire: What a hard bastard! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Linus Posted January 9, 2015 Paid Members Share Posted January 9, 2015 Hey, it's NXT! Your reason for existing is here!Show starts with Sami Zayn coming down to the ring with his title belt. He won it 3 weeks ago at REvolution but hasn't been on TV since because Kevin Owens DESTROYED him in the aftermath of that show.He got into the ring and grabbed a mic. The crowd was going crazy for him. He threw down the mic and jumped into the crowd. I got something in my eye at this point and wet stuff started coming out of it a bit.He finally got back in the ring and said that the title was proof that you could do things your own way. He said that the title wasn't his, it was all of theirs - his Zayniacs - and I got a bit teary again. Fuck, is this guy the best babyface working today? I think he is.He turned to the subject of Owens and said that Owens hurt him but he didn't end him and that he was here to defend the title at any time.This brought out Adrian "Ben" Neville, and there was some tension. But Neville apologised for interrupting him and said he wanted to shake his hand. Zayn said that he didn't know every rule in the book but he was pretty sure Neville was entitled to a re-match.William Regal came out and put over both men. He also said that they would have their re-match, next week on NXT! This whole segment was freaking gold.Backstage, and in black and white, the Vaudevillains were getting ready for their title re-match with the Lucha Dragons. Aidan English did the talking while Simon Gotch did squats.Hey, it's Hideo Itami! In a week when the cream of Japanese wrestling took the headlines, he gets to take on Curtis Axel, down from the main roster looking to kickstart his career.After an early flurry of kicks by Itami, Axel had most of the match, beating down and trash-talking him. Itami won with a tornado DDT into a spin kick thingy that is really not getting over as a finisher. Let him do the GTS FFS!Backstage, Byron Saxton wants to interview Tyson Kidd about his match with Finn Balor next week, but Kidd is stretching in preparation. Natalya offers to talk but doesn't say much before Tyson asks her if she's checked on his cats.She reminds him that they're their cats, but he points out that he's the one who chews up their food and spits it into their mouths when they're ill.Nattie says, "first off, that's gross, and that's what mother birds do for baby birds, and you're not a mother bird", to which Tyson replies, "I am not".He then asks her to go check on "our cats" and when she's gone tells Byron that they're "his" cats. Gold. He then tells Byron that he's not looking past Finn Balor but that he's looking past Finn Balor to the NXT title. He also says he wants to head up the SPCA because he's a friend to all animals. Especially cats.As well as Zayn vs Neville, and Balor vs Kidd, next week gives us Corbin vs Dempsey. What a show!Hey, it's Alexa Bliss! We haven't seen her since Sasha Banks broke her nose and made her bleed. She's fighting... Sasha Banks!Sasha is so great. She has everything down pat. They have quite a little match before Banks used the Bank(s) Statement for the win. Bliss looked real good.After a commercial, Tyler Breeze is back! He's been off modelling but now he's back to fight Chad Gable, who is rocking the Olympian gimmick. That's as in sportsman, not Greek god.Gable has most of the match, but is weirdly out-grappled by by Breeze at points. He does lock on a great armbar over the ropes, which Breeze sells like it was really ouchy. Breeze gets the win with the Beauty Shot.Backstage, Finn Balor does a terrible promo.Rewind footage shows someone in the rafters of Full Sail, stalking Tyler Breeze...Hey, it's main event time! It's the Vaudevillains versus the Lucha Dragons, in a re-match for the NXT Tag Team titles.The Vaudevillains get on top early on, cutting Kalisto off from his partner and working him over. Then they cut Sin Cara off, and worked on him. English did a schoolboy on Cara, not to pin him, but to send him through the ropes. This just fired up the faces and led to twin suicide dives.Back in the ring, Kalisto went for his ropewalk huracanrana but Gotch held onto English and Kalisto tumbled to the mat. It looked like a botch at first but was actually a clever spot. They worked over Kalisto again, before Sin Cara got back and they did a whacky lucha finish to keep the titles.This was an average episode of NXT which makes it a Good Show. There was nothing spectacular past the opening segment but that's what make this show so consistently good - an even spread of professional wrestling goodness. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members FLips Posted January 9, 2015 Paid Members Share Posted January 9, 2015 I was really digging Chad Gable, reminded me a lot of Kurt Angle. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Merzbow Posted January 10, 2015 Share Posted January 10, 2015 Even the name gives off the same exact vibe, to me anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Big Benny HG Posted January 15, 2015 Paid Members Share Posted January 15, 2015 A few weeks late, but I loved that when Blue Pants scored her upset win over Carmella her music was just a played-back recording of Big Cass' singing that game show ditty. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WyattSheepMask Posted January 15, 2015 Share Posted January 15, 2015 Another decent episode this week. Balor and Kidd have a real good match and Zayn and Neville have another great match. Not to R:Evolution standard but didn't expect it to be either, mainly as the result was never in question Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members FLips Posted January 15, 2015 Paid Members Share Posted January 15, 2015 Baron Corbin managing to hit End of Days on that fat sod Bull Dempsey blew my socks off. