Peter Kostka
From the NXT Arena at Full Sail University. Your commentators are Rich Brennan, Corey Graves and Byron Saxton.
Eva Marie vs. Carmella
They actually bring up Eva’s fuck-up a few weeks ago and they actually make an angle of it as Eva cuts a wooden inset promo thanking the referee for not caving in to the “biased fanbase”. Carmella beats on her and sends her out to start but Eva takes control and her programming must be buggy because she can’t stop yelling “How You Doin’?” in a mocking tone and doing vertical suplexes. She is getting less awkward in the ring, but she still isn’t great. Carmella makes a comeback and goes for a pin, but the ref stops before three again. This time we see that a bad camera angle missed Eva’s foot on the rope. So now she’s affecting the cameramen with her shittiness? She tosses Carmella who kind of hits her head on the ramp and that’s enough to keep her on the floor to be counted out. Eva celebrates like it a big accomplishment.
OK, can someone explain to me how this isn’t anything but WWE trolling the NXT fanbase? I fail to see how this is supposed to make me feel anything but complete apathy towards Eva. I would love to see WWE actually have the balls to put the title on Eva at the London Takeover show just to see how hard and how much the crowd shits on it.
Nia “Glacier” Jax is still coming….someday. At least it’s a different vignette this time.
We recap the setup to the Iron Woman match last week. Bayley wants people to appreciate women’s wrestling and the desire for them to try and steal the show. They will make history on October 7th (the show is now called Takeover: Respect) and both Sasha Banks and Bayley are ready to prove who is the true champion. Two more weeks, folks!
Bull Dempsey vs. Tyler Breeze
A slow start as Bull goofs around with Tyler’s hair before ending up being shoved off the apron and whacking his arm on the ramp. He beats the count and Tyler stomps on him as we take a break.
Tyler has a chinlock and that eats up more time. I wish I could talk about this match more but there really isn’t anything to talk about. Bull backdrops Breeze off of him and makes the comeback with fists and belly-based offense. Bull sets him up for the top rope sitdown splash, but Breeze slams him off and gets the pin with his feet on the ropes. I like Bull, but Tyler really needs something better to do and hopefully this moves both of them on.
They show a promo for that Breaking Ground show coming to the Network and it actually looks pretty cool. I’m a sucker for this behind the scenes stuff.
We recap NXT’s weekend in Texas with shows in Houston, Austin and San Antonio. Bonus points for Apollo Crews’ “I’d Flex But I Like This Shirt” shirt.
GM Regal is in the ring to introduce Kana, who is now known as Asuka (pronounced Oz-kah). She is extremely excited to be in NXT and wants to one day be champion. She signs her contract, but Emma and Dana Brooke interrupt. Man, Emma is working that little black dress. They introduce themselves as the women who ran off Becky Lynch and Charlotte and want to show Asuka who runs the women’s locker room. They tell her to hit the bricks and a dejected Asuka walks out of the ring and up the ramp, but on the stage she turns to the ring and gives the heels a smile. Not a friendly smile either, more of a “I will kick your heads off and use them as Christmas decorations” smile.
Tyler is asked about his (apparently just announced) match with Apollo Crews at Takeover. Apollo decides to mess with him a little bit.
Kyle Edwards is back for a Dusty Classic update. We recap Rhyno and Baron Corbin’s win last week and are shown highlights of Dash and Dawson upsetting the Vaudevillains in Texas to move on to Takeover. They will take on the winners of the Samoa Joe/Finn Balor vs. Enzo and Cass match next week while Rhyno and Corbin will take on the winners of the Hype Bros vs. NXT’s Greatest Tag Team match which will take place this weekend. Both teams cut promos on the match; The Hype Bros are goofs as usual while Jordan and Gable proclaim themselves the future winners of the tournament and now Gable has his entire catchphrase on his towel. Amazing.
The Vaudevillains (C) vs. Blake and Murphy (w/Alexa Bliss) (NXT Tag Team Title match)
Alexa tries to get involved right away, but here comes Blue Pants to take her down and chase her out of the arena. Blake works a headlock and avoids a English dropkick, but English Japanese arm drags the both of them and hits a nice double dropkick to wipe them out. He gets distracted by Blake on the outside which allows Murphy to suplex him onto the apron to take control as we take a break.
The match pretty much becomes a repeat of the Brooklyn match as Blake and Murphy work over English very methodically for the middle of the match until English cracks Murphy with a wild haymaker and makes the hot tag to Gotch. Gotch on offense is so fun to watch as he hits kicks from a bunch of angles and hits a rolling slam. English goes for the senton, but Blake gets his knees up and tags Murphy who hits a flying double knee for a CLOSE 2. They go for a double suplex on English, but he flips out and LAUNCHES Murphy to the outside on a backdrop before the Whirling Dervish finishes Blake to retain. Match once again picked up at the end and turned into a fun TV main event.
We close the show with comments from the participants of the Dusty Classic match next week. Enzo and Cass have plenty of respect for their opponents but they are going to send Balor and Joe home next week. Finn Balor calls Enzo and Cass his friends, but next week friendship goes out the window. Samoa Joe says they have a singular purpose: to win it all. “Ain’t that right champ?” *slaps the NXT title on Finn’s shoulder*. I absolutely LOVE these little touches from Joe regarding the NXT title; they’ve already established Joe’s desire to be NXT champion so all they need to do are little reminders like that to start and build towards a future match.
OVERALL: We have another match for Takeover: Respect and are looking towards future feuds. Most of the wrestling was OK to middling this week and I really could not care any less about whatever the hell they are doing with Eva Marie, but it was an enjoyable episode nonetheless.
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