Welcome to the Mid-Week Wrestling Wrap-Up
Covering NXT, Lucha Underground and a dash of TNA
Previously on The "M-Triple-Dub": Joe got his nose back, with a vengeance; Killshot and Marty The Moth went to war; and Matt Hardy resuscitated a dying camera drone by infusing it with the essence of his Brother's former gimmick.
All in all, a good couple days of Pro Graps TV.
Let's get our sh*t in.
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NXT
First, an announcement and an apology:
I will be unable to provide GIFs of NXT, since it's unavailable on my Network feed right now.
Sorry about that.
There was some damn fine GIF-worthy stuff in this episode too.
Oh well.
Somewhere out there is a Medical Records clerk who got Coquina Clutched.
Samoan Joseph is in the ring, and somehow he got a copy of Shinsuke Nakamura's Medical Report from last week.
He says its because he's "such a persuasive individual," so either he visited the local hospital and beat the crap out of some poor pencil pusher in the Records Department, or this happened:
Followed by Joe losing his patience, and then beating the crap out of him.
Either way, Shinsuke has all sorts of things wrong with him following being Uranage'd onto the steel steps, and he's going to be out of action for 6 -12 weeks. Takeover Toronto is Eight and a Half weeks away.
So that's how they're going to build the rematch, and I'm cool with it, especially since Joe threatens GM William Regal with the promise that what happened to Nak is going to happen to the entire roster if Reegs doesn't "either bring me Nakamura or you strip him of the title and you hand it back to the rightful champion."
If we get two months of Joey Headrocker wrecking shop on dudes every week, then turning to the hard cam and screaming "BRING ME NAKAMURA OR BRING ME MY TITLE!!!!", I know what I'm going to be thankful for on Thanksgiving.
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Oney Headlocker.
Oney Lorcan is a terrible name. Let's get that out of the way first. Terrible terrible terrible. Awful.
However, the guy behind that abomination of a name, Christopher Girard, is great. His offense is like 80% headlock based, but he totally makes it work, because the other 20% is just Sho-Ryu-Kenning dudes out of the sky and running into them really hard with pointy elbows and stuff. Also, for serious, his headlocks are pretty dope. And those aforementioned uppercuts ain't too shabby either.
If you combine his affinity for uppercutting fools with his very specific look, he's like what would happen if you crossed Cesaro with that one townie at the South Boston bar that nobody messes with because you know, he's a little off, and Sully's cousin swears that one time he saw him catch and eat a live pigeon.
I wouldn't mess with that guy, and neither would you.
I have no idea what his ceiling is, either here on NXT or up on the main roster, but even if its to job to guys on Superstars or Main Event, I have a feeling he'd be able to make even that compelling.
Here, he fights valiantly against Austin Aries, but takes the loss to the Last Chancery. It's a decent match, and Lorcan is going to make a lot of guys look good against him in his career.
Afterwards, Austin Aries calls Hideo Itami a coward who doesn't have the guts to come out and face him, so of course, when Hideo Itami comes out and faces him, Austin Aries turns tail and runs out of the ring, then celebrates while backing up the ramp as though he somehow got the better of Hideo.
It's paint-by-number heel stuff, but that doesn't mean it's not effective.
Looking forward to their match in Eight and a Half Weeks.
Though it does seem a tad long to have to wait for that one.
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Liv Each Day Like It's Your Last.
Because next week, when you face Asuka, it's probably going to be.
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Billie, Don't Be a Hero.
First, does anyone get that reference, or am I just typing into the void?
It's from a song by a band called Paper Lace, released in 1974.
Yes, I am old.
Here is a video of them performing it while dressed as Civil War soldiers and with the fog machine turned up to 11.
It is goofy and cheesy and wonderful and you're welcome.
God the internet is amazing.
Anyway, the reference is to the fact that Billie Kay also seems to think she's got a chance against Asuka, and she doesn't.
None of these women do.
