NXT HITS & MISSES 6/18: Bayley & Sasha vs. Shotzi & Nox for tag titles, Imperium vs. Breezango, Phillips interviews Dream, Thatcher’s Thatch Style Wrestling, Santos Escobar, more

•NXT Tag Team Championship Match – Imperium (Fabian Aichner & Marcel Barthel) vs. Breezango (Tyler Breeze & Fandango) – 50/50: The first of two tag team matches here tonight! Breezango’s entrance as “Emporium”, a throwback to their mispronunciation of “Imperium” last week, was incredible. Their imitation names of Marsupial and Fabio quite literally made me laugh out loud, making my wife wonder why I was laughing at absolutely nothing (I was wearing headphones and looking at my laptop).

Last week, Breezango said in their video package that they need to buckle down and be serious, yet here they are goofing around again. Entertaining, absolutely. But I would have liked to see a bit more of an edge out of Breezy and Dango after making that statement last week. Then again, Dango certainly had some fire to him after the hot tag. I don’t know when the last time I saw a powerslam executed so crisply.

The match itself was great, awesome tag team psychology. The finish was an overbooked mess. Indus Sher comes out to make themselves seen. As they go to interfere, Birch and Lorcan come out and take out Indus Sher. Then from inside the ring, Aichner throws Breeze onto the four men. Indus Sher were barely touched by the falling Breezy but fell over like they were hit by a mac truck. Then Dango went for a pin on Barthel when Aichner hit the worst looking DDT I’ve ever seen for the three count.

I understand keeping the tag division fresh with these teams feuding. But man, this just seemed like such a convoluted way at getting a cheap win for Imperium. I never thought Breezango had a chance, but I was hoping for a better finish than what we got.

•Philips Interviews Dream – HIT: Tom Philips welcomed Velveteen Dream to the show and asked what was next since he can’t challenge for the NXT Title. Dexter Lumis showed up as Dream was saying that he asked the wrong question. Dexter left a painting of him and Dream as the NXT Tag Champs. Lumis then snuck away before Dream knew. He discovered the painting and said that this was a misunderstanding and that he flies solo.

To me, this says that he and Lumis somehow win the tag titles, or at least challenging for them. Just a hunch.

•Damian Priest vs. Killian Dain – HIT: Whoa, Killian Dain. I kind of forgot about him. It must be at least two or more months since we’ve seen him on NXT TV. I think only once since this whole “COVID” era. An interesting matchup, as both Dain and Priest have been built up as heels, though Priest seemed to be trying to work face between his entrances, and kayfabe tweaking his back for sympathy at the onset of the match. The Performance Center hopefuls in the small crowd were also getting behind Priest. Since they are an employed audience and told who to boo and cheer, this looks like a definitive hard turn for Priest.

Dain, on the other hand, knows how to dish out a beating but he really doesn’t seem to know how to take one. Any time Priest was on the offensive, Dain’s selling just looked so… fake. Really fake. Like, if I saw this match at 11 years old when kayfabe began to die for me, it may have been the final nail in the coffin.

•Xia Li vs. Aliyah – 50/50: Glad to see Xia Li out of the crowd this week, and in the squared circle! She’s undoubtedly one of my favorite undercard performers and I hope to see her break out to the upper card to main event scene. During Aliyah’s entrance, she saw Robert Stone laying on the floor nearby the ramp drunk off his rump. Feeling sorry for him, she picked him up and brought him to her corner. Mauro said that Aliyah might be interested in Stone’s services. In a way, I hope not. I kind of like seeing this disheveled Stone just show up in random places so we can laugh at his misfortune. Does that make me a bad person? Uhhh. Hmmm.

But for the record: For the show, for the business and for Stone’s career, I do hope that they move forward with his story.

Stone ultimately helped Aliyah get the win. Unconventionally. He blew chunks into the ring, distracting and disgusting both the ref and Xia Li and Aliyah rolled Xia Li up for a five count. I say five count because the pin was initially botched and Li kicked out at two, then Aliyah just pinned her harder, as the ref counted again for the win.

Unfortunately, the meat and potatoes of the match wasn’t enough to make up for the botched finish. Aliyah, while improved over the years, just still doesn’t feel like a finished product to me and it shows any time she’s in the ring. I hate saying that, I really do. But I have to call it like I see it. I’m giving it a 50/50, I think the match was sub-par for NXT, but I am very intrigued at the Stone/Aliyah angle.

•Thatcher’s Thatch Style Wrestling – HIT: For the second week in a row, we’ve seen Timothy Thatcher teaching a class to some students who cannot be seen. He showed us how to do a few submission holds and said that next week the real work begins. I really, really like this and hope this leads to a badass stable of submission fighters.

•Roddy Goes To Therapy – HIT: After getting abducted by Lumis at Takeover, he’s been traumatized to the point of it ruining his life. So Cole and Fish took him to “therapy”. The therapist was Kyle O’Reilly disguising his voice while sitting behind Roderick Strong. They did a few Rorschach tests and he related each to the trunk of the car that he was locked in. Eventually they went out so he could confront his fear – the trunk. Before he could climb inside, he ran away. This was probably the best therapy segment in WWE since the original Team Hell No therapy angle. Which was pretty funny if you like sports-entertainmenty segments.

