BRM Reviews the 4/13/2021 NXT (disappointing for the Tuesday debut)

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Big Red Machine
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BRM Reviews the 4/13/2021 NXT (disappointing for the Tuesday debut)

Post by Big Red Machine » Apr 14th, '21, 21:43

KARRION KROSS PROMO- This was a good “I’m the champion now and I will be dominant” promo.

VERY LONG TAKEOVER VIDEO PACKAGE- long

NXT TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: MSK(c) vs. Drake Maverick & Killian Dain- 6.75/10

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- Imperium attack Dain and Maverick after the match.

EARLIER TODAY, MERCEDES MARTINEZ TRACKS DOWN ROBERT STONE AND DEMANDS HER MONEY- Stone starts to make excuses so Mercedes begins to throttle Aliyah. Jessi Kamea stepped in on behalf of her tag team partner and talked tough to Mercedes, who challenged her to a match tonight.
Everyone pulled off their roles here well, but I’m having trouble buying the Jessi Kamea/Jessica Eleban that I saw in EVOLVE and the Mae Young Classic (and really even so far in her NXT run) as any sort of threat to Mercedes Martinez (though, admittedly, that is all mostly from EVOLVE and the MYC, and in WWE they have not been acknowledged as being the same person, even though they were in EVOLVE). For that reason, this might have worked better for others than it did for me.

COLE VS. O’REILLY VIDEO PACKAGE WITH POST-MATCH FOOTAGE- didn’t like it
I thought that the music got in the way of deathly-seriousness that should be present when you’ve got people on stretchers. Cole shouting at O’Reilly while they were both being stretchered off is the sort of thing I would love if the feud was going to continue, but they’ve already had a match type (unsanctioned) that needs to be a blow-off because if they keep doing the same stuff they’ve been doing to each other, Regal will have to either fire them or keep booking them in unsanctioned matches, and we know it won’t be the former, while the latter would kill the unsanctioned gimmick because they wouldn’t feel any different.

MERCEDES MARTINEZ vs. JESSI KAMEA (w/Robert Stone & Aliyah)- 2/10
This was perfectly good for what it was. Kamea jumped the bell on Mercedes and beat her up a bit. Once Mercedes recovered and got the advantage, she put Kamea away very quickly.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- bad
Mercedes chases after Stone and pins him to the hockey boards. She rips his diamond-encrusted gloves off to find that he has money stashed in there. I don’t see how it benefits Stone to not just be a man of his word and pay Mercedes. If he’s relying on her as a mercenary, why would he play stupid games with her that will only make her angry?
Mercedes came over to the announcers’ desk to cut a promo saying that she was coming for Raquel Gonzalez and the NXT Women’s Title.

MCKENZIE MITCHELL INTERVIEWS THE WAY- meh
This “coocoo bananas” crap with Gargano has got to stop. Everyone’s little promos on the person they’re feuding with were good, but that, the stupid “Indi Hartwell is obsessed with Dexter Lumis” stuff, and the stupid bit at the end with Theory pulled this down.

ISAIAH “SWERVE” SCOTT PROMO- good
He talks about all of the people he eliminated in the Gauntlet Eliminator, then vows to destroy Leon Ruff once and for all tonight.

SANTOS ESCOBAR PROMO- fine
He’s a champion and he has rescued the Cruiserweight Division from obscurity. His father was a champion, and one day his son will be as well. He doesn’t even get to finish his sentence laying out an open challenge before KUSHIDA comes out, resulting in an…

NXT CRUISERWEIGHT TITLE MATCH: Santos Escobar(c) vs. KUSHIDA- 7.75/10
Escobar sent Legado del Fantasma to the locker room early on in the match. Both guys worked the arm, including a very clever use of the ringpost that I haven’t seen before from Escobar. KUSHDIA won the title, which came as quite the surprise to me, but Escobar hadn’t been doing much with it, so I’m fine with this change.

TIMOTHY THATCHER & TOMMASO CIAMPA PROMO- good
They’re going to forego their singles ambitions to concentrate on the tag titles.

WILLIAM REGAL AND THEN JORDAN DEVLIN APPROACH KUSHIDA IN THE TRAINER’S ROOM- bad
Regal congratulates KUSHIDA. Then Devlin shows and up and says that KUSHIDA is just lucky. He then excuses his loss by saying that it doesn’t matter who can “run up a ladder quicker.” Well clearly it does, buddy, or else ladder matches wouldn’t be a thing!
I HATE when people use “well, I didn’t get pinned/made to submit” as an excuse for their loss in a gimmick match not counting (or when promotions will talk about someone as being unpinned and unsubmitted” even though they’ve lost in big gimmick matches that don’t require those (TNA with EC3 is the example that most sticks out in my head, but I know there have been others) because it essentially buries the whole idea of the gimmick match. In this situation, though, it was even more frustrating because Devlin had a perfectly good excuse to give, which was that Legado del Fantasma interfered in the match!
He says that KUSHIDA is lucky because Devlin has to fly back to Europe and thus won’t be around, but vows to come for the title eventually. Sure. Whatever. Devlin felt like he had slowly been turning babyface over the past few months, and this segment undid all of that by having him be such a turd… and there was no f*cking reason to do it, because what ever you’re setting up didn’t need to be set up like this because it won’t pay off for a while. If you’re doing a KUSHIDA vs. Devlin match down the road, there were a million other ways to set it up and get it ready in time for whenever you’re ready to pull the trigger.

