The NXT Report Card (5/2/18): Ruthless Roddy Rules

In search of a new hero, Joe turns to The Undisputed Era’s Roderick Strong as he takes on UK Champion Pete Dunne in this week’s NXT main event.

Well friends, many things have changed during my stint as high chancellor of NXT reviews but if there’s one constant that still lives to this day: it’s my passion and love for the backbreaking, show-stealing, heel turning son of a gun known as Roderick ‘Roddy’ Strong. Well, tonight is the start of a new ERA for Roddy as he wrestles his first match as a part of The Undisputed Era faction. Historically, Strong’s work is only greater when he’s operating on the heel side so basically, I’m very excited right now. Honestly, I refuse to mention anything else in this intro as frankly, this is now the Roddy Report Card friends. Welcome aboard.

DISCLAIMER: any wild predictions I make that you disagree with will likely be proven completely wrong in the coming weeks, months and years anyway so don’t worry too much. Basically, take everything you read from this point forward with a grain of salt as its credibility is preposterously low.

Fittingly, The Undisputed Era open this week’s episode as Cole talks about last week’s title defence opposite Oney Lorcan. Ole Fish then threatened to send people to hospital before King Roddy spoke about Dunne. I’m fired up right now guys, very fired up.

Kairi Sane

In-ring, it’ll be some women’s division action that kicks us off as Kairi Sane takes on Shazza McKenzie. Some babyface silliness got us started before Sane rallied with a few big chops and ‘The Sliding D.’ The Alabama Slam followed as well Kairi’s big elbow drop to give her a rapid win. Super short match but Sane always come across as a strong babyface nonetheless.

Grade: B

As Kairi celebrated her win, Lacey Evans’ music hit and she made her way out to the ring. She was here with a fake apology and said that after all, Sane really did belong her in NXT. However, she then extended her hand before punching Sane in the face. Kairi’s uncertain facials here were wonderful and Evans spoke well too, actually fine little segment to be honest.

After this we got a recap of Tommaso Ciampa’s attack on Johnny Gargano from last week before hearing from Candice LeRae. She was quite upset and even started crying about Johnny’s demise…very sad but try losing your favourite rassler to SmackDown Live when you have a weekly report card to write. That’s suffering, that’s pain.

A Lars Sullivan video package followed and was fine even if I’m still not sure as to whether or not Lars voice adds or detracts from his character. In fact, I’m unsure if I’ll ever know at this point.

Street Profits

Some babyface tag team action now in a match that totally, definitely won’t lead to a heel turn as The Street Profits take on TM61. Montez Ford and Nick Miller got us started here, the opposing ends of NXT’s mythical charisma scale. Ford used his speed early, then bringing in Dawkins to overpower his foe before some tandem offence sent TM61 to the floor.

Miller soon avoided Dawkins corner splash gimmick though and the Aussies then took over, controlling the big man for a short portion of the match. A double clothesline spot came before long though and allowed for Ford’s hot tag as he run wild on Thorne. His hot tag unsurprisingly had big energy but in the end, Thorne stole a win, putting his feet on the ropes for a suspect roll-up win.

As I said last week folks, heel turn alert.

Grade: B

TM61

As you can imagine, this match didn’t have a lot to it but its purpose was a simple one: change things for TM61. Even with their well-made vignettes upon returning, Miller and Thorne have just felt rather aimless in NXT and unfortunately, were rather low on the tag team totem pole. Hopefully this will alter things for them but as for this particular match, I haven’t got much to say other than it was weird to see Thorne feed a hot tag rather than make one.

Speaking of such, I’m interested to see how these two develop their heat segments as here it was just their signature offence, but I’m sure that’ll change now that they’ve officially made the switch.

Grade: B-

Following this tag match, we got some hype for another one. After seeing the tale of the tape for War Raiders vs. Heavy Machinery, we also got a video package to promote the match too. They gave this a big fight feel and I for one am very much looking forward to it on next week’s show.

Kassius Ohno, the knockout artist that’s hard to hit, was here now and he called Ciampa a coward before challenging him to a fistfight of some kind. Fun.

Kona Reeves

Well here we go, the big re-debut that no one has been waiting for…Kona Reeves is back! He’s facing Patrick Scott and is apparently now friends with Bobby Roode but either way, he’s trying way too hard here in his entrance here. That’s not a major criticism, he’s young and committing the best he can but to me, this needs some refining as right now, it feels very rough around the edges. I reiterate though, that’s to be expected.

Speaking of such he was shouting wildly and whilst this was also a bit much for me, it did lead to some nice aggression in-ring as Reeves jumped on Scott, mauling him in the corner. I appreciated that you could see him trying to implement some strong heel mannerisms and such and whilst they aren’t quite there yet, his mean-streak is still encouraging. The reverse elbow wasn’t so cool though, and THE HAWAIIN DROP isn’t the best finish either.

This was far from a homerun but it’s too early for me to overly criticise right now. I’ll give this character and moreover, the performer behind it, a chance to develop for now.

Grade: C

Following this wackiness, we got an EC3 video package in which he made a somehow good “five stars” reference. He also intentionally lied about sequels always being better and this ruled too. EC3 then said that he planned on making this place ‘NX3.’ This would actually hurt my minimal brand greatly but all the same, I love this character and he’ll be IN ACTION next week.

