December 18, 2019 – Winter Park, Florida
Adam Cole def. Finn Balor {NXT Championship Match}
They’re really pushing Prince Balor as his nickname now, to the point that Mauro Ranallo straight up called him that before correcting himself, but I think they should just dive in and remove the Finn. Nigel McGuinness brings up Jordan Peterson here and Mauro tells the “kids” to google him, and they can both seriously go fuck themselves by encouraging children to become angry man-babies in doing so. I guess Nigel didn’t vote Labour. There was a great moment in this match where Cole and Balor kicked each other unconscious, and even though Cole collapsed on top of Balor he instinctively kicked out at 2 as well because he didn’t know what was going on. I probably overrated Balor’s match at Takeover (not so much that willing to amend my rating) because this is the kind of match I really want out of him. It didn’t hurt that the crowd was wild for both guys from the start, but the urgent energy here really elevated this to greatness. I called the finish weeks ago, as Johnny Gargano appearing on the ramp to distract Balor (and the ref) long enough for Cole to hit a low blow and the Last Shot for the win at 15:16. It makes such a difference when they suspend commercials for big matches like this. It was predictable because it was the correct way to go. Gargano beats up Balor with a chair after the match. And Cole is the runaway wrestler of the year in NXT, capping it off with yet another incredible title defense. ****
Damian Priest def. Killian Dain
This was supposed to happen a few weeks ago, but Priest got injured on Takeover weekend. Two heel vs. heel matches in a row is kind of a weird move here, and the crowd is way less interested in this one. The match was largely Dain working over Priest’s ribs, which makes sense but wasn’t the most exciting way for them to go. Priest’s comeback was fun, though. Things got a little wobbly down the stretch, and I think these two have a better match in them. Priest hit the Reckoning for the win at 10:50 (shown). **¾
The Dusty Rhodes Tag Team Classic is returning next year. The teams will be announced in two weeks on the New Year’s Day episode of NXT. I’m frankly pretty surprised they’re producing episodes to air on the holidays.
Cameron Grimes def. Kushida
Grimes is poutier than usual without his silly hat. Kushida is in a great mood while wearing the hat, so maybe I shouldn’t judge the fashion choice since it brings whoever wears it so much joy. I liked the way this match built in intensity, starting on the level of their first match but then becoming something much more once it passed the four minutes that they got the first time around. Grimes’ win is bound to make people feel sour, but to me it just means they must keep this rivalry going and build it into something important. Grimes hit the Cave-In at 10:32 (shown) for the win. ***¼
Io Shirai def. Santana Garrett
Ranallo drops that Shirai is engaged to NJPW’s EVIL. She has a thing for dudes wearing under eye makeup. Garrett got a little bit of offense here, but it was mostly a let’s-not-forget-about-Shirai match. Shirai hit the moonsault for the win at 4:03. **
Pete Dunne def. Travis Banks
To me, Banks just doesn’t look like a legit threat in an NXT ring. I haven’t seen him in NXT UK since his stateside appearance last week sort of brought down the curtain on him for me, so I’m curious if when he pops up in a British ring again if he’ll look like as much of a geek over there. This wasn’t bad by any stretch, in fact it was quite fun, I just think Banks carries himself in a way that I can buy as a threat. They certainly tried though, giving Banks a ton of offense, but I think it was smart to have Dunne kick out of his finisher. Dunne picked up the win at 7:26 (shown) with the Bitter End. ***
Dakota Kai is mad that Mia Yim put her through two tables, resulting in a bunch of staples needed to close a head wound. She reminds us that she was the winner of that match, and that she’s going to continue to beat NXT’s women. Later, they announce that Roderick Strong will defend the North American Championship next week on a special Christmas episode of the show. We’ll also get Lio Rush & Keith Lee vs. Priest & Tony Nese.
