NXT Philly live results: Austin Aries teams with Finn Balor; Sami Zayn battles A-Ry
Submitted by Richard Kelly
Enzo Amore & Colin Cassady vs. The Vaudevillains
Fun little comedy match, not a lot to it. The two teams did the chicken fight spot with Enzo on Cass’ shoulders and English on Gotch’s shoulders, and then Enzo and English had a fake boxing fight in the middle of the match with Gotch and Cass as the corner men. Got a nice “This is boxing” chant, rather than the “This is wrestling” chant. Cass got the hot tag, they won with the Rocket Launcher.
Carmella vs. Peyton Royce
Carmella isn’t very good, Peyton Royce got very little reaction but wrestled very well. Crowd wasn’t too into this, Carmella won with a Bronco Buster and then her flatliner/headscissors combo for the submission win.
Apollo Crews vs. Elias Samson
Drifter got booed to high heaven. Before the match started, he made the announcer hold the microphone so he could play his guitar and sing a song; I heard none of it because the crowd was booing and chanting “Shut the f*ck up” very loudly. Crews is great and why he isn’t a top guy on Raw is beyond me. This was an okay slow paced match, Crews won with his backdrop powerbomb.
NXT Women’s Champion Bayley vs. Alexa Bliss
Bayley was insanely over. She went out into the crowd twice before the match started to hug people and play with the fans. Fans did all of the Bayley songs that all of the other crowds have done, but I found it lame and annoying. This was a decent match, comparable to their TV match from a month or so ago, Bayley won with a Bayley to Belly out of nowhere.
Sami Zayn vs. Alex Riley
Sami was over like crazy, Riley was booed like crazy. Not much to this match at all. Riley got the heat, Sami made his comeback, won with the Helluva Kick. My section had a great time heckling Alex Riley.
Asuka vs. Eva Marie
Eva was also booed to high heaven and tried cutting a promo, but again I couldn’t hear anything over the boos. She is very very bad live. Yikes. She did a few suplexes that looked fine, but everything else she did, moves, strikes, selling, etc, was all bad. And I don’t know who decided to give Eva a 7 minute heat segment in like an 8 minute match, but that was not a good decision. Crowd had fun chanting “Is this wrestling” and “You still got it” to Eva, but I was very bored by this.
Samoa Joe & Baron Corbin vs. NXT Champion Finn Balor & Austin Aries
Joe and Corbin were out first and then Aries’ music hit and the place went crazy. I’ve not seen Aries wrestle much ever, but wow is he good. Him and Joe worked well together, Corbin did a good job with everyone. Corbin almost botched a tilt-a-whirl powerslam spot but saved it. Finn got a hot tag, and they did the spot where Joe has the choke, goes to lay down but Finn rolls out of it and hits a standing double stomp, but then sold the ankle after the move, so good little touch there for him if that was a sell job. Aries got the hot tag after that, cleaned house, and then Balor won after hitting a Bloody Sunday on Corbin for the win. They posed together after the match. This was definitely the best match of the night.
Final Thoughts:
Overall, it was a house show. A little disappointed no American Alpha or Dash and Dawson, and a little upset Sami didn’t wrestle someone better and have a better match, but it was fine. Last year in May in Philly, Bayley was over, but she was just a girl on the roster. Now, she has such an overarching fanbase and is so popular with everyone, including children. And she’s a great wrestler who is really developing a sense with the crowd and how to work with other people. She’s really a superstar. I’d say half the people tonight have so much talent and are capable of being megastars on the main roster. Just remains to be seen what they do with it.