November 30, 2019 - Evan Luebbe

The Fiend Changing Daniel Bryan

November 30, 2019 by Evan Luebbe

A pattern is beginning to develop with all three of The Fiend’s opponents. After he has had an encounter with them, they have all immediately undergone a character change. Think about it: immediately after Finn Balor had a match with The Fiend, he returned to NXT and turned heel. The same thing with Seth Rollins, who underwent the final transformation in a character change just this week.

Now the same thing is happening with Daniel Bryan. He is at a crossroads in his career. He is in the process of deciding whether or not he will be The New Daniel Bryan from now on or if The Yes! Movement will return (which it looks like it will be the latter, and fans have to love that).

The New Day celebrated a victory on their 5-year anniversary, which was very appropriate. It is absolutely unheard of for a group in the sports entertainment industry to last for five years because they almost always grow stale. It’s only happened a few times in history, so congratulations to The New Day.

Lacey Evans was given an unexpected spotlight this week. When she first debuted on the main roster, she was presented as a very annoying Baron Corbin-type of character, which didn’t suit her. However, now that Vince McMahon has discovered the ideal character for her, he can push the former Marine to the top.

It appears Lacey Evans may receive a SmackDown Women’s Championship match at the TLC Pay-Per-View. One has to wonder what WWE will decide to do with Nikki Cross, since she pinned Bayley just a few weeks ago. She may be reforming her tag team with Alexa Bliss, who returned on this Black Friday edition of SmackDown.

Le Champion Celebration

November 30, 2019 by Evan Luebbe

Chris Jericho delivered A Little Bit of The Bubbly and a successful title defense on Dynamite; also, a potential showdown with Jon Moxley looks like it’ll happen sooner rather theme later – and that’s awesome!

Kenny Omega needed a victory against a credible opponent to regain some of his confidence after losing the Lights Out match to Jon Moxley, and he got exactly that by defeating Pac.

Maxwell Jacob Friedman is a completely self-absorbed and entitled brat, but he is awfully entertaining. The presence of Wardlow is another irritant to fans because he enables MJF to have that level of attitude – it keeps fans coming back for more.

Balor Title Win Inevitable

November 30, 2019 by Evan Luebbe

Everyone in the WWE universe could’ve foreseen that a second NXT Title victory for Finn Balor was in the works when he returned October 2. A superstar with that much star power is perfect to carry the third brand of WWE into the future. By the time the next Takeover rolls around, Adam Cole will have been champion for almost a year. He will have not necessarily become stale, but he has run his course as champion. It will be about time for a change in the Title’s natural evolution.

Dakota Kai will obviously be a major driving force going forward in the ratings for NXT. It also has to feel very uplifting for Akira Tozawa to be given a spotlight and a title match on NXT TV after being treated as an overqualified enhancement talent on the main roster in recent weeks.

Boy did Tozawa and Lio Rush ever deliver too; they were moving so fast I couldn’t keep up with who was doing what.

Steve Austins Broken’s Skull Podcast with The Undertaker

November 30, 2019 by Evan Luebbe

My primary takeaway from this first episode was when The Undertaker (or Mark Calloway) said “less is more.” This is incredibly true and very applicable to the superstars of today. Sure, they can’t do everything you could imagine athletically, but at the end of the day it doesn’t matter if they can’t captivate and enthrall the audience. They have to make them care about their particular character and show them why their character is different from anyone else.

I personally love guys like Ricochet and want them to succeed more than anything. But, superstars need to be able to develop a mystique about them that makes the audience care and draws in the WWE universe if they want to truly get over and have longevity and marketability within the company. The process of getting over comes down to character every bit as much as, if not more than, athleticism.

Rollins Heel Turn Cemented for The Week

November 30, 2019 by Evan Luebbe

Seth Rollins’ heel turn is finally official, at least for this week. WWE creative went about it in a very clever way by adding a very real element to it. This is exactly what Seth does on social media, a perfect example being when he called AEW the minor leagues of wrestling. The more he talks, the more he seems to stick his own foot in his mouth. He did it this time by calling out and almost insulting the entire Raw roster after they gave it their all at Survivor Series.

Seth is going to play more of a tweener character where he’ll be working as a heel in some programs and a babyface in others; very similar to what Roman Reigns was doing several years ago. Hopefully he will have more luck in getting over with the WWE universe as a more authentic character who is true to himself.

It’s impressive for Rey Mysterio to still have the endurance at 45 years old to be able to put on three matches in two nights; and look good doing it. This has been a good run for Mysterio toward the end of his in-ring career with WWE.

His primary goal right now may be to hang around long enough to give his son Dominic a good storyline to springboard his career with WWE. Rey has probably won a title at this point for that reason which is extremely unselfish, and I greatly respect that.

Side Note: it’s good to see AOP being given an immediate spotlight upon their push. The red friend is clearly the place for new stars to be created right now in WWE.

Survivor Series

November 30, 2019 by Evan Luebbe

The single biggest take away from Survivor Series was that NXT seems to have been officially established as a third brand in WWE. NXT is no longer just developmental, but rather a place that has more of a focus on recruiting young talent that has not previously been with the company.

