The Official WWE / NXT Discussion Thread *May Contain Spoilers*

[Jaysin]

Charlotte is beyond overrated. My god this narrative they try to push of her being the best women’s wrestler is just ridiculous.

[Jaysin]

What a garbage main event

[TLCJR4LIFE]

Pre curb stomp spam the main event had one of the most tense, big match feels in wrestling in a long time.

 

 

After that basically the worst booked match in the history of pro wrestling took place. The Fiend’s over the top durability(there’s a threshold here of looking abnormally durable and stupidly so, after a point they crossed well into the match, t basically doesn’t become believable for the Fiend to ever lose a match), coupled with a no contest finish where The Fiend just laid in the middle of the ring for the last 5 minutes. Rollins didn’t even look like he knew what he was doing.

 

Hell in a Cell ending in a no contest is absurd.

 

I think my interest in this company depletes by the event.

 

AEW is gonna WWE the WWE and just let the other show kill itself a la WCW at this point.

[Makhai]

Charlotte is beyond overrated. My god this narrative they try to push of her being the best women’s wrestler is just ridiculous.

 

Especially after we just saw the real ones put on a spectacular match. But the gameplan with her is 18 title reigns. And she's gonna get there in 3 more boob jobs.

 

What a garbage main event

 

He went from a legit cool act to Doink the Clown with a red filter.

[TLCJR4LIFE]

The WWE has legitimate problems. The fans like the edgier gimmicks with more character. So the result is you get this extremely low tier babyface champion, Seth Rollins without exaggeration being one of the weakest in recent company history(only rivaled by Kofi)

and because he has no character or charisma the fans want the edgy hot bad guy to win.

 

The WWE has formula booked for 30 years now so they don’t know any better. They were unprepared for the hot new heel act to basically dwarf the stale corporate face of the company in popularity and didn’t know how to book their way out of it while maintaining the interest in The Fiend but keeping the title on Rollins.

 

 

The answer was simple, put the title on The Fiend and wait until you get a babyface that’s actually over so you can have him beat the Fiend. Or turn a hot heel babyface and have him keep the majority of his character ala Stone Cold and The Rock.

 

 

It’s not impossible, Becky is super over as a babyface, so even in today’s heels rule the roost climate you can still have a viable babyface draw, they just need to be really good, have literally everything because the entire concept of a babyface is everyone likes them because they are so awesome.

 

On the male side, Reigns is the only one who moves the needle as a aface, but he’s also the only one who’s been seriously pushed outside of Rollins who is a huge flop and it was obvious he wa going to flop because he possesses no main event babyface qualifies at all. Half of his run they had him trying to leech off Becky to get over for god’s sake.

[milamber]

Sasha vs Becky © - One of the best non-NXT WWE matches of the year. Shame Sasha lost.

Roman & Bryan vs Harper & Rowan - Fun tornado tag was fun. Disappointed Bryan didn't turn on Roman, although I wouldn't mind if he was drafted to Raw to feud with the Fiend.

Orton vs Ali - Solid match.

Bliss & Nikki © vs Kabuki Warriors - Good match. Kabuki Warriors acting heelish was interesting. Green Mist! Holy crap they won the titles! Didn't see that coming.

The Club vs Viking Raiders & Strowman - Meh.

Corbin vs Gable - Solid match.

Charlotte vs Bayley © - Good match. Expected Bayley to lose after Sasha did.

Rollins © vs The Fiend - Entertaining match that required a huge suspension of disbelief. Rollins losing it while Bray kept surviving like a cockroach was the right way to book it, IMO. Better than having Seth buried in a quick squash. Rollins let him in so the DQ finish worked for storyline purposes even if it was dumb... so long as next time Seth pussies out and The Fiend takes advantage to win... otherwise I'll backtrack and agree with the criticism. The red lighting was OK but I don't want to see it again in a hurry.

[Derek B]

Without knowing where things are going.... I didn't like the main event. I can see ideas for what might be and things could develop into something, but I just didn't like it. The Fiend was ready to be put over huge so that they can capitalise on the massive crossover appeal of the character....

 

The fact we don't even know what that finish is meant to be was bad. Was it a DQ? A no contest? A ref stoppage (I think it's this)? I know we're probably meant to focus on Seth Rollins letting the darkness in to win the battle, even though he still lost the war... but the execution wasn't great. It feels a lot like the WWE put a lot more input into The Fiend, instead of having him mostly control it himself. The live crowd turned on Seth before the stuff towards the end... they've been slowly turning on him for a while because as talented as he is, he's naturally more of a heel than a face.

