Yes, it was tonights NXT takeover ppv.

This picture is over 10 minutes after he got busted open and had refs wiping him up with towels. He got ****ed up. He did a superplex through two tables on someone but nailed his head on the table.



The match was very fun after Sanity got in there. Dain's a beast. Disappointed that it could and did end on a pinfall. Gotta surrender like a *****.

The reception of the show was very good but I didn't like the Ohno, Velveteen, or 4-way women's match, and didn't watch the title match, so I didn't like it much.

Velveteen/Black was fine at the end but trading near falls isn't akin to a great match. Ohno/??? was just awful.

I agree with most of this, the dream/black match underwhelmed.. It could have been so much better. I actually did like the Ohno/lars match but I had very low expectations of that match coming into it.

The title match was very very good. I think it should crack 4 *s. The wargames match was amazing.

Also, its tough to tell in that picture but young bleed the hard way too on the bridge of his nose.

I've always had a low opinion of Ohno. I've been watching him since 2011 in PWG/ROH and I just can't stand that 90% of his offense is strikes and that he has to slap his thigh for each and every one of them. I'd never seen Lars prior to this. When he came onto the set, I thought he was like 6'11 or something.....then I saw him get into the ring. ****ing midget. He needs a lot of polishing up in the ring.

Dain also got some hard way blood.

That ****ing coast-to-coast by Dain was insane. I'd post a gif if I could find one. Every single Takeover I watch, Sanity's one of the top highlights. I really those guys.

Yea, I am a big fan of Sanity also.

People can say a lot of things but this show was better than all of the recent WWE ppvs besides SummerSlam. Why is that exactly? The main roster has a ton of talent, are they just not willing to let them do their thing out of fear of injury?

I know a couple of years ago when the first Bayley/Sasha match happened, a lot of people said that that was so much better than the main roster counterparts because they didn't have a heavy house show schedule and they were able to choreograph that at the performance center. This makes a lot of sense given how bad those two have been on the main roster (same goes for Paige). But if I'm not mistaken, NXT tours a lot now (?), so I'm not sure why the main roster has such completely awful ppvs in comparison to NXT's. One thing is the main roster shows are all going ~3.5 hours now and that NXT show tonight was around 2hr 35m. Tomorrow's is a 6 hour show if you include the preshow. That's dreadful.

Yea good points. I think a lot of it is the booking. Which sucks because if the booking is translating so well to the fans in NXT you'd think some changes would be in order for the main roster. I really did dig the booking up to this ppv. The black/dream match had me really excited. Almost more so than the wargames match.

Speaking of which, mark my words. Dream will be a very big star one day.

Agreed re: booking. I almost mentioned that as well. There have been a couple of decent in ring ppvs this year on the mr but the booking was just so bad, that it made it impossible to come away with any satisfaction from them.

Despite not liking the Black/Dream match that much, I think both have a bunch of potential. I did say that about Black in his Takeover debut in either August or April and it doesn't seem like he's progressed much since then.

More Wargames to come.

I gotta say that during the match I was very disappointed that it wasn't one member at a time that got out of the cage but by the end I was happy about that because getting to the awesome stuff with Sanity after 9 minutes was much better than getting to that after 15 minutes when the match's almost over. The match ended up going ~32-35 by my count.

I had similar feelings as well. When I saw the rules were different and there was no top to the cage, I was like wtf wwe? This match is perfect if booked right without you changing the rules around. But I do like the changes now. I can see them going a lot of directions with it. Teams accidently getting eliminated by going over the top, heel cowards esacaping to get eliminated, maybe using the shark cage and entrance ramp somehow to do some high spots.

Also, I think using the middle area between the two rings would be cool. Maybe do a table spot there with the table on the ropes? Lots of potential.

But please! Keep this on NXT. Make it an annual event, survivor series is the pefect time for it because it is the lowest watched of the big 4 so it could boost interest in their product during this time, also it has a team element.

He makes it so obvious too.



What makes it worse is he feels the need to do it when he's not even involved in the move. I remember a match he had with the Bucks where he slapped his leg after every superkick and at the end of the match it looked like he had this massive bruise on his thigh.

Watching now. This is the first time I've watched NXT in a very long time so I don't know a lot of these people. Lars seems bad. I don't like Black's strike heavy offense but I thought the whole "say my name" story was really good despite not seeing any of the build. First time seeing this Dream guy and yeah he seems like he has potential to be pretty huge. He mostly made the match for me, really talented and great expressions. Seems like the type of guy that could run with a few gimmicks as well.

It sounds like Drew suffered a likely torn bicep on one of the last two spots of the match. It sure did look like a legit injury after the match as Drew's arm was hanging lifelessly.

I hated Lars at first as well but the way they've built him.. I have kind of just bought that he is a monster. Maybe I am a mark? Lol

It sounds like he is on the weekly tv show. They said he'd never been knocked off his feet before last night. It's easy to squash no name talent and look dominant. It's always the ppvs/specials where you're either going to be exposed or put on a great showing. Sid's the easiest example of this. He could have passable ppv matches but his squashes on tv were fun af.

Yea, thats a good analogy. He is a modern day Sid. But much smaller and without the charisma :P

Sid had to be in there with a generational talent (Michaels) to even have a passable PPV singles match, and it's the only one I can remember. Bret wasn't able to pull a passable match out of him the following month. Feels like everything else was absolutely brutal.

I agree that Sid squash matches were fun just because the person jobbing would bump like crazy and make it enjoyable. And he was decent on the mic and had tons of charisma and an awesome look. But I basically wouldn't be able to name a worse in-ring worker if The Great Khali hadn't come along.

Well I can name a few but probably none that were that over and on that big of stage.

I'm pretty ignorant when it comes to indies, so I'm mostly just going off of the big two and ECW. El Gigante/Giant Gonzalez would be another to consider.

That was a name that came to my mind but he was nowhere near as over as Sid. I think its obvious that the Giant Gonzalez was a worse worker than Sid but the Giant Gonzalez was more of a special attraction.

Public Enemy could be a strong consideration as well.

I hated Public Enemy with the fire of a thousand suns, but Rocco Rock probably shouldn't just get lumped in with Johnny Grunge as a worker. Pulling individuals out of WCW tag teams of that era, I'd go Rocco Rock >> Stevie Ray > Johnny Grunge. (Obviously Booker T wouldn't belong in the "bad worker" conversation. I'm not sure there was a bigger disparity between long-term tag partners than between Booker and Stevie.)

But frankly I'm not sure that Sid was better than any of them. Beyond having a really limited offensive arsenal that was terribly executed, his attempts at selling were absolutely comical. That stunned face that he would give came off as almost a mockery of a pro wrestler selling a move.

Man, talking about comical selling always gets me thinking of Luger who can absolutely fit in this category. He did have a great match with Flair at Starrcade 88 but, Flair.

edit: to be clear, I'm not even talking about his yelling. I'm talking about his facials and the way he laid the same on the mat every single time he got knocked down.

Sucks if they had to take the title off Drew due to an injury. Sucks even more if they did it just because that was the plan all along. Was really looking forward to a Drew/Lars feud, which I think could have been NXT's Braun/Roman.

Wonder how much input Ellering has on creative. War Games is back and also I think he was originally the first guy they ever put into one of those cages above the ring. Two things they've done since he's been back.

Why did both guys from each team get to enter at the same time?

I don't know whether Percy is the worst or that the other guys in the booth are so good that he doesn't even have a chance.