NXT MAY 3RD 2017

Killian Dain w/Eric Young vs. Danny Burch
Burch did his best, but was largely dominated and Dain won with the Ulster Plantation.

Itami was shown arriving earlier in the day.

A video teasing “The Velveteen Dream” aired, who is presumably Patrick Clark.

Heavy Machinery vs. Ricardo Watts and Hector Kunsman
I’m pretty sure they must have put out a casting call for the smallest possible jobbers to be in this match with Heavy Machinery. Dozovic still fascinates me and Heavy Machinery are still rather wacky. For the finish, Dozovic picked both of the jobbers up as if for a slam and Tucker leapt on his back to force both into the mat. The crowd seemed fairly receptive to Heavy Machinery.

Heavy Machinery got promo time afterwards. It was something. Tucker said they wanted the Authors Of Pain. Dozovic made a lot of noises and pulled a lot of faces. They said they were starting to get real hungry and it was about time they ate. If they keep these promos up, guaranteed they’ll start getting ironic Feed Me More chants.

Bobby Roode was shown talking to Kona Reeves backstage ahead of his match with Itami.

Kayla interviewed DIY, who admitted Heavy Machinery were big, but while they didn’t have their size they were former NXT Tag Team Champions and they were still owed a rematch. Ciampa said they welcomed the competition, but the line started behind DIY.

Hideo Itami vs. Kona Reeves
Reeves jumped Itami before the bell and they sold it that Reeves was acting on Roode’s behalf for the night. Reeves controlled things for a while but got too cocky and let Itami back into the match. Itami ran through Reeves in fairly short order from there and won with the GTS.

Short video recapping Drew McIntyre’s return to NXT.

Part two of the profile on Roderick Strong aired, this one focusing on he and his fiancee who are preparing to have a baby, before going into his background on the indies with footage from IPW where Strong got his start, then footage from his NXT tryout. They covered his time in ROH, by name, with photos of him against Steen/Owens, Tyler/Rollins and Okada among others. It ended with him saying that when he became NXT Champion he’d be doing it for his family.

Regal was with Roode in his office, apparently watching the tail-end of the Strong video, which Roode didn’t seem interested by. Regal wanted to talk about Roode’s opponent at Takeover Chicago. Roode cut him off and said they needed to protect him because he was their biggest star, but with Itami running around it was dangerous for both of them. Regal agreed that Itami needed to earn an opportunity to face him, so announced Strong versus Itami for the number one contendership, which Roode didn’t seem thrilled by. Strong entered and had a tense moment with Roode on Roode’s way out.

WOMEN’S TITLE #1 CONTENDER BATTLE ROYAL
Lacey Evans, Billie Kay, Peyton Royce, Nikki Cross, Liv Morgan, Aliyah, Candice LaRae, Kimberley Frankele, Bianca Blair, Rachael Evers, Sonya Deville, Victoria Gonzalez, Sarah Bridges, Ruby Riot, Ember Moon
A fair few unfamiliar names, or familiar names but unfamiliar to NXT in some cases. It took a while for the first eliminations, with Victoria Gonzalez going during the break thanks to Iconic and Bianca Blair followed soon after. Aliyah eliminated Evers, Liv dropkicked out Bridges and Iconic got rid of Evans and Deville as they were helping to eliminate Bridges. Iconic spent the whole match helping each other out as you’d expect. Riot got Kimberly out with a hurricanrana and Candice was eliminated by Iconic, which the crowd weren’t pleased about. That left, unsurprisingly, the main seven roster members- Ember, Liv, Iconic, Riot, Cross and Aliyah.

Aliyah didn’t last much longer before Cross got rid of her. Nikki eliminated Liv as well, which left Riot to fight Cross while Iconic tried to work together on Ember. Ember was able to fend both off and eliminated Billie, then Peyton. The final three got a bit of time, before Ember hit the Eclipse to Cross. Riot tried to eliminate Ember as she was trying to throw Billie out, leading Ember going for the Eclipse on her too. Asuka ran out and pushed her off the top though, which apparently caused a disqualification, just like in every battle royal never. The dodgy finish was made up for by Asuka hurling Ember between the turnbuckles and all the way into the barrier face first. Asuka took out Riot and Cross as well and celebrated, saying nobody was ready for Asuka. If you ignore the rules for basically every battle royal ever, Asuka destroying people was fun and the bump Ember took was impressive. Regal came out afterwards with the other three recovering in and around the ring, announcing Asuka would face all three of them at Takeover in a fatal fourway.

 

RECOMMENDED VIEWING: Nothing bad, but nothing to really go out of your way for either. The second part of the Roderick Strong video was probably the best stand-alone thing on the show. Everything else was okay.

NXT WEEK: Roderick Strong versus Hideo Itami for the #1 Contendership to the NXT Title at Takeover Chicago and Aleister Black in action.

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