Dean does the Dusty move! Cody and Dustin nowhere to be seen!
Ok, would not have picked Sheamus, but there we are.
Of course they had to tie up Cena/Owens at 1-1. Next month, CenaWinsLol. I’d rather Owens drop the NxT title to Finn Balor in Tokyo, then come at Cena with no title and take the US Title from him at Battleground. That actually gives them something to continue the feud with.
Only God knows why Bray Wyatt is being thrown at SuperReigns. Wyatt hasn’t won a single feud ever, and no one in the local galactic supercluster thinks he’s a threat to Reigns. Hell, the cybernetic platypus beings of the Phoenix Cluster are probably wondering what the fuck is up with this one.
I’m packing all this week, so I might be a bit absent…
Basically last night was decent overall. Didn’t think Sheamus in a million years, and thought maybe they just gave it to him to waste it, which if they’re doing that…why not Kofi?
Don’t mind Wyatt and Reigns. Both are decently over nowadays and neither have anything else to do.
Hate that Nikki is breaking AJs record when she’s done NOTHING to deserve it, although the dusty finish was a bit nice
Cena/KO is in match of the year talk. I barely like KO and I thought he did a good, solid match. I don’t even think it was a lolcenawins because Cena won on something other than the 5 moves
Poor New Day, they didn’t need that. Although I don’t hate the Primetime Players
Barrett loses. Yawn.
The final match left me WAAYYYY underwhelmed. The match went on forever, there were no crazy cool spots, the end was just godawful.
She’s done Cena…
And AJ is doing CM Punk, so guess which one McMahon prefers.
It seems like WWE decided the best way to honor Dusty’s legacy was to end almost every single match with a screwy swerve finish where nobody gets over. The Prime Time Players’ unexpected but overdue title win was the only match on the card that didn’t have some kind of shenanigans at the end. Overall, there were some pretty solid matches in here - Cena/Owens was a classic, and even though I disagree with Cena winning, Owens’ post-match beatdown was a great way for him to keep his heat. Putting MITB on Sheamus just seems like yet another Sandow/Ziggler/Rollins situation where they don’t actually have a plan that leads to that person becoming champion, but they have to put it on someone and they figure they’ll come up with the rest later. The Bellas are heels again, I guess - they seem to change alignment every single show these days - and as I said before, I can think of two big reasons why nobody should be fooled by Twin Magic at this point.
Here’s what was for me, however, the single most shocking, unexpected, out-of-nowhere moment of the night; after the finish of the Nikki/Paige match, JBL actually made a coherent logical point.
He stated that the match should have been ruled a DQ once the ref realized that Brie had taken Nikki’s place, which is completely correct; it makes absolutely no sense that he’d count a pin for Nikki after realizing that outside interference had taken place and without having the announcer declare that the match was being restarted. When JBL starts poking holes in the booking logic, it’s time to be afraid. Very afraid.
They’re giving us a whole five weeks to build Battleground, presumably to leave a little breathing room for the Tokyo show on the Network. From what I’ve read, BRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAWK LEZZZZZZZZZZZZZZNUR is supposed to be making his return on Raw tonight and will be wrestling at the Tokyo show (his advertised opponent is Kofi Kingston for some utterly nonsensical reason, but it’s likely he’ll end up fighting Chris Jericho instead), so it just might be worth tuning in for.
I’m just going to go ahead and predict PTP will lose the belts back to Noo-hoo Day-hee tonight.
And we have a triple threat match with Big Shoo, Ryback and Miz to look forward to. yay. Get to see Miz lurk outside the ring most of the match while BS and Ry slug (as in the slimy gastropod) it out.
KO finally has his first WWE loss. Does that mean a downward slide will ensue? That’s what happened to Neville after he lost the NXT belt, but he was xfering anyway. When Sheamus pulled him off the ladder by his hair, JBL should have said “That’s what you get fer lettin’ your hair grow out, Maggle!”
Brrrrock is supposedly due back soon, so Seth can now sweat him. What about Dean? Will he steal the briefcase again?
My latest crazy WWE theory:
- Owens loses the NXT title, presumably to Balor
- Owens beats Cena for the US title, possibly with some assistance from Rusev
- Somewhere along the line, Sheamus cashes in on MITB
- Cena beats Sheamus for the world title, tying him with Flair for the most.
They’re going to put the world belt on Cena (and then Lesnar) eventually, and that’s the only thing I can think of where having Sheamus winning MITB makes any sense.
[Emperor voice] All is proceeding according to plan! [/ev]
Yup, we have Owens going for the US Title next month. I’d bet $50 he drops the NXT title to Balor in Japan, then takes the US Title.
Somewhere in KO’s feud with Cena and his eventual Tokydome match with Finn, he’s supposed to have some kind of showdown with S’more Joe. This may already be resolved, given the tape delay nature of NXT, but if Finn wins the NXT belt and KO vaults to the main roster, maybe Joe will turn heel and do to Finn what KO did to Zayn. Joe is the indie heir apparent, but they shouldn’t want to repeat themselves with the “pissed because he’s been overlooked by WWE” angle.
Joe’s match with Owens is going to be on tomorrow night’s episode of NXT, which is the last one they have in the can at the moment.
Oooooh… is Bray Wyatt going to kidnap the daughter of Roman? Brainwash her? Make her his own disciple? Have her hand out pamphlets at airports and play the tambourine? Carve pentagrams on pregnant women?
The MITB briefcase was just laying there in the walkway. Dean could have just picked it up. But noooooo. Instead, he’s now going to team up with Orton against life-sucking Kane and Sheamus or something. I hope he doesn’t keep selling the leg.
KO is wearing the heel crown for sure now. Vince likes him. Vince really likes him. KO just seems to enjoy making everybody hate him. Why? Fuck you, that’s why. CM Punk was that way.
The Fergal Devitt video package on NXT was pretty awesome. I was rather surprised they went with his real name throughout when they’re calling him Finn Balor. If you missed it, go back and watch.
100% agree. This was easily the best part of NXT.
If anyone wants to know how far Bayley has fallen (given she hasn’t won in God knows how long and is barely on TV anymore), I was watching the Balor thing and…holy crap Becky Lynch is hot
I could have sworn I saw Bayley on the left side of the screen when they were showing Finn’s class.
I didn’t really get into LU last night, since I had a colonoscopy today, had to drink bowel-clearing solution last night, and spent most of the evening on the toilet. I can’t even think of a wrestling analogy that works. It was just one match anyway.
So it was a day long Vince Russo scripted match? 
Burnnnn!!!
SD was kind of usual last night, but I am digging the Roman Reigns/Bray Wyatt storyline. Bray discovered Roman’s kryptonite, his daughter. The Father’s Day promos made Roman more human, instead of the push-at-all-costs placeholder guy, and made him somebody the audience can identify with. Plus, he actually got pinned by an upper-middle card guy in the type of tag match where Kane typically takes the fall. The picture with burned edges appearing in the ring after the lights went out was a nice touch. Bray is the Joker to Roman’s Batman, performing little mind tricks designed to make the hero crack.
Which, in the long run, will probably go in about the same direction as it did when Bray found out about Dean Ambrose’s father - nowhere. He’ll mention it once or twice, they’ll have a few matches, and then Bray will decide the feud is over and start picking on Dolph Ziggler or something.
Dunno if I said as much, but I have a floor ticket for the August 17th RAW in Minneapolis. I work until 5pm that night, about 6 blocks away, so I’ll just go get something to eat after work and wander over.