Courtesy of WWE
WWE NXT REVIEW 6/4/24
- Matthew Widdis, Contributor
It’s the go-home show for NXT Battleground on June 9th and the theme is “new”: New arrivals, new titles, new contenders, and so on.
The show starts with “All Ego” Ethan Page pulling up the Performance Center/NXT Arena intent on annoying Ava and her new attaché, Robert Stone, in anticipation of his signing.
Jordynne Grace vs Stevie Turner
Good work with the veteran leading Stevie around and Stevie doing her part in coming off almost delusional with confidence. Mostly a squash to show unfamiliar audiences who the TNA Knockouts champ is and what she’s capable of. The answer? She’s The Juggernaut, bitch! The short stack of steely sinew hits her Juggernaut Driver for the pin.
Winner: Jordynne Grace
After the match, NXT Women’s Champion, Roxanne Perez, tries to get up in the face (and the head) of her Battleground opponent. She shoves Jordynne who sends her flying and then running.
Later on, Stevie Turner would find Ava to talk about another opportunity but it’s the wrong night with Ethan Page’s shenanigans.
Booker T hosts the summit for the six-woman ladder match to crown the first ever NXT North American Women’s Champion. It was the usual “three lines to explain who you are before getting interrupted by the next to hold the mic” sort of deal.
Michin gets told that this NXT isn’t the black and gold she remembers (don’t remind us!) Kelani Jordan is the squeaky-clean white meat babyface that comes so natural to her. Jaida Parker certainly looks like a star so far. Lash Legend is coming into her own as the powerhouse in NXT. Fallon Henley’s new selfish attitude gives off strong Ivory vibes in all the right ways. Sol Ruca did the least talking but that finisher is living rent free in the audience’s heads.
It ended the way it always does with a dust up and powder but a wild Robert Stone appears! Mr Stone channels his best Teddy Long and tells the players that they’ve a six-woman tag team match later tonight!
In the parking lot, Lash lets Trick Williams know that he can’t be a distraction for her anymore and he understands, telling her go get hers.
Backstage, Jordynne Grace catches up with Michin and meets Sol Ruca. She’s less thrilled with Arianna Grace (No relation!) than Tatum Paxley seems to be with that bright shiny Knockouts title belt.
A package to hype Lola Vice vs Shayna Baszler in an NXT Underground match at Battle ground plays. Lola talks about how she’s the one whose rising star brought Shayna back to NXT and brought out her jealousy. The Queen of Spades finds Lola’s rump-shaking ridiculous and feels the need to remind everyone of her fearsome dominance. UFC veterans, Thiago Alves, Roxanne Modafferi, Josh Barnett, Hannah Goldy, all weigh in on their picks for the clash of former MMA fighters.
Thea Hail vs Jazmyn Nyx
Just as Chase U is about to run out of the tunnel, Duke Hudson and Riley Osborne balk due to the inclusion of Ridge Holland. Thea and Andre Chase are disappointed but understanding.
Jazmyn Nyx enters the ring while making sure to work the look and towers over Thea.
In the ring, they do a better job than most of physical storytelling with Thea constantly working the right arm and looking for her signature kimura lock. The Chase U Scrappy Doo is doing well but momentarily confused when Duke and Riley come down to ringside anyway. Jazmyn fails to capitalize on the distraction but, after the referee breaks up the hold during a standing guard kimura, the former soccer star hits a Pelé kick to stop Thea and stun the crowd.
Winner: Jazmyn Nyx
NXT Tag Team Champions, Nathan Frazer and Axiom, were hanging with fans at one of the merch trailers when good brother Gallows and Anderson show up to wreck shop. Nursing their bumps and bruises, Frazer and Axiom vow to keep their titles at Battleground.
Earlier in the night, footage is shown of Shawn Spears talking to a group of up-and-comers about what it takes to succeed. Josh Briggs comes over and calls him out on just looking for people to manipulate, including Je’Von Evans. Later, Briggs is supposed to be headed out for a match but we see that Spears has attacked him with a chair in the entryway. Je’Von Evans takes exception to this and he and Spears go at it for a bit before Evans hits that floating cutter that wows the crowd so well. [Note: Briggs had recently been working a angle where he had been “released” and was making crowd appearances at house shows. That seems to have been scrapped but he may still be healing from rumored cracked ribs at Stand & Deliver.]
