NXT JULY 12TH 2017

Show opened with a great recap of the DIY split, to hype Gargano’s appearance later in the show.

Footage was shown of Strong and his family after losing to Roode last week.

Aleister Black vs. Bobby Fish
This was a solid first outing for Fish, who got a decent reaction coming out. I think the days of people getting great reactions simply for being indie names is kind of over though. Fish got to look good before Black put together a quick combination of cool moves, culminating in the Black Mass, to pick up the victory. Not necessarily a debut that’ll be long remembered but the match was fine.

Recap of Sanity beating Ohno and Itami last week, before Ohno and Itami were shown arguing backstage, with Itami blaming Ohno for them losing and Ohno telling Itami that he’d done nothing but blame other people since Takeover Chicago but he was about actions and was done talking.

Short video hyping Street Profits, who are NXT vet Angelo Dawkins and Montez Ford who was formerly Kenneth Crawford. The video was essentially just them shooting stuff on their phone and goofing around, but they came off as charismatic enough that I’m interested to see what they’re about.

Footage from 2 weeks ago was shown of Kayla trying to interview Velveteen Dream as he left the building. Dream didn’t want to be interviewed in that setting like the other superstars and told her to figure something else out.

Mae Young Classic Qualifying Match
Vanessa Borne vs. Jayme Hachey
Hachey had worked SHINE and TNA as Jayme Jameson, but she was here to put over the contracted talent. They mentioned Borne was a former Phoenix Suns dancer and Arizona Cardinals cheerleader and it was clear here, she’s still a rookie. The spinning cradle slam type move she used to win looked good though.

They showed the video from WWE.com with Wolfe and Dain attacking McIntyre in the parking lot after last week’s show. Regal then spoke with Roode backstage in his office, saying that both Dain and McIntyre were undefeated and showing interest in challenging for the title. Roode claimed he’d beat either one, any day of the week, but suggested booking Dain against McIntyre to make a little money. Regal questioned if Roode simply wanted to see the two of them beat each other up, before making the match, but adding that the winner would face him for the title in Brooklyn.

Gargano came out to address the crowd. He came out to DIY’s music, which meant the crowd weren’t sure how to react until he actually came out. Gargano said he didn’t see what happened at Takeover coming and he’d tried to figure out why, but he didn’t understand and didn’t think he ever would. He said he wasn’t there to dwell on the past, he was there to look to the future. Gargano said Takeover Brooklyn was the biggest show of the year and he needed to be there, because he needed to be Johnny Gargano again and more importantly, he needed to be Johnny Wrestling. And different music from DIY’s played to end the segment which must be Gargano’s new singles theme.

NXT TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIPS
The Authors Of Pain (c) vs. Heavy Machinery
This match seemed inevitable once Heavy Machinery became a thing and I was unsure whether they could get a Takeover match out of it any time soon, with two raw teams. I’m still not sure about that, but this was a perfectly fine match. Heavy Machinery proved they could match The AOP for size and strength early on, before the AOP cut off Tucker after pulling the top rope down on him. Dozovic eventually got a fun hot tag and they had Akam set up for their finisher, but Rezar cut Tucker off with a boot. Akam then hit a nice DDT to Dozovic, setting up the Last Chapter to retain. The AOP have come a long way since they debuted and Heavy Machinery show some promise too, Tucker looks solid and Dozovic was probably the standout guy of the match in the short bursts he was involved.

As The AOP celebrated after the match, the Eric Young-less Sanity came out onto the stage and paper fell from the ceiling, which the commentators sold as being pages from Ellering’s book of dominance. This was rather odd, not least because Sanity are busy with another feud.

 

RECOMMENDED VIEWING: Black/Fish was good and the Tag Title match was solid also.

NXT WEEK: Killian Dain versus Drew McIntyre for the #1 Contendership to Bobby Roode at Takeover Brooklyn and Ember Moon versus Ruby Riot.

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