 

That said... the overall quality of the show was pretty good. Becky vs Sasha was fantastic and the match of the night for me. Gable and Corbin continue to be entertaining when paired together and it's good to see Gable getting some screen time consistently AND be presented pretty strongly because he is great. Charlotte looks and acts like a star, but I've been unimpressed by her (and her lazy booking) for a looooong time now. In ring I think she's the worst of the the Four Horsewomen, and her promos feel so forced... she always feels like she's playing at being Charlotte rather than just being Charlotte, if that makes sense.

 

The next few weeks of WWE TV will be interesting with the drafts, but if I get to a point where I don't have time to watch stuff, RAW and Smackdown are both on my list to cut. NXT, AEW and NJPW all give me what I want consistently and the main roster misses the mark so often I will throw it to the same pile Impact ended up on.

[Questlove]

I don't know how anybody can be angry, that finish was hilarious and entirely expected of WWE. Toolboxes, chairs, ladders, massive hammers are fine but SMALL HAMMERS? How could you, Seth?

[TheGhost]

Ya know I would have accepted the ref stoppage finish if Bray didn't get up right afterwards and destroy Rollins.

 

Problem was they booked themselves into a corner with no logical way out. It's widely known that Fox wants Wyatt on Smackdown, and I am sure that WWE has known this for a while, so why even book him in this match? Give Bray another squash match and move him to Smackdown, and have someone else lose to Rollins in the cell.

 

WWE will have to tread carefully in how they book, FOX is not a network that will put up with this kind of crap. If WWE starts to dip, you better believe FOX will start putting pressure on them.

[fullMETAL]

Legit question... who are these 8M people who watch Blue Bloods?

Mothers and fathers, it seems.

 

And people (usually old people) whose TVs/cable boxes are automatically set to Channel 2 (well, at least here in New York, CBS is on 2) on startup and are either physically unable to change the channel or are just too lazy to do it.

 

How else do you account for the ungodly numbers Big Bang Theory got during ITS run?

[mad5226]

Awful match aside, that red filter was god awful and made it almost not watchable to me. Major LOL at the “AEW” chants. I think I may finally be done with WWE.

[Jaysin]

The Rusev/Lana/Lashley stuff is literally one of the worst things they have ever done. It’s so cringey. Rusev and Lashley are far too talented for this god awful garbage.

[milamber]

I enjoyed the women's tag match on Raw but everything else was just meh. No reason to care about any of it.

[Jaysin]

It was pleasantly surprising to see Kairi and Asuka beat Charlotte and Becky

[TLCJR4LIFE]

<p>So Raw on social media did notably terrible numbers, lot sure if HIAC fallout. Ratings are incredibly unreliable due to the unscientific way they are collected but we’ll see if the ratings reflect the social media downswing.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>

Numbers are out, 200,000 viewer decline from last week, 10 percent drop overall, and a peak drop of 400k viewers.</p><p> </p><p>

HIAC fallout was real.</p>

[Jaysin]

Edge is denying it, but there’s been a lot of reports that he’s been cleared to return to the ring. That would be insanity.

[Makhai]

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="Jaysin" data-cite="Jaysin" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="25169" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>Edge is denying it, but there’s been a lot of reports that he’s been cleared to return to the ring. That would be insanity.</div></blockquote><p> </p><p> He's using AEW for leverage too. He's denying it, and nothing happens until he finds a doctor to clear him.</p>

[TLCJR4LIFE]

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="Jaysin" data-cite="Jaysin" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="25169" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>Edge is denying it, but there’s been a lot of reports that he’s been cleared to return to the ring. That would be insanity.</div></blockquote><p> </p><p> </p><p> We saw a similar thing with Shawn Michaels after he retired for a long while. </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> The long break does wonders for neck and back injuries.</p>

[Jaysin]

WWE are holding a press conference Friday and are expected to announce Brock vs Cain and Tyson Fury vs Braun Strowman for Crown Jewel

[MightyDavidson]

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="Jaysin" data-cite="Jaysin" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="25169" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>WWE are holding a press conference Friday and are expected to announce Brock vs Cain and Tyson Fury vs Braun Strowman for Crown Jewel</div></blockquote><p> </p><p> Who's Tyson Fury?</p>

[Greylocke]

<p>Was intrigued by Tegan Nox's first big match since her return on NXT UK last week. Didn't know much about her, but I kept hearing that she was supposed to be the one to win the Mae Young Classic before she got injured, so I was curious about the hype.</p><p> </p><p>

