Greetings everyone! And welcome to this weeks NXT Redux. This week we’ve got double the Divas as Carmella returns to action and Bayley enters the scene to address the NXT Universe on the recent actions between she, Charlotte, Sasha Banks and Becky Lynch.
Let’s waste no time… to the videos!~
Out to the Full Sail venue we go, where we immediately see the concluding moments of an Enzo/Big Cass promo, leading into my current second favorite theme song in WWE, F-A-B-U-L-O-U-S!~
Out struts Carmella with a microphone(!!!) as she introduces herself to be the princess of Staten Island. Also to note: She is rocking the red fur. She dubs herself the most fabulous Diva in NXT, then enters the ring and reveals she has a little message for the Divas around here — You betta watcha backs! Bada bing… hottest chick in the ring.
Enzo suddenly announces he has a little surprise for her, as a “Blue Pants” chant breaks out! This is when I love you the most, Full Sail crowd. Enzo announces Carmella’s opponent will be none other than Blue Pants! Out walks Leva Bates to the Price is Right theme song, as she walks around the ring and steps inside. The crowd is so into her, and I am at my happiest moment in life, as suddenly the bell sounds and we get underway with our rematch!
They circle around the ring and lock up, as Blue Pants Leva takes control until Carmella reverses out and takes her down. Nice set of dropkicks! From there, Carmella locks in the submission as Blue Pants is forced to tap out, much to the crowds dismay. Carmella celebrates with Enzo and Cass, and we continue to wonder if this will lead to any additional Blue appearances.
Out to the commentary table, as the trio seated then proceed to lead us into a video recap of the history between Bayley, Charlotte and Team BAE. Gasp! Double the segments, double the mic work! Bayley will address the NXT Universe after the following Kevin Owens debut video.
Bayley pops out from the back to her lively fans, as she steps in the ring to a “Bayley” chant. She announces she doesn’t have a match tonight, but she wants to be here despite Charlotte’s warning. Sasha and Becky? They’re nothing more than bullies. And Bayley has been dealing with bullies her entire life. She reveals that she would come home from school every day with tears in her eyes because of what other girls did to her, but her mom always said “You need to go back tomorrow and stand up against them because bullies are cowards”.
My heart is breaking. Bayley is my one true weakness in wrestling, and I still haven’t gotten over her reaction in the few seconds leading to the finish of her title match at the last TakeOver.
Suddenly, Sasha and Becky walk out from the back laughing. And my rage is boiling, which is hard because Sasha has basically been one of my NXT gods since she was signed. Also — can someone PLEASE fix her tron? She deserves so much better. If I wait this long for her to get called up, and it’s with that, I will never forgive them.
Team BAE step in the ring and Sasha immediately pushes Bayley. Bay then punches Sasha in the face, but Becky dropkicks her in the back and the duo beat her down. Insert sad face emoji here. Sasha grabs the microphone, or wait, I thought she did but I guess she didn’t. The crowd is not here for Team BAE, as our Bay lays down clutching her knee in pain from the beatdown.
Thoughts: Leva! I’m so happy they brought her back in, and I’m even more happy the crowd responded so highly to her. The persona she has on the indies feels PERFECT for NXT… although I guess now she would only be able to cosplay as people with blue pants in their character’s look. She could make it work though! I’m ready for another appearance from her, and in a way I appreciate that this is the way they’re going with Carmella because if they’re going to portray her character as being so new that she stepped into her first day of training after TakeOver, it kind of looks bad for her to beat any of the established Divas. Having her beat a plucky newcomer TV audiences don’t have a built in expectation for is definitely the way to go, as is her not showing too much because you don’t want to make it look like you can step in a ring for three months and suddenly be incredible.
I loved Carmella’s promo, and I’m so glad they let her cut one on her way to the ring. When I was at a taping a few months ago, she had a dark match with Natalya and cut a promo similar to this (although a little more heelish as she picked on the audience members while I pretty much died). Ever since then, I’ve been hellbent on getting her a microphone as often as possible because she’s so good at nailing the accent, and fits in well with Enzo and Cass. My only concern is that the two of them are faces and I consider her to be a heel, so it’s kind of hard to determine where to go with her. Personally, I would’ve enjoyed seeing Sasha try and recruit her to be her second in command, or even still doing it in addition to Becky, and then they could’ve added that Sasha (and Becky if they go for it now) was training her behind the scenes too.
I’m kind of mixed on the Bayley/Becky/Sasha segment. Bayley’s promo was great, and I loved the message she was sending because it’s totally believable in terms of how society portrays the genuinely good people as being the typical victims towards bullying, because they usually don’t have it in them to fight back. Her delivery was also A+, and I cannot believe how much she’s prospered on the microphone and in terms of her promo work as a whole. This tone and the way she delivers what she says is NOT easy to do without it sounding completely cheesy, but she just has that likability and she can completely sell every emotion to perfection. I honestly don’t think Bayley gets near enough credit that she deserves, and it sucks that the built-in triple threat feud we thought was coming after TakeOver 2 seems to be turning into a singles with Bayley and Becky ringside, but I’m extremely happy Sasha is getting her chance to shine. I only wish it was the triple threat so we could have a bit more fun considering NXT never seem to go beyond singles matches unless it’s a rare tag.
The part of the promo I’m split on is what went down afterwards. On one hand, I think this adds a new layer to Sasha and Charlotte’s match because they’ve eliminated Bayley from the scene and the match now looks to be Charlotte on her own with Becky free to interfere all she wants. I can see Bayley running down and taking her out to get that moment of glory and revenge, which would be great, but I also want to see Sasha win so I’m not sure how to feel if that happens (you know, considering Bayley being sad is my mortal enemy in life). The other side of things to take out of tonights segment is that they made it seem as if the bullies win out in the end, with Bayley having cut such an, albeit quick, emotional promo, only to then have her enemies run out and quickly take her out.
If she does get her measure of revenge, I can definitely see the bigger picture, so I guess we’ll have to wait and see how it plays out. On one hand, I want Bayley to finally get some sort of retribution since she and Sasha have been facing off against each other for the past 65 years, but on the other, I’m ready for someone to freshen up the division and the only two who are ready in terms of booking are Bayley and Sasha. Charlotte feels destined to go up fairly soon, and I think Sasha is the perfect candidate to beat her… I just wish it could’ve been in a triple threat so badly. Not only would it feel huge because of the fact we never get them with the Divas here, but I honestly would have no idea who the winner could be since all three are built up so well. In addition, were Sasha to be their choice to take the title, we could immediately have a built in storyline between she and Bayley down the road too. That can still happen of course, considering their immense history with one another, but I just hope they really go for a legit feud between them and not just have a series of matches where Bayley wins her way into a title shot.