RAQUEL GONZALEZ PROMO- a meh promo, but overall a bad segment
She cut a complete and total babyface promo. She’ll make a fine babyface, but she needs to ditch Dakota, who still feels like a heel.
Frankie Monet debuted by interrupted Raquel. Her gimmick comes off as fake to me. I think it’s the laughing. They exchanged barbs. Raquel threated to shove the dog up on of Frankie’ orifices. I don’t speak Spanish so I don’t know exactly which one, but the context made it clear it that it was an orifice.
After Frankie left, Rhea Ripley came out and got in Raquel’s face. Then Bianca Belair came out. Why are these two even here? And why are they stealing Raquel’s moment? They all smile and pose together. Three months ago, Rhea was telling me about how Raquel was her best friend who turned on her and then I watched them beat the sh*t out of each other and the announcers told me that Raquel had put Rhea out of NXT. Why are they friends now? This photo-op did nothing for anyone and hurt kayfabe.
Tom Phillips (or whoever is calling the show) told me that I should “expect the unexpected every Tuesday night on NXT.” I think if wrestling companies stopped trying to give us the unexpected and settled for giving us the logical, the pro wrestling world would be a much better place.
Then the segment ended, so I guess that whatever Raquel was in the middle of saying when Frankie interrupted her wasn’t important anymore. Someone stuck an old picture of the three of them up on the Tron, so this was clearly pre-planned… so why did Rhea and Raquel have that face-off? Just to f*ck with the fans? They’re both babyfaces. Why would they do that?

PETE DUNNE PROMO- very good
He beat KUSHIDA at the PPV, and now he is going to continue his quest for championships.

SARRAY VIDEO PACKAGE- fine
It’s a few people (mostly Regal) telling us that she’s a big deal while we watch clips of her.

RODERICK STRONG HANDS WILLIAM REGAL HIS LETTER OF RESIGNATION- fine
Regal tells Roddy that he is welcome back any time. I assume that was Marina Shafir standing next to Roddy, but 1) Regal mumbled the name and 2) she hasn’t been on TV in so long that I’ve forgotten what she looks like, so I’m not certain.

LEON RUFF vs. ISAIAH “SWERVE” SCOTT- 7.25/10
Scott won clean, but Ruff got enough close nearfalls that this has successfully ended the idea that his early success was any sort of fluke.

MCKENZIE MITCHELL INTERVIEWS ZOEY STARK- meh
Stark cut a babyface promo that came off as a little over the top. It was one of those promos that mixed the generic babyface “I’ve worked so hard” with the putting over the company’s recent big event, and so it came off as a little phony. She says she’s going to set her sights on the NXT Women’s Title. Mercedes Martinez interrupted and said that she should be next in line for a title shot, “not some rookie.” Start took exception to being called a rookie.

IMPERIUM VIDEO PACKAGE/WALTER PROMO- good
He says that Imperium will grow. Who fits in with them, other than Thatcher?

MCKENZIE MITCHELL INTERVIEWS ISAIAH “SWERVE” SCOTT- meh
He cuts a bragging promo, but is then attacked by Leon Ruff. Scott didn’t cheat and didn’t really say anything that bad about Ruff, so this is the babyface being a sore loser, which is never a good thing.

MIXED TAG TEAM MATCH: The Way vs. Dexter Lumis, Bronson Reed, Ember Moon, & Shotzi Blackheart- 6.5/10
They did stuff. This was not main event quality, never mind the sort of awesome main event you want for your first show in the new time slot. The important part is that Indi Hartwell played dead, and when Dexter Lumis saw this unconscious woman, he decided to pick her up and walk to the back with her. What the f*ck is wrong with Beth Phoenix that she doesn’t think this guy is a total creeper?
After that, they went into the finishing sequence, which saw the babyfaces win when Reed pinned Theory. At one point during the finishing sequence, Ember Moon asked Reed to let her hit Theory with an Eclipse off of his shoulders. Per the rules of this match, that’s cheating. The babyfaces shouldn’t be doing it unless the heels are, too, and he heels had not done so in quite a while.


This was a meh episode of NXT. There were some great matches and the big news of the title change, but a lot of the rest of the show was meh or worse. As a big show for the debut in the new time slot, it was certainly a failure.
Hold #712: ARM BAR!

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