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Linus Posted January 15, 2015 Paid Members Share Posted January 15, 2015 Hey, it's WWE NXT! It's that show you love made by the same people that make that show you hate! The show started with Tyson Kidd coming to the ring for his big revenge match with Finn Balor. Balor - and his pal Hideo Itami - got the better of Kidd - and Justin Gabriel - a few weeks back, and then saw off Kidd & Tyler Breeze a few weeks after that. Kidd asked for this re-match, sensibly jettisoning his dead weight partners, and NXT commissioner Steven Regal is a man who gives people what they want! Our announcers welcomed us to the show, the first on a Wednesday night to accommodate Smackdown's switch to Thursday. Renee Young said that Wednesday is her Woman Crush day, and her crush - as always - is Joey Mercury. Her boyfriend will be disappointed with that. Axel Riley claimed that Wednesday is shoulder day in the gym for him, while Rich Brennan looks bewildered by it all and can’t wait for the action to start. Finn Balor came to the ring, the crowd loving his usual entrance. He has some great music. I'm glad he's saving the full make-up extravaganza for the big shows or he'd just be Jeff Hardy. And nobody wants that. Balor got the match off to a fast start with a huge dropkick, before climbing to the top and missing a double footstomp. He hit some chops and a dropkick to a prone Kidd in the corner, and Kidd rolled to the outside for some respite. They did some more in and out stuff and then Kidd rammed Balor into the guard rails, which moved a foot back. These are not your WWE guard rails. And that's where it stopped being good. I don't know what it was, but these guys did not work well together tonight. Everything they did seemed a little off. It wasn’t terrible, but you’d expect so much more from these guys. Renee informed us that Tyson had pictures of his cats on his boots, and sure enough he did. Last week he was telling us how he regurgitated food into their mouths when they were sick. I love Tyson The Scary Cat Man. They pulled out some big stuff - the Pele kick, a weird but cool floatover neckbreaker thingy, a flip dive to the outside, and a dragon screw on the ropes - but it just did not come together. Balor got the win with the reverse Bloody Sunday and a double footstomp off the top rope. They'll both have better days. They showed a video package hyping tonight's main event, Sami Zayn versus Adrian Neville for the NXT title. As this mostly included highlights of their battle at REvolution, this rocked. Backstage, Devon Taylor talked to Bull Dempsey. He told her that Baron Corbin isn't the only undefeated guy in their match - up next - which really isn't true, because Bull was on a losing team in a tag team tournament six months ago. He also said that the last thing Corbin would hear was "Bull, Bull, Bull." I see. Hey, it's Baron Corbin! He's really quite big, but quite lean with it. He has a laconic cool to him, backed up with lots of wins in very short matches and a nice line in biker gear. He’s a lone wolf! He's fighting Bull Dempsey, and I always have to focus properly to avoid typing Balls Mahoney. Dempsey's a fat lad in a wrestling singlet. He’s an angry koala! The two couldn't be further apart. Remember how I didn't like the last match, and that was surprising because they're both really good? Yeah, this wasn't good, either, but I don't think anyone expected it to be. They clubbed away at each other, and one thing Corbin really needs to work on is his punches. They fought outside for a while before bringing it back into the ring. Dempsey hit a body block, which actually took Corbin off his feet, and then climbed the top rope for his diving headbutt finisher. Corbin moved, and Dempsey missed. An End Of Days later – yes, on Dempsey! - and Corbin was your pinfall winner. The crowd, robbed of their usual entertainment of counting along with Corbin's matches, instead counted the 1-2-3. Although, it only went 94 seconds so they could have given it a go. Today's youth, eh? There is a serious lack of backstage fun tonight, which sucks. It's straight on with the next contest, with NXT Women's champion Charlotte and Natalya (slumming it down from the main roster) taking on Team BAE, Sasha Banks and Becky Lynch. Natalya and Becky worked most of the match, and it felt a little lacklustre. Natalya seemed a little slow, a little off, and her rope running was really bad. Maybe she was tired? Usually I don't notice these things in NXT so who knows what's up tonight. Is it me? Is it the show? Who knows! Becky took a break on the outside, with Sasha giving her support, which just led to out-of-time stereo baseball slide kicks from the babyface pair. Back in the ring, Natalya tagged Charlotte in, and they hit a double stalling suplex for a near fall. Natalya tagged back in and they did a whacky lucha move in a very non-lucha way. Charlotte was in for, like, 30 seconds. Whut? Becky managed to make the tag to Sasha, but Natalya took her down and literally ran over her, stepping on her head. This FIRED UP Sasha, and she hit her usual moves - the double knees in the corner for a near fall, and the Bank(s) Statement for a near submission. Natalya fought out and tagged Charlotte. At last! Charlotte hit some chops and a neckbreaker but Becky broke up the pin. The heels tried to double-team the champ, but Natalya pulled Becky out of the ring, and Sasha awkwardly finished Charlotte with a neckbreaker of her own for the win. Yeah, this didn't work. And that was bad three matches out of three, and that NEVER happens on NXT. Still, Sami Zayn and Adrian Neville up next. If anyone could save the show, it was those guys... Hey, it’s Adrian Neville! He used to be the NXT champion but he lost his belt at Revolution to Sami Zayn. Since then, Kevin