NXT UK Worth Watching: Noam Dar! Grizzled Young Vets! Josh Morrell! The Hunt!

Noam Dar vs. Josh Morrell NXT UK 1/18 (Aired 2/19/20) (Ep. #80)

ER: Noam Dar wrestles like a guy who's not actually signed by NXT UK, but shows up every couple of months just to show that he's better than every single regular in NXT UK. I'm 80 episodes into NXT UK, and the Noam Dar start-stop push through the entire thing has been one of the weirder and more entertaining things of my viewing. Dar shows up for an episode every 6 weeks or so, is always kept strong, always looks great, and then disappears for a couple months and never gets close to any title. My favorite part of the first 80 episodes of this show has been Kassius Ohno, which I don't think is a very contentious opinion. But at this point I think Dar is just as consistent a performer as Ohno. The problem is that for its entire duration, NXT UK has been the easiest place in the WWE brand to hide in plain sight. Noam Dar's last several years have been a tree falling in the woods, a different woods than the one with  Wolfgang's tree. 

This match is a Dar showcase against a very fun wrestler who has an even more ridiculously fragmented appearance rate than himself. Josh Morrell is this hyper athletic guy who shows up once or twice a year to get massacred, and always has new ways of falling on his face or backflipping his way into a bad situation.  He's great as a showcase opponent, and is good at getting himself some shine. I have no idea why he isn't an actual regular as he's always entertaining. Dar bullies Morrell around and Morrell hits back, literally. I loved Dar's slap after going for a knucklelock, and how Morrell went right at him and knew what kind of match it was going to be. Dar hit some of his most painful kicks, and Morrell is a guy who always leans into kicks while making them look painful. Dar had a couple of cool legsweeps too, kicking Morrell out at the shins, and Morrell is good at whipping his face into the mat and holding his loose feeling jaw after. Dar took out Morrell's legs as a way to get to his arm, an attack he kept up until finally getting the win. The balance felt really nice for an extended squash, another argument for Dar as the best Time Management guy on the brand. 

Grizzled Young Vets vs. The Hunt NXT UK 1/18 (Aired 2/27/20) (#81)

ER: A nice simple match to showcase the Vets, but that doesn't mean the Hunt doesn't get to shine as well. GYV get to work some nice double teams, strong cut offs, and both set up The Hunt's comebacks really nicely. GYV have nice complementary skillsets, and this match saw them both lean into their differences: Drake is the stronger seller, better at taking offense, quick, and tenacious; Gibson is vocal in a way many wrestlers aren't, good at stooging, and good at setting up and executing double teams. I liked the early moments of each Vet saving each other from the apron, leading to them cutting off Boar from Primate. Drake throws a real stiff back elbow, they work a cool tandem kneelift, great tandem backbreaker on the floor, and they just keep hammering down on Boar with splashes, clotheslines, and elbows, refusing to let him tag out. Primate's eventual hot tag is very fun, nails Gibson with a spear and tosses Drake with a backdrop, but it also leads to my least favorite kind of GYV double teams, the "Gibson holds a guy while Drake does a couple thigh slap kicks", but the ending stretch did have some surprises. Primate usually doesn't stand out more than Boar, but I loved him attempting to take out Gibson with a big axe handle off the top to the floor, and how he uses the same axe handle to Drake but does not see the blind tag. This all felt like a Grizzled Young Vets/The Hunt touring house show match, but on a brand that doesn't actually do house shows, these tags stand out. 

COMPLETE GUIDE TO NXT UK

Read more!

NXT UK Worth Watching: Danny Burch! Oney Lorcan! Ridge Holland! Tyson T-Bone! The Hunt!

