Last Thursday I settled down and watched the latest episode of NXT Wrestling, the development show without a network because in the beginning WWE didn’t really want you to know it existed, unless like me your from Ireland where it airs late at night on Sky Sports. I’ve been a regular viewer of the one hour show since it began airing over a year ago and to be pretty honest it is one of the brighter wrestling orientated parts of my week.
On last weeks episode some guy called Sami Zayn whom some moronically believe to be El Generico – idiots, Generico has gone back to Mexico to help the orphaned kids, everybody knows that – made his debut by defeating former WWE Tag Team Champion and Ring of Honor fan Curt Hawkins. He would later interrupt former King of Wrestling Antonio Cesaro and begin an impromptu match which surprisingly (or not so surprisingly depending on how you view the recent run of Cesaro’s character) Zayn picked up the win.
The main event consisted of former independent stalwart Sterling James Keenan, now with shorter hair and new name Corey Graves facing the son of the evil tax man IRS, Bray Wyatt, who had his Wyatt Family faction at ringside in the form of NXT Tag Team Champions former DGUSA star Brodie Lee otherwise known as Luke Harper and virtual unknown Erick Rowan, the trio seemingly in a war for best beard which I am of the opinion Brodie Lee is edging.
Overall the episode was quite entertaining, as are most episodes of the developmental show headed by of all people “The Game” Triple H. Its old school wrestling mentality is a nice change from WWE’s storyline driven attitude, NXT allows some of WWE’s best and brightest some more in-ring freedom while honing their craft and adapting to the WWE style of things before getting the call for flagship show television.
But it got me thinking, isn’t there a show with some similarities to NXT Wrestling? Even the name seems somewhat familiar. Small location, those metal sheets covering the guard rails surrounding the ring, a ton of young talent trying to show themselves as the next best thing in wrestling.
Seems a lot like ROH Wrestling.
On March 21st 2009 Ring of Honor debuted their ROH Wrestling programme on HD Net. It would feature a number of notable stars such as Chris Hero, Claudio Castagnoli, El Generico, Austin Aries and Kenny King who can be found on WWE or TNA television respectively, and helped promote the companies then starting iPPV’s and feuds including the highly acclaimed Steen versus Generico.
In 2011 after their two year contract expired, Mark Cuban’s HD Net announced it wouldn’t be renewing but that they had enjoyed the partnership with Ring of Honor. Left without weekly television the future looked bleak, Cary Silkin was paying out of his back pocket to keep the company afloat and questions were being asked, until Sinclair Broadcasting intervened and purchased the company on May 21st 2011, just over a month after the final episode of the HD Net series had gone to air.
The show began airing weekly in September of the same year, initial reports stated the show got off to a good start but there were obvious problems. The production quality wasn’t high enough, with Jim Cornette implemented as head booker many felt the quality began gradually decreasing, stars such as Austin Aries and Colt Cabana quickly left and newer audiences found the new product uninteresting. Kevin Steen would refer to times similar to these as “growing pains.”
Eventually though things will work out, and nowadays they certainly have. The production quality of the show has significantly increased on what it was originally. With Cornette gone and Delirious booking the shows they resonate more with the staunch hardcore fan base ROH grew over a number years as somewhat similar, most agreeing that most changes are understandable as it is now a television product and therefore must appeal to both the hardcore and casual fan in-order for it to grow.
In my opinion 2013 has been a very good year for ROH Wrestling TV, which I would go as far as to say along with NXT Wrestling is the most consistent one-hour weekly wrestling show going today. The number of quality matches, storyline progression and promotion compared to the year previous is near pathetic levels, the Cornette era had little clue on how to correctly market the show or format it which Delirious has the ability to do.
Straight off the top of my head the number of good matches to have taken place thus far this year may double the overall total of 2012 and certainly those few months in 2011. Whether it be Eddie Edwards versus Bobby Fish, Kyle O’Reilly versus Davey Richards, reDRagon versus Forever Hooligans, Karl Anderson versus Michael Elgin, the last two weeks main events of Adam Cole versus Kevin Steen and Roderick Strong versus Taiji Ishimori, ROH Wrestling TV is providing fans a reason to continue watching.
NXT Wrestling showcases some of the best up and coming talent in the WWE whereas ROH Wrestling showcases some of the best up and coming talent in all of wrestling. WWE’s product features appearances and matches from veterans such as Chris Jericho, Daniel Bryan and Kane, ROH Wrestling is bringing in talents rarely seen in America nowadays from Japan such Rocky Romero, Karl Anderson and Taiji Ishimori.
You can find NXT weekly on Hulu Plus or as aforementioned if like me you live across the pond every Thursday night on Sky Sports, but what if you’re in America and don’t have access or can’t afford a Hulu Plus subscription? Well then good thing this is the age of Internet and social media because there are several ways to find the latest episodes of NXT Wrestling without paying a cent.
