The NXT Discussion Thread

[d-d-d-dAz]

1 hour ago, Supremo said:

As is tradition, supposed, “smart,” fans proving to be the thickest of the lot. I’d be absolutely furious if I was Ricky Saints or Ethan Page, working for proper, normal reactions, only to be met with tribal, dickhead chants of, “Tony Fumbled.”

With the amount of AEW references on WWE television right now, it’s enough to make you think momentum is swinging and one company could be a bit rattled. They might as well fly Mark Henry in for the Starks vs. Page match. “It’s time! For the Main event!”

It still surprises me every time I see good ol’ Ricky on NXT. He’s someone I think they absolutely could have parachuted in to the main roster. At times during his AEW run, in spite of the fact he was clearly angling for the WWE move, I was convinced he was going to be the next big thing.

When he gets going he’s great and pisses star power.

[RedTwoster]

1 hour ago, Supremo said:

As is tradition, supposed, “smart,” fans proving to be the thickest of the lot. I’d be absolutely furious if I was Ricky Saints or Ethan Page, working for proper, normal reactions, only to be met with tribal, dickhead chants of, “Tony Fumbled.”

I totally agree. Clearly this isn’t the intention, but it almost feels disrespectful to the wrestlers and it completely took away from what they were trying to achieve. I absolutely hated that. 

(Also, I don’t actually think he did ‘fumble’ in the case of Ricky Starks - he was given plenty of opportunities, but it felt like he was missing something - I still don’t feel convinced by him!) 

If you don’t enjoy AEW or WWE, that’s fine. Taste is subjective. But don’t fucking chant about it. 

[tiger_rick]

18 minutes ago, d-d-d-dAz said:

It still surprises me every time I see good ol’ Ricky on NXT. He’s someone I think they absolutely could have parachuted in to the main roster. At times during his AEW run, in spite of the fact he was clearly angling for the WWE move, I was convinced he was going to be the next big thing.

When he gets going he’s great and pisses star power.

 

16 minutes ago, RedTwoster said:

I totally agree. Clearly this isn’t the intention, but it almost feels disrespectful to the wrestlers and it completely took away from what they were trying to achieve. I absolutely hated that. 

(Also, I don’t actually think he did ‘fumble’ in the case of Ricky Starks - he was given plenty of opportunities, but it felt like he was missing something - I still don’t feel convinced by him!) 

If you don’t enjoy AEW or WWE, that’s fine. Taste is subjective. But don’t fucking chant about it. 

Quoted both because I was gonna reply to Daz and then Twoster pretty much said what I was going to. I don't think he's capable of being "it" either. There are a couple of things, one that's probably fixable and one that clearly isn't.

The first is that the act doesn't feel authentic. He's taken a bit of a lot of people and put it together and sometimes, I agree he can piss charisma and feel like a big deal and a lot of the time he feels like a caricature and I find it real hard to get invested. It's clearly something that can be tweaked and honestly, even if they don't, LA Knight got over and I think he's a bag of wank, so would it even hold Ricky back? Probably not.

The bigger issue for me is his look. He's just not convincing as a top guy. It's not the business it was so it's not as big a deal as it was but I still think a guy like Jacob Fatu turns up and heads immediately turn and you think "wow", this guy is insane. That's not the case for a Ricky or a Speedball Bailey. They have a place and they're talented as hell but I'm just not buying them as a big deal ever. Danny G will always have that issue too in my shallow little world.

[d-d-d-dAz]

32 minutes ago, tiger_rick said:

 

Quoted both because I was gonna reply to Daz and then Twoster pretty much said what I was going to. I don't think he's capable of being "it" either. There are a couple of things, one that's probably fixable and one that clearly isn't.

The first is that the act doesn't feel authentic. He's taken a bit of a lot of people and put it together and sometimes, I agree he can piss charisma and feel like a big deal and a lot of the time he feels like a caricature and I find it real hard to get invested. It's clearly something that can be tweaked and honestly, even if they don't, LA Knight got over and I think he's a bag of wank, so would it even hold Ricky back? Probably not.

The bigger issue for me is his look. He's just not convincing as a top guy. It's not the business it was so it's not as big a deal as it was but I still think a guy like Jacob Fatu turns up and heads immediately turn and you think "wow", this guy is insane. That's not the case for a Ricky or a Speedball Bailey. They have a place and they're talented as hell but I'm just not buying them as a big deal ever. Danny G will always have that issue too in my shallow little world.

I think the LA Knight comparison is very fair, I could see him filling that role but with better matches.

[LaGoosh]

Ricky is charismatic and sounds good but he has a tendency to talk really fast and with a lot of passion but what he's actually saying most the time is total bollocks, barely coherent or cliches. He's a decent hand and you can definitely get something worthwhile out of him but pretty laughable that he was fumbled. There were booking mistakes here and there for sure but he should have been able to rise above them. Fundamentally AEW didn't want to fully commit to him because it was obvious to everyone that he was going to jump ship to WWE - simple as that really.