Oney Lorcan/Danny Burch vs. The Hunt (Wild Boar/Primate) NXT UK 1/17 (Aired 1/30/20) (Ep. #77)

ER: This tag was another one of my introductions to NXT UK. I had never seen Wild Boar before this, and had not in fact ever even heard of him. Wild Boar has been a consistent highlight 77 episodes later and it was because the brand had the good taste to use guys like Oney Lorcan that I even saw him. The match was a cool Danny Burch showcase, one of his greatest performances I've seen. He was a real rugby thug asshole in this, working with disdain against The Hunt, grinding Wild Boar's ears on headlocks and softening up his face with vicious palm strikes that I hardly ever see him use. Muga Burch is something we need to see more often. Wild Boar really threw himself headlong into his own and everyone's offense, hitting hard and getting hit harder. His crash and burns were the best, including a sick missed splash to the floor that kept him away from the finish. Primate made the most out of his hot tag and threw some of several suplexes down the finishing stretch, and really runs over Lorcan with a big lariat. Just like Wild Boar's biggest miss was greater than his greatest hit, Primate also took a great bump into the ringpost. Lorcan nails Primate with a big uppercut and Burch headbutts Boar into next week with a headbutt after Boar had just flattened Lorcan with one of his best ever cannonballs. It was a really great match that felt intense the entire time, and felt bigger than its relatively short 7 minutes. Great, great tag. 

Ridge Holland vs. Tyson T-Bone NXT UK 1/17 (Aired 1/30/20) (Ep. #77)

ER: This is only 3 minutes, but it's two guys who like to fight, fighting for 3 minutes. That's always going to be entertaining, even if I wish they had twice as much time. There's a big boy lock up, heavy knees thrown to the midsection, and real forearm shivers across the length of the jaw. Holland controlled things for a bit, and he's got plenty of ways to muscle around a tough dude like T-Bone. He worked T-Bone over with crossfaces and knees, ran him over with a lariat, and tossed him with a cool belly to belly. They worked back and forth but in a way that wasn't 50-50, just two guys going all out, destined to crash into an early finish. And, once Holland grabbing T-Bone by the ears and throwing headbutts into Tyson's T-Zone I knew the end was nigh. Just a couple of guys hitting and throwing each other around for three minutes, which is what those with good taste call Pro Wrestling.  

COMPLETE GUIDE TO NXT UK

Read more!

NXT UK Worth Watching: Noam Dar! Ashton Smith! The Outliers?

Noam Dar vs. Ashton Smith NXT UK 11/15 (Aired 11/28/19) (Ep. #70)

ER: I really liked this as a Dar showcase against a guy larger than him without being super heavy. NXT UK isn't really a superheavyweight roster, so Eddie Dennis is one of their biggest guys (and he would be maybe the 3rd highest member of the Spirit Squad). But it's cool seeing Dar adjust the slot he throws strikes from, kicking out the front of Smith's knee to throw downward elbows at his jaw. Dar is also really great at running headlong into Smith's big stuff, getting where he needs to be in skilled style. Smith hit a real sick Death Valley driver, powering to his feet and rolling through it like a Finlay roll. Later Dar runs in with the Nova Roller and gets swung up and planted with a great blue thunder bomb. So Smith's big stuff looked great, but I love how all of Dar's stuff looked. He cuts off Smith with a vicious elbow on the floor, knocks him believably around with hard dropkicks and whipping body kicks, and runs that foot right across the bridge of Smith's nose when he does hit that Nova Roller. I thought this was going to have a lot more matwork, with Dar working over Smith's knee to lock in his nice kneebar and cutting down Smith's tree, but I like that we got to see Dar in more of a slugfest with a larger guy but not putting him away easily. 

Dorian Mak/Riddick Moss vs. Wild Boar/Primate NXT UK 11/15 (Aired 12/5/19) (Ep. #71)

ER: This was an awesome debut for The Outliers, two guys from the northern United States who are larger than any other person in NXT UK who only made one more appearance in NXT UK. Mak and Moss were longtime NXT developmental guys at this point. Moss had a couple of small pushes derailed by injuries at this point and was constantly getting slightly repackaged (which has continued, only with promotions). Mak was a Nathan Jones motherfucker who was kept off TV for his entire 5 year WWE employment, except for his two NXT UK matches. The Hunt are one of my favorite NXT UK teams, but The Outliers were positioned as a team that was clearly going to be a force going into the new year. You watch this match, and you would have never guessed that they didn't even make it to that new year, less than one month away. Moss and Mak really ragdolled Wild Boar around the ring, and it was such a mauling that it made me excited to see more of The Outliers (welp). As I said, upon arrival they were instantly the biggest two guys in NXT UK, and The Hunt are like 5'6. Watching two huge muscle guys throw Boar around like a bag of laundry, and Wild Boar is one of the best underdog babyfaces under WWE contract. He has good offense that makes use of his density, but is good at making opponent offense look good. 

