NXT 8/19/20 feat. Cole shoulder-to-face meeting with McAfee & Go-home show for non-PG named Takeover
 

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Surprised they didn't edit out the scary Gargano injury spot from this Gargano vs. Holland match.

Gargano vs. Holland was pretty good but one of the weaker starts to a NXT show.

Match flow unraveled a lot post-injury spot though.

Guess Rachel Gonzalez finally managed to escape from catering to help her pal Dakota.

That's one of those times his size saved him. I don't think a 240+ pound wrestler's neck would have held up under the extra weight.

Legado Del Fantasma's entrance tron might be the best one currently in WWE.

Legado Del Fantasma vs. Breezango & Isiah "Swerve" Scott match was pretty good.

Ending was a lot more convoluted than it needed to be though and due to the ref never bothering to start counting Breeze on the outside after the quick tag spot. Made Scott look like a huge moron in the end.

First hour was mostly good but also feels like NXT is currently blowing a golden opportunity to convert AEW viewers into NXT viewers.

Yeah, if he was an inch or two taller, that easily could have been a broken neck instead of him probably suffering a stinger and getting the wind knocked out of him.

They really should have called off the match after that spot since Gargano clearly wasn't into things afterwards.

Pat McAfee's promo was pretty decent but that might have been one of the weakest confrontation segment in years by WWE & NXT.

If it wasn't for the Cs blowing out the 76ers in the 2nd half, likely would have been paying more attention to the game since this show has been decent but also somewhat skippable so far.

Women's tag match was decent.

Seems counter-productive to have only 3 sides of the ringside being protected by plexiglass although that powerbomb toss by Ripley to Martinez on the non-plexiglass side was pretty cool.

NXT title hype video was great but :lol: at the choice of music for it. Almost killed the serious mood of the video.

It was the best thing on tonight's show so far.

Dream randomly getting booed by the crowd during his entrance was a bit odd since he's not a heel nor did they do that during his return last week.

Can scratch Cameron Grimes name off of the winner's list for the North American title ladder match at Takeover XXX since he's currently holding the title while mocking Dream and Balor.

He should pull a page from Sasha's book and just leave with the title since that makes you an actual champion via WWE logic these days.

:lol: at that ref bump spot.

Dream vs. Balor ended up being somewhat dull although Grimes antics were easily the best part about it. Whole thing turned into a big mess near the end because of NXT going overboard with all the shenanigans.

Going by WWE logic, nobody is winning the NA Ladder match since everyone involved grabbed the title at one point during that match.

This week's episode was mostly enjoyable overall but NXT really did blow a golden chance to pull viewers away from AEW with the quality of tonight's show. In terms of go-home shows, NXT's go-home for Takeover was better than RAW's go-home for SummerSlam though.

Pat McAfee should beat the shit out of Adam Cole. He is a star. Adam Cole is not.

Cole will probably win though and WWE will continue to be confused about how stars are made.

That would be such a WWE move to do.

Take a young and/or new star that's been built up for around the past 2 years as a top star and feed him to a part-timer.

Would be even worse considering all the time NXT spent making Cole and Undisputed as the dominate group of the brand. They even went as far as rushing title changes solely so that the early NXT shows on USA Network would revolve around their dominance for the men's side of the brand.

Cole and Undisputed Era really should have been called up post-Survivor Series or War Games since they were already becoming stale on NXT and having their potential star power growth being stunted by sticking around for way too long.

I think the mistake was ever building him up to begin with. Now they’ve got him in the Lawler role against a quasi-celebrity. Fuck it. Put McAfee over, let him brag for a while and build up an actual star to shut him up.

He’s a fucking punter. Who the fuck cares about punters?

He never even won a Super Bowl. This is not Lawrence Taylor vs Bam Bam ffs

Blame Triple H for that since Cole was the one free agent he craved signing the most at the time and was the hardest to get for like 2 years before it happened. Not even nabbing Balor was as tough nor took as long as he needed for Cole. All it took for Balor was basically just buying out his rich sponsorship deals.

Once he got signed, it was only a matter of time before he was going to get a major push and top star status for the brand.

On the flip side, only a matter of time before Tegan Nox starts having a Shayna Baszler-like iron grip on the Women's division since that's who Triple H currently favors the most in the division for top star material.

I kind of want him to win similar to how Otis won MITB since itd fit his Character if he won a belt by having it fall into his hands instead of grabbing it himself or actually pinning someone.

My guess is Bronson Reed wins it though

Grimes or Reed would be great choices to win the NA title.

Wouldn't be surprised if Dream wins instead since it wouldn't make that much sense to bring him back with all the current baggage surrounding him unless they had some big plans for him at Takeover and afterwards. They already gave him a big singles win over Balor albeit not clean.

I'm not really feeling this Takeover which probably means it'll be great.

I agree that McAfee seems way more interesting/charismatic than Adam Cole has ever seemed to me

I dunno man, I feel like if they had their "call up" they'd inevitably be broken up within 90 days and have tag team feuds, which would then lead them all to turn on Cole, blah blah blah. Adam Cole is a fucking twig that just wouldn't fit on the main roster, I don't believe. I just can't take him seriously at all.




This, hard this. Who the fuck is McAfee. I KNOW who he is, but he's a fucking nobody tbh.

Pat McAfee's show is incredible so I'm fine with using him, but yeah the amount of mainstream appeal he has is minimal/non-existent.

He has roughly 7 million times more mainstream appeal than Adam Cole.

Yikes @ Johnny Gargano's neck, glad he seems to be okay.

Really love how they're booking Fantasma these days. Him and Swerve together are guaranteed to have a good match every time.

Kinda liked Ripley and Shotzi together. Think they could be a good tag team more permanently.

Cole/McAfee is just meh to me.

They've been building up Bronson Reed really hard lately. Wouldn't be surprised if he won the ladder match.