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Velveteen Dream injured?! Roderick Strong is going to die next week on an amazing triple
threat and Damien Priest topples Pete Dunne?!
I’m El Fakidor Laurie Blake, click the thumbs up, leave a comment and give us a subscribe
and click the I above my head to let us know who you think won the Wednesday Night War
this week: NXT or AEW Dynamite.
Luke will be reviewing Dynamite in a bit, but first I’m giving you the rundown of
NXT for October the 16th.
The show opens with Daddy Ciampa coming home in a match against Angel Garza and his interchangeable
trousers.
And it really was bout between Tomasso, Garza and his pants.
Because after some back and forth, including Ciampa absolutely trashing Angel at ringside,
Garza gives the ladies and NXT superfan Kyle what they want and sheds the legs.
But this gives Tomasso the window to fire back, wrecking Garza in the corner with running
knees, he then grabs the pants and gives them the same treatment even miming the Fairytale
Ending, before using them to distract Angel and hit the draping DDT for the win.
No time to celebrate though as the Undisputed Era arrive and surround the ring, before Kyle
O’Reilly hands over a USB drive to Mauro at rinside saying you might want to see this.
Just AirDrop it mate, so much quicker.
The production crew manage to sift through the thousand pictures of Roddy’s boudoir
shoot with the North American title and find a video of the UE backstage where they’ve
left The Velveteen Dream bruised and beaten on a slab.
We then jump into a contest between Oney Lorcan and Danny Burch against Imperium’s Marcel
Barthel and Fabian Aichner.
This was a great match and a much better showing for Imperium than their first NXT match. It
all ends after a blind tag on Imperium’s side allowing them to hit a spinebuster penalty
kick combo and follow up with the European Bomb for the 1, 2, 3. Great stuff.
Io Shirai took on Kayden Carter next and Beth Phoenix described Io as a modern mercenary
hellbent on achieving her egocentric destiny. Now that’s a heck of a Tinder profile.
This was a quick little match with both women showing off some highflying skills, though
a few sloppy moments held it back from greatness.
Shirai rightfully picks up the W with a brutal avalanche German suplex and her moonsault,
Before grabbing a microphone and saying she wants Shayna.
But Ripley’s music hits and she strides into the ring snatching the mic as she goes.
She says that Bianca called her out and next week she’s going to put her in her place
and if Shirai ever spits her name out of her mouth again she will have no problem shutting
her up too.
This didn’t come off half as cool or aggressive as Rhea hoped, but did lead to a staredown
that had the crowd chanting ‘fight fight fight’ before Io walks off ranting in Japanese.
Cathy Kelley grabs Regal for a quick chat and he says that Velveteen Dream is injured
and won’t be able to challenge for the North American Championship but Roddy will still
have to defend against the winner of Keith Lee and Dominic Dijakovic.
That match came next and was a slower affair overall than their recent clashes. It still
featured some crazy athleticism like a poison rana from Lee, a triple deadlift suplex and
an earth shaking splash onto Dijak’s injured arm.
I wish this had gone longer and reached what would have been a crazy final stretch, but
Strong interferes causing a double dq, but but Regal is already on the balcony freaking
fuming, like Randy Datson wrote an article about him, and says that the match next week
will now be Roddy vs Lee vs Dijak! Now that’s grand.
Matt Riddle then had a lovely little match with Bronson Reed where the king of bros showed
off his strength and tossed the big man around like he was nothing. It was an important display
of dominance from Riddle who needed a win after losing to Cole on NXT’s two hour USA
debut.
We then got a Bianca Belair promo package that showed us how hair physics actually work,
no thanks to you 2K20.
And get an update on Kushida who will be out injured for a month with a fractured wrist.
Tegan Nox returned to NXT action after that taking on Taynara, the judoka whose win record
is a joke, and it wasn’t rectified here.
A little show of spirit from Taynara was quickly cut off by Tegan who nailed her with a diving
crossbody and the shiniest wizard, casting sleep on her for about three seconds.
Cathy Kelley attempts to start a ringside interview and is interrupted by Dakota Kai
who is interrupted by Shayna Baszler and the lady centaurs.