Owens has beaten both men up and left them lying in a pool of their own vitals. But they have FIGHTING SPIRIT and they are back to grapple for our entertainment. Sami Zayn came out to the usual rapturous response. His music is awesome. Even I - a broken down, washed up old cynic, sat on a sofa in a provincial suburb – cannot help but join in with the “Let’s Go!” refrain. This started slow. And it felt kinda awkward for a while until it dawned on me what they were doing. They were doing a more Japanese style match than you'd usually see, especially in the WWE (even the NXT part of it), and the story of the match was that they knew each other well enough to counter everything the other was doing. Once that had sunk in, it was a decent match. Nowhere near the level of their REvolution tussle, or even their match before that one, back in November. But why have the same match, again and again? That's why I love this show. Some of the shots in this were harsh. A forearm war, a huge uppercut by Neville in the corner, two Huracanranas which saw Zayn landing ON HIS HEAD... all that and Neville blocking Zayn's DDT through the ropes with a kick to the face. Harsh, man. The finish came when Neville missed the Red Arrow, and Zayn missed the Helluva Kick. Neville rolled through for a nearfall on Zayn, but Zayn hit the exploder suplex into the corner, and the Helluva kick for the win. After the match, Kevin Owens appeared in the ring and pop-up powerbombed Zayn out of his boots. He stood over the fallen champion and the crowd did NOT know what to do. Seriously, they were just eerily silent as Owens made his way back up the ramp. Their hero had fallen... Okay, this wasn't a Great Show. If you take the main event out of it, it's a Bad Show. But Zayn and Neville dragged it right up into an acceptable watch. NXT hardly ever has Bad Shows, let's hope it's a while before the next one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
King Pitcos Posted January 16, 2015 Share Posted January 16, 2015 I've given it a couple of months now, and I'm still not on board with Baron Corbin. I don't really see the thousand-yard stare or the charisma, he seems to me like a bit of a geek that they've put a half-arsed biker gimmick on. That may well just be me. And after this show, I quite like Bull Dempsey. He's been ridiculously miscast as an undefeated monster type, but I think he's got lots of potential as a lower card wanker villain and we might see that more now he's been beaten. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WyattSheepMask Posted January 16, 2015 Share Posted January 16, 2015 The next NXT Takeover special was confirmed at tonight's taping, and two matches were confirmed: NXT title Match: Sami Zayn © v Kevin Owens NXT Women's Title: Charlotte © v Sasha Banks v Bayley v Becky Lynch Also at tonight's tapings Wesley Blake & Buddy Murphy (the lads with the tron vid made on Windows Movie Maker) won the NXT Tag Team titles from Lucha Dragons. Seems a bit random as they have been a jobber team Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GavinSAFC Posted January 16, 2015 Share Posted January 16, 2015 re: the NXT tag title change - could that mean the Lucha Dragons are coming up to the main roster? I think so. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members LaGoosh Posted January 16, 2015 Paid Members Share Posted January 16, 2015 (edited) Am I the only one not paticularly impressed by Finn Balor? He's good in the ring but I have no idea what his character is supposed to be. Normal bloke who occassionally puts mad makeup on? I don't really see what makes him stand out. Dissappointed with Hideo Itami too. In his debut he came across as a proper no-nonsense Japanese karate hard bastard. I could get behind that. He's nothing these days though. Hoping they give these two guys something more to work with in the future. Edited January 16, 2015 by LaGoosh Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members ColinBollocks Posted January 16, 2015 Paid Members Share Posted January 16, 2015 (edited) I've given it a couple of months now, and I'm still not on board with Baron Corbin. I don't really see the thousand-yard stare or the charisma, he seems to me like a bit of a geek that they've put a half-arsed biker gimmick on. That may well just be me. And after this show, I quite like Bull Dempsey. He's been ridiculously miscast as an undefeated monster type, but I think he's got lots of potential as a lower card wanker villain and we might see that more now he's been beaten. Nailed it. Both men could probably be decent in other roles, but both are completely unbelievable currently. It's the old, feels like two geeks playing wrestler, which is absolute death to me. I thought their lack of connection and believability was strongly highlighted during the last NXT show. A show that was filled with quality, until them two had that laughable face off, which felt like the two soft shites in the playground squaring off. The hair on Baron Corbin's head is terrible too. He's got Undertaker's hair from 5 years ago and all the facial hair I could grow when I was 18. He looks like a tit. Edited January 16, 2015 by ColinBollocks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
King Pitcos Posted January 16, 2015 Share Posted January 16, 2015 I just went through a Google image search of him. He's gone through a few different looks, all of them quite bad. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Your Fight Site Posted January 16, 2015 Paid Members Share Posted January 16, 2015 I just went through a Google image search of him. He's gone through a few different looks, all of them quite bad. [image] He looks like a shit boyband member. Like a member of a modern-day East 17. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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