Moss and Mak pummel him with clotheslines and boots, Moss smashes his nose with a back elbow, and Boat gets lifted up to some great heights on slams. The Mak vs. Boar sections were nothing but hits, with great stuff like Mak bouncing Boar off his own knee with a chokeslam, and what I have to assume was the greatest bearhug in 2019 professional wrestling. I used the word "ragdolled" earlier and I defy you to find a better representation of that word than Mak exorcising Boar with this bearhug. Moss has a great habit of missing as hard as he hits, so you get to see him break ribs on corner shoulderblocks but then flies as hard or harder shoulder first into the turnbuckles (see: derailed pushes due to injury), and it sets up a big house cleaning from The Hunt. Primate's hot tag is the weakest portion of the match but they make up for some offense that doesn't really make up the size difference by tossing out a lot of it. Primate and Boar don't just run through their typical comeback, instead repeating some moves in triplicate before finishing with a fun string of top rope diving headbutts. This is one of those real hidden gems that showcase NXT's great use of the 8 minute match, while giving us a look at a seldom seen tag team that looked better than 80% of the current WWE tag team roster.  

COMPLETE GUIDE TO NXT UK

Read more!

NXT UK Worth Watching: Wolfe! Aichner! Barthel! Boar!

Alexander Wolfe vs. Saxon Huxley NXT UK 9/1 (Aired 10/3/19) (Ep. #62)

ER: Wolfe is the coolest NXT UK guy who has barely been on NXT UK. He last wrestled two months ago and had one of the best matches in brand history (vs. Jordan Devlin). Now he shows back up and works a sick Fit Finlay WCW Thunder match. Huxley also hasn't been on in awhile (this was clearly a long day of tapings so they were digging deep into the roster by the time they had to fill this episode) and got the only consistent crowd reactions of his NXT UK time by happening to look like Jesus Christ. It's either going to be Vegan Brody, or Jesus, and Huxley's strappy Gladiator laced boots edged the comparison closer to the Bible than Texas. Both try to drag each other to the mat, Huxley holding Wolfe down after a headlock takeover. But Wolfe is always crafty without being cute, so he yoinks down Huxley's kneepad. When Huxley goes to fix it Wolfe kicks him in the face. Wolfe is a real asshole in control, working over Huxley's arm and knee, throwing him with a hard suplex, hitting a great enziguiri across Huxley's jaw, and the crowd was rooting for Jesus to make a comeback the whole time. It looked like Wolfe was just going to grind Huxley down, Huxley sprang onto him with a Thesz press. Wolfe is great at bumping around for Huxley's flash comeback, getting booted in the chest from the apron, but then typing Huxley into the ropes by dodging his next boot. Wolfe going for the kill is always memorable, and here he immediately bicycle kicks the stuck Huxley and tosses him with a German suplex (authentic!) and his best-in-wrestling sitout powerbomb. Put Wolfe on television more! 

Fabian Aichner/Marcel Barthel vs. Wild Boar/Primate NXT UK 10/4 (Aired 10/17/19) (Ep. #64)

ER: These teams were in a really good match on Episode 56, that was quite similar to this one. I said that match felt like the base level match these teams were capable of having, and this match felt like a better version under similar time constraints. NXT UK's sweet spot is the 7 minute match. Main Event and 205 Live also frequently utilize the 7 minute match, but the NXT UK roster hits that mark much better. This match had a real aggressive Aichner performance and a couple of nice nearfalls, easily enough to make this a nice memorable snack. Boar is really fun taking out Imperium and being beaten down by them. I loved his rolling tackle to take out Barthel at the shins, with the follow up senton while Barthel is on all fours recovering. Aichner catches a Primate tope impressively, then runs him straight into the ring steps and follows up with a running knee. They work over Boar with some stiff but simple offense, the best being a running Aichner clothesline that ran so hard into Boar that it should have separated Aichner's shoulder. The hot tag to Primate has a couple cool suplexes but he does that annoying thing where he tags in his tired partner 30 seconds after the hot tag. It's a hot tag trope I despise. Your boy just got worked over and your tagging him right back in? But these guys are smart and the match plays into that, with The Hunt going up for their diving headbutts only to see Boar get knocked off immediately by Barthel. The match went by quick but was good at adding in wrinkles. I thought that was going to be the end of the match, but we wound up with a nice Hunt nearfall when they finally do hit that headbutt, only for the pin to be broken up. Aichner is a great finisher, knows how to hit his big Saito suplex and European bomb with the confidence that it will be finishing the match. Aichner doesn't always do spectacular offense, but he runs into everything with such force that it makes a lot of other clotheslines and powerbombs look like child's play. 