After that segment, it cut back to the arena where Cole was getting interviewed. Keith Lee walked by and laid claim to the NXT Title by smashing the hourglass left by Killer Kross last week. I would love to see Lee become a double champion.

•The North American Title Scene blends into the NXT Title Scene – HIT: Cole came out to address the audience about his 380+ day reign as NXT Champion when North American Champion Keith Lee walked to the ring. He just called Cole out in the prior segment, so before he could talk, Gargano came out and laid claim to both championships. Then Finn Balor came out and laid claim to both of them as well.

The whole Double Championship thing may become reality Regal announced a triple threat match between Gargano, Balor and Lee for the NA Championship. The winner of that match would go on to the July 8^th show to face Cole, winner takes both the NXT and NA Championships. I’m definitely on board with this idea to a point, but as far as long term booking goes, it can be hard to build one person into two title feuds. Ultimately, one of the two titles will take a backseat while the other is defended by the dual champion, bringing the division of the non-defended title to a halt.

•Kayden Karter (w/Kacy Catanzaro) vs. Dakota Kai (w/Raquel Gonzales) – HIT: Last week, we saw Kacy and Kayden team up after Kacy’s match to try and get an advantage against Gonzales and Kai, but come up short. This week, Karter squared off against Kai for some retribution. Karter has largely been a jobber up until this point, but she really looked great against Kai tonight. I didn’t think she had a chance to win this match, and ultimately I was right. But she still looked good against Kai. I’m just wondering what two beat downs of Kacy and Kayden at the hands of Kai and Gonzales means. Can they get retribution at this point?

•Mercedes Martinez Video Package – HIT: ABOUT TIME! We’ve seen Mercedes Martinez show up here and there since being signed, but this is the first time its been hyped. Can’t wait to see what she has in store for the division.

•Bronson Reed vs. Leon Ruff – HIT: Leon Ruff actually got an entrance this week! That didn’t make him any less of a jobber. But hey, a step in the right direction? I think his entrance lasted longer than this squash. What an impressive splash from the top from Reed though. Reed cut a promo after the match calling Kross out for beating him down last week, demanding a match for one week from now. That’s not a smart idea, Bronson. Not smart at all.

•Santos Escobar & His Stable Address The Audience – HIT: The new NXT Cruiserweight Champion, former El Hijo Del Fantasma, Santo Escobar made his way to the ring with his luchador compadres, Joaquin Wilde and Mendoza. Escobar said that for 20 years he was just seen as a Mask, the son of Fantasma, though he was considered to be the best in Mexico. He cut a promo about being the leader of leaders. The entire thing just gave me the Lucha Seth Rollins vibe, honestly. But I’m going to give it a week or two before passing judgement. Drake Maverick came out to get revenge on these three men and put up quite the fight before taking a chair to the back from Escobar, who then gave him a ‘Santo Driver’ through a nearby table onto the tile floor. Drake was then taken away to a local hospital during the following commercial.

I didn’t like the presentation of the stable. We’ve had way too many bad guy trios in suits over the years. But I liked the chaos they brought and am hopeful that they differentiate themselves from Seth Rollins and his faction moreso than they seemed to be tonight.

•WWE Women’s Tag Team Championships, Bayley & Sasha Banks vs. Shotzi Blackheart & Tegan Nox – HIT: As the only title that can be defended on any of the three main brands (RAW, Smackdown and NXT), the WWE Womens Tag Champs, Bayley and Sasha, returned home to NXT for the first time in years to defend their tag titles. Even before the match, they foreshadowed the outcome of it on RAW when the IIconics challenged Bayley and Sasha to an In Your House Rematch next week on RAW. Because of that, I couldn’t see Shotzi & Nox having any sort of a chance to win.

I really would have loved to see Bayley and Sasha return to Full Sail with a crowd, but hey, it was still nice seeing them wrestle surrounded by the Black and Gold logo. Bayley screaming at all of the stage workers and Performance Center hopefuls “YOU’RE WELCOME FOR YOUR JOBS!” popped me big time. Excellent heel work.

We all know that Sasha and Bayley are amazing talents. Tegan Nox has been around long enough for us to know she’s a great worker though she may need some more character work. One woman had something to prove tonight, and that was Shotzi Blackheart. Prove it she did, as far as I’m concerned. Quick, unique and crisp offense throughout the entire match and she was booked to look to be the most dominant in the bout to boot. The fact that she escaped the Bank Statement the first time and then succumbed to it a second time, only after Bayley interfered, says a lot to me about how they want Shotzi to look. They haven’t given her a clean loss in awhile now and booked her very strong here. Only good things for Shotzi to come, I’m sure.

Of course, a couple of Smackdown girls can’t take out a couple of NXT girls without the NXT Women’s Champion making herself heard. Io Shirai chased Bayley and Sasha out of the arena to close the show.

RECOMMENDED: 6/17 NXT ON USA REPORT: Wells’s report on Bayley & Sasha vs. Shotzi & Tegan, Imperium vs. Breezango