Maybe Ember Moon.
But definitely not Billie Kay, and DEFINITELY not Liv Morgan.
They might one day, but right now, they're cruising for a bruising. They're also cruising for a traumatic brain injury.
That too.
(Note: I should probably mention that I still firmly believe that Billie Kay's opponent in this match, Aliyah, is going to be NXT women's champ by the end of 2017, and if she's not, someone has messed up bad. That is all.)
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Blonde Eva Marie is gonna get O-Faced SO HARD.
Here's the deal.
It's not that I think that the rest of the NXT Women's Division is bad (maybe Liv Morgan), it's that Asuka is probably the best Female Wrestler in the ENTIRE COMPANY. It's possible she's the best in the ENTIRE WORLD.
The pecking order among the NXT women is as follows.
1. Asuka.
2. Ember Moon
.......
3. Everybody else.
Ember Moon will probably O-Face Mandy Rose right into a plastic surgeon's office. That would be a great way to start a feud with them, actually. Have her get a kayfabe broken nose and walk around like Marcia on that one episode of The Brady Bunch.
GOD I AM SO OLD.
But seriously. Have this happen, except instead of a football, it's the shoulderbone of a werewolf assassin:
Then this could happen, with very few changes required:
There, I just booked your women's division midcard feud.
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And here's where we come to the part of the show where me being able to GIF things would have come in handy.
Cedric The Entertainer.
Cedric Alexander is out of this world. He should be NXT Champ at some point. He's that good, and that over with the crowd ALREADY.
He's got a theme song that I could listen to forever. I know, because I just listened to it for a half hour straight and never got tired of it for a second.
THAT CHORUS THO.
Plus, and this is definitely an added bonus, I'm reasonably certain that Cedric Alexander is not a human, but rather a mutant endowed with the power of FLIGHT.
That is simply absurd.
This match, with the criminally wasted Andrade Cien Almas, is one of the best non-title-picture non-Takeover matches in the history of NXT.
If you have the Network, and you haven't watched this match, what the hell are you waiting for?
GO WATCH IT.
I'll be waiting here when you get back.
............................
Welcome back.
WASN'T THAT AWESOME?
The best part of the match isn't even Cedric's amazingness. It's getting to watch Almas be slowly embraced by the Full Sail crowd, who previously wouldn't have spit on him if he was on fire.
He gets to do all of his amazing stuff, to counter all of Cedric's amazing stuff, and by the time they're both kicking out of stuff at 2 and a half, the crowd is super into both guys.
I mean, they still want Cedric to win, because they feel like Cedric is in NXT because they chanted something that one time, and HHH makes all of his decisions based on crowd reactions, but they still totally appreciated all of the cool stuff that Almas was doing, too.
It made it even more special when, after Cedric won, Almas shook his hand, raised it in victory, and pulled him in for a very sweaty bro hug.
I'm sure that these two will be the best of friends forever and nothing will ever change that.
Yup. Everything's gonna stay just like this.
Best friends forever, just like the Fox and the Hound in that one movie.
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Lucha Underground
Skipping around through most of everything else to get to what I really want to talk about.
WHEEL! OF! MISFORTUNE!
First up, Dario's brought back his Dial of Doom, (the totally-random-and-not-at-all-rigged way he picks out opponents for his brother now) and this time it lands on The Mack.
For those of you who are new to LU, The Mack is a dude who is built like Ice Cube but can do backflips and hurricanranas and sh*t.
He also likes to Stunner mofos, on the reg:
He takes it to Matanza for a while, doing pretty well for himself, until he tries another stunner and get's release-German'd into next week.
It's mostly Matanza from there on out, and when the Mack Bullfrog Splashes onto Matanza's knees, that's all she wrote:
Because after that is the Wrath of the Gods, and NOBODY gets up from that.
Seriously, that move is more protected than Fort Knox. Whoever they have be the first guy to kick out of that thing, that's going to be your new champ.