Rhea Ripley def. Shayna Baszler {NXT Women’s Championship Match}
Like the opener, this happened exactly as it should have. Well, in the end it did, as Ripley needed to beat Baszler here. But I didn’t love the way they got there. I get why they went with so much gaga here; Ripley was able to fight through interference, a ref bump, and a DDT on a chair, as well as all of Baszler’s actual skill to win the belt. But unlike when Tommaso Ciampa won the NXT Championship on TV in a match with a ref bump, here it felt tacked on and awkwardly executed. So did the Horsewomen interference, mostly because the Horsewomen are really quite terrible at everything they do. It’s personal preference, but I was digging how dominant Ripley had been in the build to this, and wasn’t really in the mood to see her fight from behind so much here. All that said, the way Ripley grabbed the referee’s shirt to show that she hadn’t passed out was dope. They built a ton of drama leading up to the finish once all the other silliness was out of the way. Ripley hit an avalanche Riptide for the win and the title at 14:23 (shown). Sidenote: Ripley’s submission is now called the Prism, and I’m not sure what that name has to do with anything. ***½ This was getting a lot more love than I was expecting it to after the fact, so I went back and watched it again a week later. In a very unexpected twist, the match was a lot easier to watch with the commercial breaks cut out. I find that odd, because in matches like Damian Priest vs. Pete Dunne, seeing the action during the commercial inset made the match a better watch. But here it worked a lot better without the commercials and the replays after the commercial kept things a lot more concise and dramatic. The ref bump was still iffy, but worked better on a second watch. So since I’m basically in the bag for NXT, this gets **** now.
The roster and fans rush the ring to celebrate with Ripley after the match. That’s a really nice moment for the fans (many of whom are regulars) to give them a chance to get on screen for a special interaction during a big title change. It also adds weight to Baszler’s insane run as champion. Rik Bugez is there, so it seems rumors of his release have been exaggerated.
From Diamond Ring Kensuke Office Changes. They emphasize that Nakajima beat Dragon Gate wrestler Kenichiro Arai 
From Dynamite 131. This is a qualifying match for the Owen Hart Foundation tournament. Joe debuted at ROH Supercard of Honor, saving Jonathan Gresham from Jay Lethal (whose soul searching apparently led him to turn heel) & Sonjay Dutt after the main event. And now that ROH and AEW are the same thing, that seems worth mentioning. Caster’s pre-match rap was cute. This was real squashy, with Joe needing only two minutes to put Caster down with the Muscle Buster at 2:52. Lethal & Dutt pop up on the big screens and Lethal says he’d been trying to get a hold of Joe during his difficult soul searching time, and Joe never picked up. They have a present for Joe next week. N/A
From Dynamite 132. Jay Lethal & Sonjay Dutt were in the front row cheering on Joe. Sarcastically, probably, as they brawled with Joe at ROH Supercard of Honor XV. 
From Rampage 39. 
From Dynamite 137. 
From Dynamite 138. This is a 
From Double or Nothing. 
From PWF York Cougar Football Fundraiser. I didn't know that this match happened until over a month after the fact. This started out as a non-title match, but we'll get to why I've listed it as a title match in a moment. FTR have Mick Foley in their corner while their opponents have Bill Behrens. I’ve never actually seen Behrens do an on-camera gig before. He's holding a tennis racket, presumably as an Umaga to Jim Cornette. But it's confusing because there was actually a tennis player named Bill Behrens. They announce this match as having a 20-minute time limit. Only 11 minutes in, they say there are three minutes remaining. Until then, this was as run-of-the-mill as a modern FTR match gets. But the announcement snapped everyone out of their heat-on-Wheeler funk and forced them to go for desperate pins. They announce ten seconds remaining a couple of times, but no one can get the roll up pin they're looking for. The 20-minute time limit expires at 1