Baszler says Nox is running out of limbs to rehab if she wants to know what it’s like
taking her on just ask Dakota.
I was expecting a run-in from Rhea or Bianca or Io here, so it’s kind of weird that Baszler
is back to threatening random members of the women’s locker room.
We then got a video package of Finn Balor who talked in riddles about crossroads and
paths and walking ones he’s walked before like he’s Bob Dylan crossed with Blazin’
Squad, but basically was saying he’ll be back in action next week.
The penultimate match saw a fired up Boa try to get a modicum of revenge on Killian Dain
after the random act of violence last week.
But after a brief spurt at the start, Dain lands the divide and then begins to slowly
subtract functioning organs from Boa’s abdomen, landing three big vader bombs and an abdominal
stretch to force him to tap.
Dain is then spotted lurking as Pete Dunne makes his entrance, but makes the rookie mistake
of directly pointing at him. You know this Damo keep your fingers away from farm animals
and Dunne.
Dunne doesn’t care though strutting down to the ring to take on Damien Priest. And
this is finally the match I’ve been after from Priest!
Now I see why they’re clearly so hot on him backstage. This match was fire emoji,
100 emoji, eggplant emoji.
Great back and forth, close calls, near falls, counter upon counter and worked the crowd
into an absolute frenzy by the end of it.
Especially after the two lock up in a corner with the ref stuck between them, as she squeezes
her way out Priest goes low giving him the chance to hit the Reckoning and put Dunne
away, keeping his winning streak alive!
This got the crowd pissed, but after weeks of sending people home happy this was a refreshing
finish to an NXT episode and instantly elevates Priest to hated heel.
Almost time for AEW but click the ‘i’ above my head to give your rating of this
week’s NXT - where you can choose from: An EST NXT, Undisputed-ly Good, The Fine-est,
2 Out of 5 Live, and Cameron Grimes’ Hat.
For me this week’s NXT had one stand out match, some exciting showings from favoured
stars, but also some funky angles that didn’t have the intended gravitas or stalled for
time until the proper match next week. So while still super worth watching this NXT
gets a high FINE-EST from me.
Now over to Luke for AEW.
SCU and Lucha Brothers advance in the tag title tournament! Luchasaurus has picked up
an injury! And what are the rules? I am Luke Owen, and make sure you vote in the poll to
let me know which show out of AEW and NXT you preferred this week, as I review the 16th
of October edition of AEW Dynamite. The show was supposed to kick off with Christopher
Daniels and Frankie Kazarian of SCU taking on Best Friends in the tag title tournament,
but Daniels and Kaz were attacked by the Lucha Brothers before the match - with Pentagon
Jr. laying the Fallen Angel out with the Penta Driver on the ramp. Scorpio Sky ran down to
make the save, and took Daniels’ place in the tag match. But with Kaz’s back hurting
from the attack, Best Friends were able to dominate the match early on, before all men
broke down into great sequence and nearfall after great sequence and nearfall. Sadly the
finish wasn’t quite so smooth, and Sky mistimed his part of SCU’s double team move to give
them the win. Sky didn’t look too pleased with himself after the match, but the commentary
cleverly covered for this by saying he was disappointed because he wanted Daniels and
Kaz to be the team in the tournament. Santana and Ortiz of Inner Circle quickly
dispatched of two jobbers, which made the former LAX look really good, and after the
match they challenged Young Bucks to a match at Full Gear via a Chris Jericho video on
the screen. Speaking of Full Gear, and we got a promo
video to hype Cody Rhodes ahead of his AEW World Championship match against Chris Jericho
at the PPV. This was fantastic build to the match, and really built on the character of
Cody with sit down interviews from his wife Brandi. His mother, Jim Ross, Tony Schivone,
MJF and Diamond Dallas Page. Each person had something unique to say about Rhodes, and
it established all of his motivations heading into the match. This gets a huge thumbs up
from me, and I hope AEW do this type of package for more of their talent.