COMPLETE GUIDE TO NXT UK

Read more!

NXT UK Worth Watching: Barthel! Aichner! Primate! Boar! Conners! Oliver Carter!

Marcel Barthel/Fabian Aichner vs. Primate/Wild Board NXT UK 7/19 (Aired 8/21/19) (Ep. #56)

ER: This felt pretty base level for these two teams, but base level for these teams means that two of my favorite teams had a good tag match. This is probably our best Primate showing so far, getting to slam into Aichner before biting at his ear, throwing a big waterwheel suplex, then taking a crazy late match spinebuster on the apron to separate him from Boar. But this also felt like Imperium really starting to gel as an actual team, with Aichner dropping big spinebusters and slams, and Barthel coming in to crank limbs and throw mean kicks. Wild Boar absorbed a lot of those cruel shots, really got pulverized by the spinebuster/penalty kick combo while fighting back in cool ways (loved his senton to a hands and knees Aichner). The couple minute finishing stretch was really exciting and kept ramping up, with Barthel and Primate taking big bumps to the floor, and Boar hitting his cannonball then missing a gnarly spear sternum first into the middle buckle. Barthel flips him and gives him a brutal running kick while Boar is tied in the ropes, he and Aichner sandwich him with another kick, Aichner plants Primate with the spinebuster on the apron, and the nice flying back elbow into another Aichner spinebuster is the finish. I could have easily seen another 5+ minutes of this, as these teams have the material to add some extra beats. But i'm a big fan of the 6-10 minute NXT UK TV window, and this hit all the marks. 

Joseph Conners vs. Oliver Carter NXT UK 7/20 (Aired 8/28/19) (Ep. #57)

ER: One of the strengths of NXT UK is how well they cycle their roster. There are some guys who deserve to be featured more (like Tyson T-Bone, or Jinny), but the brand is mostly great at staggering debuts and quietly churning through the roster, keeping match-ups fresh and always building to something new. This match is something they do really well, which is giving a nice debut to one guy, while rehabbing a forgotten member of the roster at the same time. Conners hasn't been featured in any way in at least two months, and Carter is a guy with decent size making his debut, and it turns the match into a fun battle of "I have no clue where either of these guys are in the roster hierarchy". Carter works like a stiff Kofi Kingston, and I think that's a very good thing. He lands heavy uppercuts, a nice standing dropkick, super hard clotheslines, nasty double stomp, big belly to belly, works a nice showcase for a debut. Conners gets his showcase by leaning into all of Carter's offense and making him seem like a potential force, taking big bumps to the floor and into the ropes, while being good at cutting of Carter's offense and hitting his own good suplexes and clotheslines and a nice neckbreaker. I actually like the idea of debuting a guy with a loss. It's become far more common for WWE to debut someone with a title win than debut them with a hard fought loss, and the latter is far more interesting. Carter didn't come off worse losing to Conners (who has lost to many people), but instead this came off as a "welcome to the bigger leagues" match that played to the strengths of both. 

COMPLETE GUIDE TO NXT UK

Read more!

NXT UK Worth Watching: Wolfgang! Gallus! Wild Boar! WALTER! Primate!

