BRM Reviews NXT TakeOver: Portland (GARGANO VS. BALOR!)

[Big Red Machine]

NXT TakeOver: Portland (2/16/2020)- Portland, OR


NXT NORTH AMERICAN TITLE MATCH: Keith Lee(c) vs. Dominik Dijakovic- 6.75/10
I never thought I’d have to say this about an NXT match but they fought on the outside for WAY too long without getting counted out. This one was actually even worse than usual because the referee got up to five and then just stopped counting when he realized they weren’t going to come back anytime soon.
The problem- which is a problem I had with a large part of this match- was that they just seemed to want to do everything as an 11/10, and thus they felt they needed to do their big strikes on the outside while milking them as much as possible, and in the process they ignored the ten-count. That was just one example of where I thought they went too over the top in this match. There was just too much that felt like it was done extra big so that it would get a bigger pop when in was kicked out of rather than because doing so added to the story in some way. Having Dijakovic pop up after taking that first Spirit Bomb before kicking out of the second was the other major strike into this category, but a lot of their big stuff felt like they were doing it big just to do it big. I’m not going to rule out the possibility that my own surety of the finish and the fact that I’ve seen these guys have similar matches so many times before in NXT (and EVOLVE, and AAW, and PWG, and NEW, and Beyond) made this match feel less exciting that it otherwise might have, but my experience is still my experience, and that’s part of what goes into the rating.

STREET FIGHT: Tegan Nox vs. Dakota Kai- 8.5/10
I think the majority of fans have been of the opinion that this feud has been (at the very least mishandled, and I have definitely agreed with that. This was exactly the sort of hate-filled grudge match street fight that it needed to get back on the right track. These two looked like they were trying to maim each other. They worked in the story of the knee and even gave Tegan the “could have won the match but wanted to inflict more punishment” out to both try to protect her in the loss as well as set up a possible next step in the story for her.
I’m totally spoiler-free for this show (I’m watching it Monday afternoon) so I don’t know what the prevailing opinions are about the finish, but my guess is that the majority of people did not like f*cking Raquel from TNA a few years ago coming in and giving us an interference finish in this grudge match. While I probably would have been happier if Tegan had just won clean here and the feud had just ended, I don’t hate this finish at all.
One of the big mistakes that I think was made in this feud was having so many other women come after Dakota before Tegan returned, and while they understandably didn’t want to beat Dakota, they seemed to not want to beat those other women, either, so got a series of segments and matches that either ended in frustrating DQs or where Dakota would actually get her butt kicked but it wasn’t supposed to count as someone getting revenge on her for no adequately explained reason.
Adding Raquel Gonzalez to Dakota’s side accomplishes several things. First, it gives them another heel to keep things fresh with, so instead of constantly getting heat on Dakota via DQs or her cheating to win, she can now cheat to help someone else win, or by hiding behind her big muscular friend, or by having someone else cheat to help her. It also creates a natural reason to bring another woman (most likely Candice LeRae) into the feud on Tegan’s side. This not only gives Candice something more relevant to do, but it also prevents the feeling we had before that the heel Dakota was feuding with multiple babyfaces at the same time, and was thus always outnumbered after the match. And, looking down the road a bit, adding Raquel in on Dakota’s side creates another female tag team, which is something that WWE is sorely short on, despite having a title for (and if you bring Candice in on Tegan’s side, that’s yet another team, and something for those two to do because we all know Rhea Ripley isn’t going to lose the belt for a good long while). So, while this certainly wasn’t my preferred finish to this match, I do see it being a move than can lead to a lot of good.

JOHNNY GARGANO vs. FINN BALOR- 9.5/10
This was a FANTASTIC story. It managed to both be a wrestling match and a grudge match, with lots of intensity, great selling, and some BRILLIANTLY laid out sequences where they would tease a move but have it countered into another move, then take you through two or three twists before returning to it and having the wrestler who did the countermove go for he move he used as a counter, only for it to then be reversed into the original move. Throw in a story about Balor going for the same move he used to put Gargano out of action and Gargano desperately trying to fight it off, and you’ve got yourself an absolutely phenomenal match.

CATHY KELLEY INTERVIEWS UNDISPUTED ERA- fine
This was mostly done to plug the Roddy vs. Velveteen Dream match for Wednesday. They did briefly touch on the other matches, too, but the weird part about it was that they let RODERICK STRONG do the talking for everyone. Did all three of the others come down with laryngitis?