From NXT UK 183. McGuinness started by essentially saying that Fraser is going to pee or poo himself during the match. Unnecessary. Had Shawn Michaels been game to have a good match against Vader, this is what it would have looked like. Actually, a more appropriate and modern analogue is Brock Lesnar vs. Seth Rollins from SummerSlam. Much like that match, Frazer used quick strikes and avoided his larger opponent’s signature big move to stay alive. Here it was the powerbomb whereas there it was suplexes. Here, Frazer also successfully damaged WALTER’s knee, which slowed the big man down and made it hard for WALTER to hit the powerbomb. Unfortunately for Frazer, WALTER was able to bide his time and clothesline Frazer’s legs out from under him. An inevitable powerbomb followed and won the match for WALTER at 14:02. I hate to say this because I’m happy that he’s healthier, but the way WALTER has slimmed down has taken some of the magic away from his aura. At least for me it has. That said, dude can clearly still go as well as ever in the ring. ****
From NXT 659. Strong was feeling it here, which is thanks in large part to the crowd being maniacally loud from the get go I’m sure. His whole game was fast and devastating stick and move attacks. That worked pretty well, as WALTER was dazed from time to time. But as with all good WALTER matches (which is pretty much all WALTER matches), everything WALTER does is devastating here so it takes very little for him to take back control. And eventually he did just that and hit the powerbomb for the win at 9:46 (shown of 12:18). After the match, WALTER gets on the microphone and says that his name is Gunther now. I did not think WALTER would be a victim of the renaming curse this far into his run. What will they rename Strong?! ***¾
From NXT UK 185. Andy Shepherd helpfully announces from inside the ring that the reason for the stipulation is that the feud has gotten so violent that it wouldn’t be safe to have fans around. Devlin says during the match that it’s because he thinks Dragunov could only muster the energy to win if he had the crowd behind him. I like that explanation a lot more. The only real reason I could think of to do this without fans is that there was a scheduling conflict with one of the wrestlers for the regular TV taping date and they needed to get this thing filmed. We just had such a long stretch of empty arena NXT UK episodes that I can’t imagine anyone was dying to get another taste of it. This aired the day after Adam Cole vs. Orange Cassidy in a match that was also no disqualification and falls count anywhere, and this served up everything I felt was missing from that match. Now you might say, “Brad, Cassidy is not the same kind of character as Devlin or Dragunov, how could you expect the same level of violence or intensity?” To that I say, when Cassidy started his match by breaking his own sunglasses and rapidly punching Cole, he was indicating that level of violence and/or intensity. And instead the match was mostly wacky. Anyway, this was not wacky. It was stiff and intense and featured weapons that made sense and spots the didn’t take forever to set up. Dragunov got in trouble when his eye injury acted up. Devlin took control and beat the crap out of him. I wasn’t wild about how meek Dragunov was when Devlin was zip tying his hands, but I did like that in the end it turned out to be an error on Devlin’s part anyway because Dragunov’s finisher requires no hands. And indeed, a bound Dragunov jumped off the steel steps (which had been brought into the ring) and hit the Torpedo Moskau on Devlin for the win at 21:43. NXT UK is still sneaking in these dope matches that no one is watching. Y’all should watch them. ****¼ 
From AAA Triplemania Regia. FTR come out with Vickie Guerrero. This was supposed to be explained at an earlier AAA taping but FTR and Guerrero all missed them. AAA is notorious for having this kind of luck/being incompetent lately. FTR is also wearing Eddie Guerrero tribute tights, with American flags on one side and flames on the other, I suppose to pay homage to his Gringos Locos and Latino Heat gimmicks. This match mostly sucked, but one cool spot saw FTR tie Pentagon’s mask to the ropes and force him to unmask with his hands over his face to stop them from climbing the ladder. That would have been a very meaningful moment to lead up to the Lucha Brothers winning the titles back, but unfortunately instead it led into nothing. He just got his mask back and the match continued on in its lame, derivative way. At one point, Pentagon was the only man standing, but instead of climbing the ladder he grabbed a table from the floor. So the titles mean enough to him that he’d unmask to stop his opponents from winning, but not enough for him to get the titles when he had a clear path to do it? Vickie powered Pentagon, causing him to voluntarily jump through the table and Harwood grabbed the belts at 12:12. This was abysmal. *