It just feels right to have Becky Lynch main-eventing a Pay-Per-View. She creates the same aura John Cena did; not so much in terms of on-screen character but because they both command the attention of the audience so well. They emanate the feeling that they are in exactly the right place within the company that they should be. Shayna Baszler also already feels like a main eventer.

The NXT roster had an extremely strong showing, winning 4 of 7 head-to-head matches between Raw, SmackDown, and NXT overall at Survivor Series. Three of four which took place on the main card.

Three NXT superstars stood out:

Rhea Ripley had an amazing weekend, leading each of her respective teams to victory, each with a disadvantage.
Adam Cole and Pete Dunne each fought through injuries from the previous night to put on what was probably the best match of the night. This match also put NXT in the spotlight because it was for the NXT Title. I would love to see the spectacle these guys could execute when fully healthy.
Keith Lee is another one that stood out, mostly for not only eliminating The Architect Seth Rollins (who is due for a heel turn) and being put over by The Big Dog and the top superstar in the entire company Roman Reigns. Roman is a very classy guy in his own right and legitimately cares about the company more than anything.

While it was nice to see Dominic doing his absolute best to even the odds for his dad Rey Mysterio, it simply was not enough to overcome Brock Lesnar. This was more than expected. It has become somewhat of a staple for Lesnar to have his best match of the year at Survivor Series: AJ Styles in 2017, Daniel Bryan in 2018, and now Rey Mysterio in 2019.

I was somewhat disappointed with the lack of emphasis “The Fiend” Bray Wyatt and the Universal Championship received. At least for this Pay-Per-View, it was relegated to the status the WWE Championship has been under for about the last three years. The Fiend and Daniel Bryan both deserve better than this.

It seems that WWE could possibly create a tag team of Daniel Bryan and The Miz which would be a great idea since they have an extensive amount of history with one another deleting back to 2010 in the first season of NXT.

Shinsuke Nakamura is significantly benefiting from the presence of Sami Zayn. What is happening is that the WWE universe is getting so irritated by Zayn and his punchable face that they are starting to develop a liking again for Nakamura. As a result, I would expect WWE to turn Shinsuke into a fan favorite again within the next couple of months, leading to a match between him and Sami Zayn at ‘Mania.

Potential option ideas for WWE creative to execute at Survivor Series 2020 are:

To either have each match have some sort of Royal Rumble implication (I will leave it up to them which implications they choose for the matches to have, but it would be great if the Survivor Series matches had some type of impact in the future).
Or, WWE could always go back to the more traditional route of orchestrating it so the Survivor Series matches served to create new, marketable superstars; either way, I just think I speak for the entire WWE universe when I state that it would be beneficial if one of these transpired.

Side Note: The Viking Raiders needed the victory in the tag team match to keep their momentum as an unstoppable force in the Raw tag team division. Very smart decision.

NXT Takeover: WarGames

November 30, 2019 by Evan Luebbe

Most true wrestling fans have an appreciation for NXT Takeover events because while only 4-5 matches take place at each one, they are still of the utmost quality and keep fans talking about them for several months until the next Takeover.

The current NXT superstars who will most likely be receiving a sizable push heading into WrestleMania season are Keith Lee and Dakota Kai. Lee has probably traveled about 90% of the road to being built up properly in order to become a champion in NXT. The NXT universe is chanting “Bask in his Glory” when he is not even participating in matches – and this is a telltale sign that a superstar is clearly over with the audience.

The most despicable heel turn of the night goes to Dakota Kai. This will undoubtedly draw eyeballs to the storyline she is involved in, because there was really no clear reason as to why she would attack her best friend Tegan Nox. This could make Kai a household name in the NXT women’s division.

This comes at a great time in her career, because she has had trouble for a while getting over as a babyface. Now in one night, she goes on to be one of the most hated superstars in NXT with perhaps the only exception being Shayna Baszler

I must say that if people really pay attention to WWE they could have seen the Kevin Owens appearance at Takeover coming. Triple H was talking to him on the previous episode of Monday Night Raw about how he has been told on a few different occasions over his time on the main roster that he doesn’t exactly fit the mold of what a traditional WWE superstar is supposed to look like, and he loves it. This is accurate, and Kevin has extraordinary potential in WWE to be a massive star.

He could be like a Steve Austin type of persona if WWE has the inclination to turn him into that, since he’s already got the Stunner. Maybe this was the reason behind his tweet from a couple of months ago that read: 14 – 24 – 20, coinciding with the letters of the alphabet spelling NXT. He could have been saying “I’m coming soon.”

I can’t be 100% positive because he left the ring prematurely after giving Tommaso Ciampa a hug, as if to say this was a one-time thing.

It’s a smart storyline move on WWE’s part to orchestrate an NXT Championship match to take place at Survivor Series. While the matches should all be great, none of them have very many implications for the future other than the couple title matches. It will be nice to add one more. In my humble opinion, I would orchestrate for at least some of the Survivor Series matches to have some sort of Royal Rumble implication.

The most established NXT superstar was booked to win the match which was absolutely the right call – Pete Dunne was the beneficiary. The other two superstars in the match are both incredible talents, particularly Damian Priest. Both are most likely future champions; they have just not built enough of a following yet.

Finn Balor may be a heel, but it has to be respected that he did exactly what he said he was going to do by beating Matt Riddle, a wonderfully talented superstar in his own right.