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If this Opportunity knocks, pretend you're not home.
They Call Him Cage, who is billed as being "from the 5-5-9" (which is just an intimidating way of saying "Hailing from the Fresno area") and who might actually be a cyborg, we're not sure, takes on Texano, a Cowboy-cosplaying rough and tumble type who's like super into the who Mexican Pride thing but whose name means "Guy from Texas."
Whoever wins will get Dario Cueto's UUUUULTIMATE OPPORTUNITY. Of course, he doesn't tell us what that means, but the guys who have won "Unique Opportunities" in the past have all been rewarded with, like, "Hey Congratulations! You get a title shot! ... IF you can defeat this GRIZZLY BEAR!"
I'm joking, of course, but just barely.
Cage wins, when he somehow combines a vicious Discus-Clothesline with a Side Effect.
Of course, this being Dario, that's not enough, and he says this is just the first match in a Best of Five, and the winner of that, they get the UUUUltimate Opportunity.
Unlike with WWE's writers and bookers, I trust LU, and I am actually looking forward to this series.
Sorry Sheamus and Cesaro.
Not sorry Sheamus and Cesaro.
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Family Matters.
So earlier in the night, Johnny Mundo barges into Dario's office (catching him mid-coke-snort) and demands a title match with his brother Matanza, who just got done picking pieces of The Mack out of his teeth.
Dario says "No, you have a Trios Title match tonight," and Johnny Mundo says "That's not good enough, I wanna be champ! "And off he goes, to brood in his Dojo.
So Taya, who is also there, says "I'll take my boyfriend's place in the trios match alongside his two Rudo-stooge buddies." And Dario says "Cool."
Above is the match, and you should watch it if you haven't.
It's full of glorious heeling, 3-Stooges comedy featuring Taya as Moe, and at one point Jack Evans (WHO DESERVES A DAMN MEDAL FOR ALL OF THE WORK HE DOES ON THIS SHOW) just stomps out of the ring and sits cross-legged on the floor and pouts, like a pre-schooler who's mad that it's apple slice day and not orange slice day.
The good guys win, because they have team cohesion, and also probably because they are a Time Traveling Aztec God (probably), an Immortal Being of Light, and a GODDAMN DRAGON-MAN.
Afterwards, Johnny Mundo runs in to help with a beatdown, until Sexy Star runs in to even the odds.
That 8-Person intergender tag match when it happens is gonna be great.
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Okay so there's some other stuff, too.
Rey Mysterio and Chavo Guerrero both want to Mentor El Dragon Azteca Jr, but DAJ doesn't think he needs mentoring. Also, both DAJ and Chavo want to get revenge on Pentagon, since Pentagon broke an arm on each of them.
Also, someone is sending Dario creepy pictures that are infused with black magic or something, and he gave them to a gringo jobber that we haven't seen since Season 1, and there's a really good chance the next time we see that guy he's going to have Ringu Face.
Also, did I mention that Dario has a coke habit now?
I did?
Oh.
Well, that's it, I guess.
NO WAIT I LIED.
POSSIBLY THE GREATEST PRODUCT PLACEMENT IN THE HISTORY OF HUMANITY.
Okay, so a little backstory. Two weeks ago, Son of Havoc was the first victim of Dario's Dial of Doom, and since then, he's been convalescing at his mother's house.
He's sitting in the basement rec room, holding an ice pack to his neck, which, Dude, if you're still icing your neck two weeks after a match, I don't care if it was against a mongoloid half-God, GO SEE A DOCTOR, but anyway, he's watching TV with Mascarita Sagrada, who is apparently friends with SoH, even though we've never seen them interact before right now. Mascarita is the mini that we watched get creamed last week by Dr. Wagner Jr., new client of Mascarita's old agent Famous B.
A Famous B commercial comes on, because yes, this Wrestling Agent advertises on local television, and yes, there is apparently only one channel in the Lucha Underground universe.