ROH Wrestling does well on the networks it has, but its range isn’t broad enough and the show can be quite difficult to access via your television screens. So, what is the next best alternative if your local CW or MyNetworkTV stations doesn’t show it? Hop online, go to ROHWrestling.com and sign-up for free to access new episodes every Thursday afternoon. Or subscribe and get access to a ton of features.
Despite some similarities the shows also have some differences, the main one being production value. NXT Wrestling is a product of the multi-million dollar corporation trading on the stock market known as the WWE afterall, there going to have top quality production equipment, editing and sound. But there not exactly exempt from mistakes themselves, they and ROH both suffer from similar issues.
The main one being the levels on the microphones. One of the most irritating things sometimes about watching any Ring of Honor produced show is that the commentators are occasionally speaking too loud, their levels are off and it distracts you from the action. A perfect example of this was Border Wars, in the beginning Kevin Kelly sounded as though he was shouting into his headset while Nigel McGuinness sounded like he was screaming into his microphone from a distance.
Yet especially in the beginning of NXT whenever it became a three man team usually consisting of Byron Saxton, William Regal and Jim Ross, Regal’s voice would be feint, Ross would be standard and Saxton would be loud. This has been sorted since but a few weeks ago during a bout between Kassius “Chris Hero” Ohno and William Regal, Briley Pierce replaced Regal for the night and his levels were off the entire episode – but really if the volume of the commentators is the only issue I can find, not necessarily a negative. It just goes to show the almighty WWE aren’t impervious to basic flaws.
Some fans occasionally allude to Ring of Honor being competition to Total Nonstop Action Wrestling’s Impact Wrestling broadcast, and while I feel the quality of ROH Wrestling TV is better than Impact there really is no basis for that argument other than the fact TNA is recognized as the second top pro-wrestling promotion in North America and ROH is widely seen as the third. ROH simply doesn’t have the network or even the investment from Sinclair such as the one TNA has from Dixie Carter to be competitive.
So are Pro Wrestling Guerrilla or ROH founder Gabe Sapolsky’s DGUSA competition to Ring of Honor? Maybe in years prior they were, but not anymore. While Pro Wrestling Guerrilla is highly entertaining and I love what Super Dragon and company product it is a tape and DVD driven product, there is no television, no pay-per-view and no instant access other than DVD’s and in certain cases the Internet.
It’s literally the same case for Dragon Gate USA other than the fact they can and do compete with Ring of Honor via iPay-Per-Views. Over WrestleMania Weekend I watched Open the Ultimate Gate and despite the interference from the live feed in the beginning it contained three very good matches in Akira Tozawa versus Ricochet, The Young Bucks vs. CIMA and AR Fox, and Johnny Gargano vs. Shingo – but are the numbers competing with those for ROH iPPV’s? Only two people know, Joe Koff and Gabe Sapolsky.
But even then, Dragon Gate USA isn’t a threat to the Ring of Honor audience without television, so there is no point in looking behind you because it simply isn’t productive. So if Impact Wrestling is too far ahead to be viewed as competition and Ring of Honor is ahead of the curve compared to other independent promotions, then who are they to assess themselves against if not on iPPV, then at least in-terms of television?
For me the only fair comparison is with NXT Wrestling. You have two one-hour, weekly products, both wrestling driven shows with segments to progress angles, featuring the next stars of WWE’s main brands such as Bray Wyatt, Sami “definitely not El Generico” Zayn and Kassius Ohno, and the next stars of professional wrestling such as Kevin Steen, Michael Elgin and Adam Cole. Each show has their own titles – although that comparison may be a little unfair as ROH has a recognized World Championship.
Neither are fully accessible to national audiences, if you want to find them you have to search, not everyone can watch either show but that is what makes the comparison all the more true.
NXT Wrestling gains a lot of praise from viewers, it stands out, it’s different to everything else in the WWE product, it’s a real old-school wrestling show showcasing – get this – wrestling! It may be a development territory for the WWE but when their opening a multi-million dollar facility in Orlando you can be rest assured that development is seen in an extremely important light to them so challenging a show such as NXT Wrestling shouldn’t be viewed as “second rate” solely due to how long ROH has been open.
If any show or product should be used to compare an episode of ROH Wrestling to it should never be a three hour episode of RAW with fireworks and stunts and light shining out of every available space, or even a two hour episode of Smackdown or Impact Wrestling with the millions both WWE and TNA respectively pump into it, it should be the one-hour of NXT Wrestling that showcases the same type of thing ROH Wrestling does, just maybe not to the same level, but pretty closer than most things you’ll find on TV.
In my eyes despite their lack of production quality and “household stars” with “drawing power” the two most consistent week to week wrestling shows are NXT Wrestling and ROH Wrestling, because at the end of the day do we really watch for swirling lights and flashy videos, or do we watch for the spectacle of what happens inside the four ropes? Production is a nice touch, but it isn’t everything.
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