I think I can see what made them so high on her (although they might have chosen her for an entirely different reason, or of course the rumours might be completely false). She might not be the best in the ring, but she can really sell her emotional investment in her matches like few others can, and I think better than anyone else on the UK roster. That's someone i can totally get behind. Really enjoyed the match with KLR. I'm even glad that she lost, since I don't think she should be thrust into the title picture this quickly with her story. A feud with Rhea Ripley is ready-made, I think, since she was the one who advanced due to her injury (even if the injury wasn't her fault), and her big bully character would be the perfect foil for Nox's character.</p>

[Greylocke]

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="TLCJR4LIFE" data-cite="TLCJR4LIFE" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="25169" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>Balor going back to NXT along with NXT overwhelmingly getting absolutely trounced in the ratings signifies what a colossal failure NXT has been as a whole.<p> </p><p> Smarks will prop it up as the greatest thing ever because it’s essentially the WWE Abrams ties to a glorified Indy, but in terms of actual business it’s borderline castatrophic and an unprecedented failure. But yes, and I can’t stress enough this is the result of constantly trying to appease the IWC, and internet sub-cults of fans rather than mainstream audiences who actually keep you in the black.</p><p> </p><p> NXT was supposed to be about developing future stars for the WWE, only no one in the 5 or so years of the brand being a thing has actually drawn any money except Braun Wyatt, and he was classically trained and developed in FCW, not brought through the NXT system. </p><p> </p><p> The WWE essentially failed massively at their goals because instead of looking for John Cenas, Batistas, Randy Ortons and such to put through developmental, they signed a bunch of Indy darlings on the wrong side of 30s who did nothing but work in bingo halls their entire lives. As a result everyone they called up was already a near post prime finished product with a really linear skillset, basically smark spot wrestling. We see it with Owens, Zayn, Balor and countless others.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> Now the WWE is shipping these old midcarder peak type dudes back to NXT and reintroducing it as a “brand” rather than developmental to make it seem less of a bust, only the brand will probably get outdrawn by its competitor by over 100 percent.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> The UE is 3 vanilla midgets and a Shawn Michaels clone with a good catch phrase. Of course a heel stable is the best way to book them. They can also draw too probably if WWE pulled the trigger on them. The tag team are excellent in the ring and Cole has the camera skills to carry the rest.</p></div></blockquote><p> </p><p> My issue wasn't so much that they're stable, I;m more against the fact that they gave every title to said stable. And then, at the same time, also have 2 other heels stables on the show each controlling a title. Even if you love dominating heel stables (and I don't), surely this is a case of having "too much of a good thing"?</p>

[Greylocke]

<p>Like, who's blaming anything? I find a show's wirting to be boring/lazy, and I said so. I even flat out said that I probably wasn't their target audience anymore. How's it different from everyone complaining about RAW, Smackdown and HiaC? Or am I under obligation to specifically name Vince McMahon for every bad thing I see on he shows?</p><p> </p><p>

Besides, I doubt Vince books NXT. That's Triple H's baby.</p>

[MightyDavidson]

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="Greylocke" data-cite="Greylocke" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="25169" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>Like, who's blaming anything? I find a show's wirting to be boring/lazy, and I said so. I even flat out said that I probably wasn't their target audience anymore. How's it different from everyone complaining about RAW, Smackdown and HiaC? Or am I under obligation to specifically name Vince McMahon for every bad thing I see on he shows?<p> </p><p> Besides, I doubt Vince books NXT. That's Triple H's baby.</p></div></blockquote><p> </p><p> I was referring to TLCJR4LIFE's comments, not yours. Damn near every star that's come out of NXT has been booked horribly by McMahon, that's on him not NXT. Time and again NXT has handed McMahon awesome acts and time and again Vince cuts their legs out from under them or just plain doesn't do anything with them.</p><p> </p><p> Also the fact that WWE is trying to make NXT it's own brand shows that it's NOT a bust because they'd certainly not be giving it more exposure if it was. If it was a complete and utter failure as TLCJR4LIFE claims, they'd have shut it down years ago.</p>

[Greylocke]

NXT may or may not be a success as its own separate brand, that remains to be seen and it's too soon to judge....but I would say it hasn't been a success as a <em>developmental</em> brand in recent years. It used to be actually good at that (back when it was actually doing <em>work</em> in getting people like Tye Dilinger and Bo Dallas over and not just dropping established stars from ROH/Evolve/Japan who already have an established fanbase from the start), but now it focuses too much on showcasing stars who have already proven their skills elsewhere and not really doing much with actual fresh talents who had their start from their much-touted Performance Centre. There's literally 1 home-grown star in NXT: Velveteen Dream. The Performance Centre only provides bunches of faceless jobbers that cycle in and out.