Wolfgang/Mark Coffey vs. Wild Boar/Primate NXT UK 6/14 (Aired 6/19/19) (Ep. #47)

ER: Great hard hitting sprint, both teams have a strength at building quick in and out tags that are majority killer and not any longer than they need to be. This started with The Hunt running wild and hitting a pair of dives and Boar hits some sentons, and you can see a strength of Coffey and Wolfgang is getting into position for all of The Hunt's attacks, cutting off in nicely timed spots, but also setting up small comeback moments (like Mark taking a big bump off the apron after getting hit by Boar, only for Wolfgang to cut him off), and I like the simple ways Gallus grounds Boar, with stomps and a full nelson and quick tags. It was all building to a big Primate hot tag (which honestly should have been hotter, and gone on at least a couple beats longer), but Mark and Wolfgang are good at getting good height on things like backdrops, and I did love how quickly Mark turned to tables by just running Boar into the ring steps with a double leg. The assisted powerslam/kick finish felt like it came a bit too quick, but I liked the work in the match that got us to that point. It ended up being a nice Gallus showcase, and I was a bit surprised how "down the ladder" it made The Hunt come off, but could be easily explained by "good teams beat good teams" and that's fine. They were working at a pace that easily could have allowed for another 6 minutes of strong tag wrestling, and I hope they get the chance to have that match. 

WALTER vs. Travis Banks NXT UK 6/15 (Aired 6/26/19) (Ep. #48)

ER: WALTER is so good at being a territory Ric Flair, in his specific territory. He almost always towers over every one of his challengers, but that doesn't mean that he would have to actually be good at believably selling for his small opponents, doesn't mean that he would have to ever get good at integrating his small opponents' offense into a match. But he is really great at showing vulnerability, and it's matches like these that highlight how good he can be at showing just the right amount of it. Travis Banks doesn't necessarily have offense that looks like it would be too damaging to WALTER, but it's worked into the match at such a time, and sold so excellently by WALTER, that you get the sense the WALTER *could* be surprised with an upset. WALTER is of course savage here, throwing full weight behind everything he hits Banks with, and my favorite moment came early when WALTER just grabbed a kicking and resisting Banks and plopped him on the top rope, as if he were a Long Island security detail removing Low Ki from a venue. 

WALTER lays Banks across the turnbuckle and then just climbs up to stand on his neck, until Banks falls hard to the floor. Banks did not seem like someone who should even be challenging WALTER in that moment, so it was impressive when he starting landing leg kicks and WALTER started feeling them. WALTER's selling was really what put this onto the next level, as he was great at realistically occupying himself by lightly limping, showing his knee buckle, stopping briefly to make sure the injury wasn't worse, the tiniest little things to give Banks enough time to get to his next attack. There was a good nearfall when Banks hit a nasty double stomp off the top, felt like Toyota really driving her heels into Kong. And Banks' tope really sent his weight all the way into WALTER, and I love when an undersized man throws himself as hard as he can into a tope. Also, it felt like WALTER appropriately sold that tope, and it made sense that even with that nice dive WALTER was still able to finish things 30 seconds later. NXT UK is maybe the only brand under the WWE banner that seems to understand that nothing needs to be 50-50, and there are plenty of engaging ways to craft high quality and/or interesting matches at 75-25. 

Wolfgang/Joe Coffey/Mark Coffey vs. Wild Boar/Primate/Dave Mastiff NXT UK 6/16 (Aired 7/10/19) (Ep. #50)

ER: Trios continue to be an underutilized match style on NXT UK, and here's another one that shows what an asset they can be to the program. I also like that this is just six bruisers, just gathering them all in one place. NXT UK men's division is definitely divided up between fast guys who want to hit their spot sequences (and some very good at it) and guys that just want to crash into each other, and this match just throws six of the crashers in together. This was a real nice Gallus showcase, shows how well they work together and the slightly different things they all bring. I really like Wolfgang, a wrestler who does a ton of cool things but nothing overly flashy. He might be the only guy in wrestling to still fling themselves into the mat on an Irish whip, and I love it, it's like Mitch Williams falling off the mound to throw harder. Wolfgang has some cool tackles, a nice diving lariat, the perfect glue guy for Gallus. Wild Boar is a great hot tag, comes in with an awesome log roll trip, then a great senton and an awesome spear in the corner. Gallus separates him from his boys and I dug all of Gallus controlling Boar, all building to a big Mastiff hot tag. Gallus are good at control, and arguably better at feeding for comebacks, especially Mark Coffey. Coffey is intentionally in the ring when Mastiff runs wild, because nobody was going to take a higher backdrop than Mark. Mastiff hits an awesome Finlay roll into Wolfgang with Mark on his shoulders, hits a German on Mark, headbutt to Joe, cannonball to Mark, and then we get stereo dives from The Hunt. It was a great finishing stretch, and I had no clue who was going to take it, as all were very good at hitting something cool and then getting taken out. Joe wound up leveling Boar with a lariat after Wolfgang took out Mastiff, and yes I'm going to need more trios matches. We've seen some good trios with bruisers, let's see a flier trios!