NXT WOMEN’S TITLE MATCH: Rhea Ripley(c) vs. Bianca Belair- 6.75/10
There was something of a story was that Rhea was mostly too strong for Bianca, but for the most part this was just moves in a relatively dramatic order. This was another match that hurt by no one really thinking the challenger had a chance.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- great!
Charlotte Flair jumped Rhea Ripley from behind and said that she was going to challenge for the NXT Women’s Title at WrestleMania. The crowd went nuts for this. Charlotte also attacked Bianca to get some revenge for being attacked on NXT a few weeks ago. I could have done without the crowd’s silly “YOU DON’T GO HERE!” chant.

NXT TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: Undisputed Era (Bobby Fish & Kyle O’Reilly)(c) vs. the Broserweights (Matt Riddle & Pete Dunne)- 8/10
Riddle cut a goofy comedy promo before the match. They have managed to completely ruin Matt Riddle for me in a matter of weeks. The match was what you’d expect from NXT at this point, with both babyfaces taking a turn as the babyface in peril followed by a match that break down into a series of dramatic spots.

NXT TITLE MATCH: Adam Cole(c) vs. Tommaso Ciampa- 8.75/10
This was the big, long, epic main event with lots of kickouts. Ciampa worked over the head while Cole worked over Ciampa’s neck, which the announcers often reminded us had been “surgically repaired.” There were lots of extremely convincing nearfalls and great selling and great intensity and all of that stuff that makes a match awesome… but this time, I HATED the interference finish.
I will admit that it at least explains why Gargano didn’t come out o help fight off Undisputed Era like you would assume he would have, but I really don’t like this turn. It feels like a turn done to get attention for the Mania weekend TakeOver rather than something that is a good idea storyline-wise. Gargano is capable of being a fantastic heel, but this was not the time to pull the trigger on that turn, and definitely the wrong way to do it.
With Ciampa in particular being the guy Gargano turns on, I think you needed a bigger moment of acceptance for Ciampa as a babyface from Gargano. They were willing to team together, but Ciampa still feels like he’s secretly a heel to me, and a large part of that is that he never actually turned babyface so much as he just showed up looking for his title and the champion at the time happened to be a heel. (I guess there was the hug when Gargano won the belt, but that felt like a rushed non-kayfabe thing to me). Ciampa needs to truly be a babyface for Gargano turning on him to really pack a punch.
Ciampa’s relationship to the belt in particular also makes this disappointing. Story felt lit was brought to a point where Ciampa would either win the title tonight, or fail to win the title and then have to deal with the mental consequences of his failure (which, for him, was likely a heel turn). What we’ve done here by giving him someone he can legitimately blame his loss on is kicked the can down to the road to tell a different story for a while, which might seem fine but I just don’t think it works with Gargano as the heel because Gargano feels like the guy who is supposed to try to keep Ciampa a babyface.
Also, looking at the division at the moment, Gargano turning leaves a HUGE void on the top of the card. Who is Cole going to face on Mania weekend if your top male singles wrestlers are either going to be otherwise occupied (Ciampa with Gargano, Dream with Roddy) or already champions (Lee, Riddle, Dunne)? I guess there is an argument that this is a good thing, but I don’t really see anyone who can be plugged into the open spot. Obviously this is all my own interpretations and theories, but it’s a big chunk of why I found the finish so deflating.

This was an awesome show from NXT, and yet this is still probably the most deflated I’ve ever felt after a TakeOver. That’s really a testament to how phenomenal both the wrestling and the booking have been on these shows that on a show this good I still felt a little let down because not as much of the wrestling or booking clicked for me. This show is definitely worth you watching and deciding for yourself, but for me this is definitely going down as one of the lower-tier TakeOvers.

[KILLdozer]

I partly saw Gargano screwing him over as a possiblity, and I feel if he wasn't going to win the title (Ciampa) , this was the best and really only possiblity for it happen.

It doesn't necessarily have to be a full turn even, even going off you saying "Ciampa never really switched sides anyway. "

Regardless of the hug and agreeing to team, there's no way these two guys don't still secretly, or not so secretly hate each other. It was guaran-damn-teed to happen like that one way or another at some point, and if anything you could say Gargano simply made sure he was gonna be the one to make the first move.

As far as WM weekend goes, make it a triple threat and be done. Ciampa and Cole is far from over, and Ciampa won't give up after being so close. He won't give up until he gets the belt back, and one way or another Ciampa v Gargano never officially ended properly anyway.