Tony D’Angelo (c) vs Damon Kemp for the NXT Heritage Cup
After a weird case of Charlie Dempsey trying to do a DeNiro in front of the mirror and The Don of NXT letting The Family know that he’s getting used to the Heritage Cup style, we’re ready to go. Tony D scores the first fall in the first round and, although Kemp hangs tough and gets robbed by the bell of a fall of his own, a wicked spinebuster in the fourth keeps the cup with La Familia.
Winner: Tony D’Angelo
Natalya vs Izzi Dame
Karmen Petrovic was originally supposed to compete but accompanies Natalya while on crutches as the NXT parking lot has claimed another victim on their women’s roster. Nattie actually gave her sunglasses to Booker rather than a fan to Vic Joseph’s consternation. It was good to see Natalya get a little more out of young talent than they’re used to. Izzi Dame looked like a brickhouse, even if some of her lifts looked like she was legitimately powering through them. Nattie gets a fairly quick win here before quoting her uncle with “Enough is enough and it’s time for a change!” Whoa.
Winner: Natalya
Tyriek Igwe and Tyson Dupont are two big boys, lookin’ real jacked, baby. It ain’t a body show, though, as Gallus cancels whatever match was supposed to take place with a beatdown before grieving last week’s main event when Ava banned Wolfgang from ringside. Joe Coffey says that he should be considered the favorite going into Battleground’s North American Championship match because a triple threat match favors Gallus. Champ, Oba Femi, and former champ, Wes Lee, make their way to the ring to offer their opinions and the brawl starts. It’s still three on two, though. Gallus boys on top tonight.
A teaser of Wendy Choo returning with a darker attitude plays.
Dante Chen attacks Lexis King in the back and the two tear each other up until separated by trainers and security. Lexis King suggests one more match to put the whole thing to rest.
Lash Legend, Fallon Henley, and Kelani Jordan vs Sol Ruca, Michin, and Jaida Parker
A lot going on here and actually pulled off pretty well. The action was smooth while the teams were shown to not be on the same page at all. There were a few times where a wrestler flat out refused to tag in her teammate. Jaida Parker got a lot of ring time. Fallon Henley did a lot of crowd interaction. Jacey Jayne in some sort of Bill Laimbeer-type face mask and Jazmyn Nyx come out to watch the action. Lash Legend gets on the wrong end of a Sol Snatcher to end it.
Winners: Sol Ruca, Michin, and Jaida Parker
Eddy Thorpe had a return package where he made mention of the great Native American superstars of the past… and also Chief Jay Strongbow.
The final hoops are set up for Ava and NXT to jump through as she meets Ethan Page in the ring with a table and contract. “All Ego” does an incredible job of obliquely referencing his time in Ring of Honor, Impact, and AEW. Very Shawn Michaels in his delivery and content. When Trick Williams comes out to insist that things get moving, Page throws the table out of the ring before saying that he wasn’t going to get thrown through it “the way these things always go.” Trick wants Ava to give Page whatever he wants so he can get in the ring with him someday and whoop that ass. Problem is that someday… would have to be Sunday. The clause in his contract is a title match at Battleground! Trick says to make it happen and we’ve got a main event for Battleground!
What Come NeXT?
Robert Stone being the number two to Ava is a good move. Gives him something to do for now and is a built-in parachute if she doesn’t progress to where she needs.
Je’Von Evans is being built very quickly and very well. Similar to Sol Ruca, he’s grabbing a lot of attention very early and off of a flashy finisher. So far, she’s been filling in the rest as she goes. Hopefully he will too.
I gotta see Lexis King putting out the fire of Dante Chen. The provocateur character is just too good and mirrors his father with going from a high-flying clean cut babyface to a manipulative egomaniac.
Picking most of the matches on Sunday seems easy but a lot of them make sense going another way. Don’t be surprised if you get surprised because all of them seem to be up for grabs and anything can happen in WWE, pal!
During Ego’s monologue, he mentioned how the call ups to Raw and Smackdown is leaving NXT limping. He wasn’t all that wrong. We all rode that Trick Train when the tracks got laid for us but we were a little surprised, too. Meanwhile, the two biggest things on the women’s side involve either another company’s champion or six big question marks with more to follow.