Up next, Dakota Kai was speaking to the media about the recent call-ups but quickly became uncomfortable when Shayna was brought up. Vanessa Borne then interrupted and said that if she was Kai, she’d have slapped Baszler in the face. Just when I was expecting Baszler to appear behind Borne though, Dakota simply said she’s not afraid and Vanessa walked off on her own accord. Based on this, I assume that we’ll be seeing these two women wrestle rather soon. In all seriousness, Kai played her role neatly here and Borne came off as confident. I guess that’s all you could ask for.

Candice LeRae

The aforementioned Candice Wrestling is back again, this time for her match with THE EST OF NX3. LeRae looked understandably shaken and Mauro was right to praise her courage, especially considering that Johnny’s condition is still apparently unclear. This was a revelation that reflected poorly on the local doctors if we’re being honest. Nonetheless, Candice was overpowered early before firing back with some quick counters until she was caught in mid-air and slammed to the mat.

She struggled to regain momentum from that point forward, making a comeback late that didn’t last as she was pinned clean by Belair’s finish. Candice portrayed her fear and nerves beautifully here and did a great job telling this story. The eventual rematch between these two should be a lot of fun too as there’s now a natural story to tell. LeRae really used her experience here and put in an admirable performance from a character perspective.

Grade: A

Bianca Belair

Physically, few female wrestlers on earth are more impressive than Belair and this match highlighted that perfectly. The deadlift spot was magnificent and the follow-up military press snake eyes was cool too. I’m always a proponent of her using the Torture Rack of course as it was once the most over finish in the business and is now criminally underused. In fact, a part of me thinks that it should be her actual finish but in fairness, her Alley Oop stands out quite a bit too.

Either way, this made Bianca look like a star as her offence was so eye-catching that Candice’s character stuff didn’t even make her clean win look less impressive. As has been the case for some time now, Belair quite clearly has the tools to be a major player in this division and this was a big showing for her.

Grade: A

Just before we move to our main event, we are informed that next week’s show will feature Raul Mendoza vs. EC3 as well as the teased Ciampa vs. Ohno match…cool.

Pete Dunne

Well, after over 40 minutes of waiting it’s finally here: The Bruiserweight vs. King Roddy. The Undisputed Era are with Strong here but either way this started as all grudge matches should, with the babyface sprinting across the ring full of rage. Dunne immediately floored Strong with a huge forearm and then unleashed a huge kick to Roddy’s arm before chasing him out to the floor. He then nailed Strong hard to the back of his head but was caught by a dropkick as the match’s momentum swung.

After selling solidly throughout a simply ferocious heat segment, Dunne eventually made a comeback, hitting the X-Plex before once again going after Strong’s arm. A wild strike exchange came next and Dunne then caught a rear naked choke before transitioning to an armbar. Strong scrambled to the ropes though and more back and forth action followed. Roddy’s venomous forearms only fired Dunne up in the end, and he responded by snapping Strong’s fingers and hitting a tremendous release German Suplex.

Bitter End followed but Cole & O’Reilly broke up the fall to cause a DQ finish. The Era then put the boots to Dunne until Danny Burch & Oney Lorcan made the save, clearing the ring by the UK Champ’s side. Dunne even hurled O’Reilly’s shoe at them as they escaped to safety. Dunne was very good here as usual but goodness gracious, he was in there with a wrestling god this week.

Grade: B+

Roderick Strong

Everything from the outset here was absolute perfection. It was all so sharp and crisp but yet still came with such tremendous grit and spite. After being stunned by Dunne’s forearm, Strong immediately engaged in some tenacious grappling, a moment that perfectly set the tone for this intense battle. Strong sold early as Dunne run wild but as soon as it was time, Roddy turned things around dramatically, dropkicking Pete out the air before slamming him onto the apron.

A massive chop followed as well as some vicious kicks to keep Dunne grounded. Guys, Roddy is amazing to an almost frightening degree. I mean he’s aggressive whether heel or baby but here he was just sublime, so violent and purposeful when in control. Due to the finish, Strong was obviously made to look excellent in this match but even still, he maximised each minute magnificently.

Long-time readers will know that sometimes its matches like this one that I enjoy most. To me, being able to wrestle a 10 minute TV match of this quality shows how great a worker really is. Being able to shine like this under ‘limitations’ whilst not overdoing it is a real skill and Roddy is in the absolute top tier in that regard. Honestly, of all the TVs I’ve covered since starting this Report Card, this maybe my favourite performance of all time. Superb stuff from a simply masterful performer.

Grade: A*

Final Thoughts

I think that my general response to this show is that one of NXT’s usual strengths kind of left them here. ‘Less is more’ and to me, that was evident this week as with 5 matches, this show almost struggled to breathe for me which hindered people’s opportunity to truly stand out. Some elements of this show felt rushed I thought and other than Candice vs. Belair, very little before the main event really worked much for me. Luckily, I absolutely loved the main event and that alone made this show a strong one for me.

Either way, a lot is happening in NXT right now and most of it is genuinely captivating.

Grade: B+