COMPLETE GUIDE TO NXT UK

Read more!

WWE Big 3: Lorcan, Gallagher, Gulak 1/26/20-2/8/20

4. Oney Lorcan/Danny Burch vs. The Hunt (Wild Boar/Primate) NXT UK 1/17 (Aired 1/30/20)

ER: Yes, please give me more UK tags like this, where Lorcan and Burch land across the pond and dispose of teams in under 10 minutes. The Hunt are a fun pairing for Lorcan/Burch, as they're like Fun Size Heavy Machinery (so really they are just Machinery). Wild Boar has fluffy Dog the Bounty Hunter hair and Primate seems to have no problem always running directly into danger, whether he lands a lariat or gets run into a ringpost. From what I've seen so far, Burch has been turning in his finest WWE work in 2020, and him smothering Wild Boar with a headlock while throwing great palm strikes to his head continues that trend (I even liked Tom Phillips comparing those shots to the Bride breaking our of her coffin), and this whole match was about quick tags and quick spills. Everybody is throwing chops, everyone is working like they have 7 minutes so how should we show off in 7 minutes, and it works. The tags were quick, and every new person that would tag in would immediately run wild. Primate tags in and hits big suplexes and lariats (you knew Lorcan would have to take a big twisting lariat bump in here), Lorcan flattens Primate with a big uppercut, Boar tags in and nails a cool cannonball on Lorcan only to get headbutted out of existence by Burch, Lorcan/Burch hit a big German and their double powerbomb for a nice nearfall, and Boar toothlessly worms his way into my heart by splatting to the floor with a missed frog splash, a gnarly way to leave Primate alone in the ring. And that match ending elevating DDT really felt like a fine exclamation point on the win. More of Lorcan/Burch in UK, please.

PAS: This was really fun. NXT UK is so weird, there are like a dozen guys on the WWE roster I have never even heard of, like I don't think Primate is a name I had even seen run across my Twitter timeline much less ever seen wrestle. They are kind of mini versions of the Viking Raiders, same kind of look and offense, except both guys look like they are 5'6. This is the best I have ever seen Burch look, he is usually the clear weak link of the tag team, but he provided most of the cool stuff in this match, including some really nice takedowns and the palm strikes Eric mentioned. So many of the pimped NXT tags are so long and overstuffed, it was great to watch a couple teams get in, do their business, and get out.


Oney Lorcan/Danny Burch vs. Brian Kendrick/Ariya Daivari 205 Live 2/7/20

ER: A kind of unexpected, rare miss from these four. After the video package showing what's happened among the four over the past few weeks, they built this up like a big fight, but much of this ended up feeling like a semi-genial cruiser match. The double teams felt clunky, and both teams felt like they were working a different match. Much of the match just felt off, even the timing on the reliably great Lorcan hot tag felt thrown off, guys just couldn't quite get on the same page. There were quick tags that kind of just worked to make things feel disjointed, not getting any decent length sequences from any combination of the four. Kendrick and Daivari work Burch's knee a bit (Kendrick had worked over Burch's knee the week before in much more interesting ways), but it goes nowhere; Lorcan hits a big flying uppercut as part of his hot tag, and hits a double team blockbuster, but things end in a DQ shortly after that. This is probably the most underwhelming 205 match any of these guys have been on in quite some time. On a different night I could see this leading to something special. Not tonight.


2020 MOTY MASTER LIST

Read more!