[d-d-d-dAz]

23 minutes ago, LaGoosh said:

Ricky is charismatic and sounds good but he has a tendency to talk really fast and with a lot of passion but what he's actually saying most the time is total bollocks, barely coherent or cliches. He's a decent hand and you can definitely get something worthwhile out of him but pretty laughable that he was fumbled. There were booking mistakes here and there for sure but he should have been able to rise above them. Fundamentally AEW didn't want to fully commit to him because it was obvious to everyone that he was going to jump ship to WWE - simple as that really.

This is definitely true. I like him, but nothing was fumbled. He's Founder, President and CEO of the Cody Rhodes fanclub. The minute the messiah moved, the clock started ticking.

[Snitsky's back acne]

Were the fans chanting 'Ricky Starks' or is my hearing going? 

[Supremo]

Sounded like, “slave name,” to me.

[RedTwoster]

1 hour ago, LaGoosh said:

Ricky is charismatic and sounds good but he has a tendency to talk really fast and with a lot of passion but what he's actually saying most the time is total bollocks, barely coherent or cliches. He's a decent hand and you can definitely get something worthwhile out of him but pretty laughable that he was fumbled. There were booking mistakes here and there for sure but he should have been able to rise above them. Fundamentally AEW didn't want to fully commit to him because it was obvious to everyone that he was going to jump ship to WWE - simple as that really.

And the same may be true for Ethan Page. I think he was a bigger miss, especially given that they could have reunited the brilliant Men of the Year a tag team, but isn’t he also close with Cody? It may well be that he was on his way anyway, so they simply didn’t want to do anything more than they did with him. 

But heck, even if that isn’t the case, it’s hard to look at the AEW roster and think even for a second that it’s one that could really do with some Ethan Page. And I really like the guy.

But losing people like Starks, Page, Black and the Lucha Bros has freed up time that seems to have been given to the brilliant women’s roster, so it’s been a win for AEW in that sense (Toni Storm, Harley Cameron, Mercedes Mone or any of the above? An obvious choice), a win for the wrestlers as they’re getting used quite prominently in WWE and a win for WWE, as it’s freshened up their roster.

[d-d-d-dAz]

5 hours ago, RedTwoster said:

And the same may be true for Ethan Page. I think he was a bigger miss, especially given that they could have reunited the brilliant Men of the Year a tag team, but isn’t he also close with Cody? It may well be that he was on his way anyway, so they simply didn’t want to do anything more than they did with him. 

But heck, even if that isn’t the case, it’s hard to look at the AEW roster and think even for a second that it’s one that could really do with some Ethan Page. And I really like the guy.

But losing people like Starks, Page, Black and the Lucha Bros has freed up time that seems to have been given to the brilliant women’s roster, so it’s been a win for AEW in that sense (Toni Storm, Harley Cameron, Mercedes Mone or any of the above? An obvious choice), a win for the wrestlers as they’re getting used quite prominently in WWE and a win for WWE, as it’s freshened up their roster.

I like Ethan Page, but there's something missing for me.

His look just doesn't work. I'm not someone who believes everyone has to be a massive meathead or anything, but his face doesn't seem to match his body. There's a softness to his physique that just doesn't really compute.

I think if he could do something about that (whatever that is, not sure he needs to be hench or drop weight or what) I'd connect with him a lot more.

[RedTwoster]

2 hours ago, d-d-d-dAz said:

I like Ethan Page, but there's something missing for me.

His look just doesn't work. I'm not someone who believes everyone has to be a massive meathead or anything, but his face doesn't seem to match his body. There's a softness to his physique that just doesn't really compute.

I think if he could do something about that (whatever that is, not sure he needs to be hench or drop weight or what) I'd connect with him a lot more.

I really like him, but I do think he’s someone that Vince McMahon would have transitioned into a managerial role. 

[Tennessee Moltisanti]

9 hours ago, Snitsky's back acne said:

Were the fans chanting 'Ricky Starks' or is my hearing going? 

It's worse than that, video evidence of it. Has to be top 5 crinigiest thing I've ever seen in wrestling - 

https://x.com/TripleFraud/status/1907441865533632907?t=5iDcSPjZ7M0T2XSTu91wBA&s=08

[d-d-d-dAz]

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DH_SLFZAbU9/?igsh=MXdyYm83ZGQxY2Vucg==

If Vince was still about, we'd be getting an Evangelist Preacher gimmick any day now.

[Supremo]

On 4/2/2025 at 9:54 AM, Supremo said:

How many weeks are left? How many more rubbish tropes can they try to justify why this deeply flawed match is happening? Maybe a Bianca vs. Rhea singles match, which ends in a double pin? A three-way tug-of-war for the belt?

WWE’s current creative resulting in a stupid multi-person tug of war over a belt?

Who could have possibly predicted this would happen?

 

I bet Hunter is furiously re-writing next week’s Raw or Smackdown, now that Shawn beat him to it.

[d-d-d-dAz]

What's happened? Just, seriously, what's happened?