Both Son of Havoc and Mascaita Sagrada hate Famous B, because his client, the venerable Doctor, beat each of them up recently.
They vow to come up with a plan for vengeance by the end of the night, and as we all know, planning vengeance sure can work up an appetite.
Thank goodness Son of Havoc's mom, Wife of Havoc, is around.
THE BAGEL BITES SHINE LIKE THEY WERE FORGED FROM THE DIVINITIES THEMSELVES.
Oh, and Wife of Havoc has a name, too.
NOTE: I am assuming that Son of Havoc refers to his father, but what if it's Linda?
What if she's actually the earthbound embodiment of Neiman, the Celtic Fairy-Goddess of the Havoc of War?
Because that would DOPE.
It's these little things, like the way they create a friendship out of nowhere that we totally buy, or the way their product placement isn't Mark Henry looking at a Hardee's burger like he wants to f*ck it—
NO MEANS NO.
It's the little things like this that make Lucha Underground my favorite wrestling show on television.
That, and the awesome wrestling and the supernatural soap opera vignettes and the fact that the current champ is a Splatterhouse Villain whose brother is a duplicitous coke-addled Spanish bilionaire.
All of those things too.
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TNA Impact
"Just Cody."
So because the WWE is run by a bunch of gaping a-holes (and one gaping a-holes in particular), they've decided that the name "Rhodes" is their intellectual property, and Cody Rhodes can't use it now that he's left the company and has signed with TNA.
This left the marketing folks at TNA scrambling to figure out what to do about his name.
Yes, instead of opting for the Damien Sandow/Aron Rex "I'm going to change my name to something really stupid that everyone's going to make fun of" route, he decided to just go with Cody.
Just Cody.
Like Cher.
Or Madonna.
Or Björk.
I hope they have him do something where he goes around and introduces himself to the guys on the roster who've never been in WWE, and he's like:
"Hi there. I'm Cody."
"Cody what?"
And then he'd look right into the lens of the camera and say:
"Just ... Cody."
That'd be cool.
Also we get this little vignette as an introduction:
So there's really no hint of a gimmick at all ... except for the fact that he apparently likes expensive suits and drives really fast cars.
OMG IS HE THE TRANSPORTER?
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The Further adventures of Ex-WWE Talent.
First up, Damien Sandow. Excuse me. I mean Aron Rex.
I know, Lloyd. That name. Ugh.
Anyway, he wins his match against Eli Drake with what is supposed to be a Rolling Elbow or a Discus Clothesline, I think, except somewhere along the line it gets wonky and it ends up looking like a Discus Awkward Hug.
Like when your buddy gets drunk and tells you he loves you, and you're his best friend in the world and he hopes nothing ever changes that, right before he tells you that he slept with your ex-girlfriend the night before, the one that that you're not over yet and are kind of hoping you might get back together, right before he tells you that, this is the hug he gives you:
Anyway, congratulations to Aron Rex on making it to the finals of the MMA Rules For Some Reason Tournament!
Who will he face?
Drew Galloway. He'll face Drew Galloway.
Now the only reason I'm even talking about this match is that it comes down to the end, with a judges decision, which means when the final bell rings at the end of round three, there's no clear winner.
And Josh Matthews, bless his little puppy dog heart, keeps repeating "The Bell Rang!" in a high pitched squeal. (Go to 1:04 of the above video.)
It kind of reminded me of something:
I think we sould all starting calling Josh Matthews "Ralphie"
and never tell him why until it drives him insane.
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The Great War is Nigh.
I love everything the Hardy Clan is doing right now, but I sincerely hope Matt doesn't wind up back at WWE.
They'd start calling him "Damaged Beyond Repair Matthew" and have him just keep repeating "ERASE! ERASE! ERASE!"
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Until Next Time, I've been Alex Pawlowski
And this is me praying for Heavenly Glowing Bagel Bites.
You can follow me on Twitter @pawlowskithe4th