From AEW Full Gear. Silver was hamming it up a lot more here than he was the year before in New York. That said, this had stronger just-a-match vibes than the aforementioned match. After Silver ripped out Cassidy’s pockets, Cassidy turned up the heat and these guys put on a middle of the row undercard match. Not bad by any means, but nothing memorable either. Cassidy hit the Beach Break rather out of nowhere for the win at 9:42. **¾ 
From the second Honor Reigns Supreme. The commentators sold this as Gresham getting a big shot against a top ROH guy after being an also-ran in the Television Championship division for a while. This was terrific. Both guys did a fantastic job selling their respective targeted limbs, and Gresham in particular played the role of the tenacious underdog perfectly. He didn’t just watch to see where Lethal would have trouble executing his finisher because of the damage he’d done to the former ROH Champion’s arm, he pressed the assault whenever he could, taking out the arm to make sure the Lethal Injection would never come. But what he couldn’t do was stop Lethal from battering his knee and ultimately winning with a Figure 4 Leglock at 17:54. ****¼ 
From the second Masters of the Craft. Columbus has way more Gresham fans than Concord did. That’s a neat little advancement to the plot, innit? They both went after the same limbs that earned them dividends in their previous match. And then they went ahead and built an incredible match out of that story. At first it seemed as though Lethal wasn’t going to be able to get Gresham’s leg to give out. But about halfway through the match, Gresham’s knee was in trouble. Gresham was able to escape the leglock this time by using the momentum of Lethal pulling him away from the ropes to shift to an armbar. But Gresham’s focus on the arm bit him in the ass. Lethal went for the Lethal Injection and collapsed again, but when Gresham went for a roll up after that Lethal cut back on it for the win at 18:27. This is one of the best American examples that I've seen of a match building on the match that came before. Rather than try to outdo the maneuvers from their first meeting for the sake of a big crowd reaction, they adjust their game plans in logical ways that, to me, were just as exciting. I think this match is slept on, by virtue of the fact that I’ve never heard anything about it before watching it. ****½ 
From ROH Wrestling 364. In real life, 
From Death Before Dishonor XVII. Gresham and Lethal had been teaming, but Gresham grew frustrated and started heeling. Ultimately, he turned on Lethal. It took them a little while to get there, but once they got into a groove this was exactly what I wanted from this match. It was back to their old tricks, with Lethal targeting the leg to set up for the Figure 4 Leglock and Gresham targeting the arm to block the Lethal Injection and set up for his Octopus. In the end, Lethal tried the cutback trick that worked for him in Columbus, but Gresham countered to a pin and then put on the gnarliest Octopus for his first win over Lethal at 17:20. This is the best kind of wrestling series. And none of it felt stale because it was a year after they’d wrestled last and because they found ways to energize the old tropes. And that’s not to mention Gresham busting out what I can only describe as a sumo-style assault. Gresham and Lethal make up after the match. ****
From ROH Wrestling 500. During the pandemic, ROH made the most of their empty arena shows by kicking them off with a tournament to crown a champion for the revived Pure Championship. Gresham won the tournament, and this was his fourth defense of the title. Lethal and Gresham were still allies here. In an interesting move, the other match on this milestone episode was two other partners fighting in Jay and Mark Briscoe. They cut to a commercial break about six minutes in, though the action didn’t get beyond (admittedly fast-moving) mat wrestling until the 10-minute mark. That had me thinking this was going to go long, but things took a different turn. Both guys had abused the other’s shoulders, and Lethal used that to his advantage best. He forced Gresham to use his first rope break to stop a pin, and his second to escape a crab. Then, he used the failed Lethal Injection to bait Gresham into a crossface, forcing the champ to use his final rope break. But he made the mistake of giving Gresham a breather and was quickly caught in a head scissor takedown giving Gresham the winning pin at 14:06 (shown of 16:40). For an empty arena match, this held my attention. It was totally different than their previous matches while still using a couple elements from the rivalry to elevate it just a bit. Not essential viewing, but if you’re working your way through their series you shouldn’t skip it. ***¼ 