After picking up a couple of tag wins recently, Dr. Britt Baker took on Riho for the AEW Women’s
Championship in a match that was also really good. It didn’t get off to the best of starts,
but both women are so good that the crowd were popping for the nearfalls by the end
- and I totally bought into a title switch happening when Baker was so close to locking
in the Lockjaw, before Riho rolled her up for the win. AEW’s women’s division isn’t
as strong as WWE’s, or NXT’s or even Impact Wrestling’s, but they are putting out some
decent matches that are given time to get over. There’s strong foundations here to
build a great division. It was reported before the show by PWInsider
that, sadly, Luchasarus would not be cleared for the tag title tournament match against
Lucha Brothers and would instead be replaced by Jurassic Express’ third team mate Marko
Stunt, seemingly just to annoy Jim Cornette and his Twitter followers. According to Mike
Johnson of PWInsider, Luchasaurus suffered a hamstring injury, and the decision was made
by AEW to not put him out on TV to not risk further injury. This was really fun and brilliantly
utilised Stunt’s strengths as well as show off the incredible athleticism of Lucha Brothers
and Jungle Boy, but Luchasaurus’ missing presence was felt on the match. Penta took
out Jungle Boy with a Canadian Destroyer, and totally muderised Marko Stunt with the
footstomp package piledriver for the win. Lucha Brothers will take on Private Party
next week, while SCU face Dark Order in the tag title tournament semi-finals.
Up next was the incredibly tantalizing match of Kenny Omega teaming with Hangman Page to
take on THE BASTARD Pac and JAAAAAAAAAHHN Moxley. This was awesome from the start, got
better, and the ended fantastically. If you didn’t catch this week’s AEW, go out of
your way to watch this match. It was big spot after big spot, with all four men looking
amazing to thunderous THIS IS AWESOME chants from the packed Philly crowd. The action broke
down somewhat after Mox and Omega went nose-to-nose before going out the ring to get their barbed
wire bat and broom, and this upset Pac no end. So upset was Pac at Moxley, that Mox
took the knock and gave The Bastard the Paradigm Shift - allowing Omega and Page to nail Pac
with a V-Trigger, Buckshot and Deadeye for the win. This was a fabulous professional
wrestling match. Actually, how would you describe it Kevin Smith? “It was dazzling”.
It was also announced that Britt Baker would be in action in her hometown next week, Young
Bucks will also have a match - along with the tag tournament semi-finals and a mega
match up of Jon Moxley vs. Pac. Now that should be dazzling.
And the main event of the show was Chris Jericho defending his AEW World Championship against
Darby Allin, who earned this shot by beating Jimmy Havoc last week. This was billed as
a Philly Street Fight, but the commentators made it clear at the start of the match that
rope breaks would still be in effect. Sadly the live crowd did not hear the commentary
because they’re in the building and not watching on TV at home, and so when Allin
got out of the Walls of Jericho twice and broke up a pin with a rope break, the crowd
booed and chanted IT’S A STREET FIGHT. Credit to AEW for trying to explain why there are
rope breaks in this street fight, but WHY ARE THERE ROPE BREAKS IN A STREET FIGHT?!
Really, this was done to set up Jericho taping Allin’s hands behind his back - so Darby
Allin could show off how amazing he is by making a no-handed come back including dives
and a Whisper in the Wind off the top rope, but the crowd were killed by the rope breaks
in a street fight, and were less into it than they should have been. In the end, Jake Hager
appeared from nowhere to push Allin off the top rope into a Walls of Jericho for the win.
It was a good final third, tainted slightly by the odd booking.
So what did you think of the show? Let me know in the poll above my head where you can
choose from All Elite, AEW-Some, Middle of the Rhodes, SC2 out of 5, and What The Buck.
Aside from my quibbles about the main event, this was another great episode of AEW Dynamite.
The in-ring action was always hot, the promo package for Cody was great, we got some killer
matches announced for next week and Full Gear next month, and that Omega/Page/Pac/Moxley
tag match was incredible. But due to the main event shenanigans I can’t say it was perfect.
This week’s AEW Dynamite is AEW-Some. What was the real reason Eric Bischoff was
fired from WWE? Click the video on screen right now to find out! And watch Laurie Blake
and Housemate Simon over on ScreenStalker Live right now! I’ve been Luke Owen and
that was wrestling.