Well we got to meet the woman who will join Wade Barrett and Kaval as the winners of a season of NXT. After tonight, there appears to be a clear leader among the six Diva wannabes. There was definitely a different feeling from the first two seasons of NXT on the premiere of Season Three.
This challenge showed that this was not going to be like the first two seasons of NXT. Because of the role of the Divas in WWE, this challenge made sense because of the situations that Divas are inserted. The use of Michael Cole, Tony Chimmel, and Josh Mathews was different. I thought this part of the show was overshadowed a bit by Michael Cole’s attire as well as the comments made by Matt Striker. Because of her history as a dancer for the Orlando Magic and her appearances in music videos, I was not surprised that Naomi won this challenge.
This was an interesting contest and I liked how they eliminated one rookie after each stage. However, the stages seemed to be too short to really showcase the athleticism of the Divas. They had built Jamie as one of the best athletes and she was eliminated first, so that did not help her. I thought the way that Maxine stayed in the competition going into the last stage showed a lot of athleticism.
I thought you could tell that these women were new at cutting promos because none of them stood out and made you want to see them in a situation like the Miz was in on Monday’s Raw.
A Look at the NXT Rookies
Kaitlyn looks like she is going to be the ‘Alex Riley’ type character in this group. I think Vickie Guerrero making her cut her promo a few times was the best part of her performance tonight on the mic. There is potential, but I think she needs to avoid being a copy of someone else and stand out on her own. At the end of the show, after she knocked Vickie down, it looks like we are going to see Kaitlyn trying to apologize to Vickie on next week’s show.
I have seen a lot of Aksana promos on FCW television because she hosts a talk show segment (and yes, she sounds like she did tonight on that show). Aksana was able to bring back the memories of Vladimir Kozlov because she love double double e. The biggest thing that hurts Aksana is her accent but it is also one of her biggest attributes. I don’t know if it is possible for her to talk without the accent, but I think if she wins or when she is eliminated, she should try to sound like she is from the south or northeast.
Maxine started off well by commenting on Aksana’s thick accent, but then her promo came off like she was trying out for a spot on The Apprentice, not NXT. Maybe she should be paired with Vickie Guerrero since she came off as someone who had aspirations to be in management (and she is currently the FCW General Manager).
AJ’s promo reminded me a lot of Ashley Massaro’s early promos in the Diva Search when she was giving out a phone number to get support and votes; with a bit of Trish Stratus and Mickie James thrown in. I thought she had the best promo of the rookies. She came across very innocent with her comments and I liked her comment about wanting to have an action figure with exaggerated body parts because she is very petite. This promo is a 180 from her current FCW character but I thought she came across better as a babyface character.
Since Jamie was the ring announcer for NXT last season, you would have thought that she would have been the best promo, but her work in the ring did not translate to this promo. While AJ’s promo felt like she was being herself, Jamie felt like she was trying to portray what the fans wanted to hear. This was the closest to a John Cena type promo that the rookies gave on the show. In addition to her promo, we had a video profile from Jamie. It gave us a good understanding of her background and how she has an athletic background.
Naomi connected the most with the crowd during her opening promo and she came off the same way that she does on FCW. Her promo was okay but it came off as a campaign speech not a way to get to know her. Any good that she did in her first promo was lost when she was given the mic after winning the second challenge. While she dominated the competitions, it did not help that she was winded during her promo and did not recover well.
I think it says something when they have two tag matches on the show and in both matches, the pros start off the match.
We are probably not going to see a lot of wrestling on NXT unless we see all six wrestling in separate matches. This week we had two matches that combined for five minutes of action so I would expect that this is going to be the standard for the next three months.
In the opening tag match, I thought Naomi was the best of the four women in the match. Alicia reverted back to her style before she got her push where she was falling down during the match and not really having a strong vertical base. Maxine looked out of place in the match with her ring work as well as her ring attire. The finish came out of nowhere, and it appeared to have shocked the women because we saw Naomi give Maxine a suplex after the match. It looked very awkward.
The mixed tag match was too short to give the viewers an idea of what they can do in the ring. The pinfall was very sudden and it felt like it was not the finish that they were going to do. The bulldog was also attempted twice because there was trouble executing the move the first time.
Based on the length of the matches, I don’t know if Kaitlyn and Jamie were hurt by not wrestling on the show.
The biggest surprise of the night for me was the announcement that this season of NXT was going to be three months long. Since the show is not listed on Syfy’s schedule beyond September 28th, will this go to the internet or will it be a part of Smackdown, which debuts on Syfy on October 1st or will it be a part of Raw? NXT is listed at 7:00 pm on October 1st, but that is the last scheduled airing on Syfy.
I really hope they will have a challenge where the winner gets to use a last name since they have taken them away from the rookies.
The introductions by the pros were a good way to match the names to the faces of the rookies, but the Divas doing the introductions were definitely not as good as the introductions done by Primo, Goldust, or Vickie.
At least Alicia did not talk about things being Undefined, but Cole might have had the line of the night when he said that Maxine was ‘very defined’.
I don’t know if it was because of the inexperience of the Divas, but I thought the announcing was good for the most part. As I was watching the show, it felt like I was watching Tazz and Cole doing commentary during the Torrie Wilson/Sable match during the 2004 Great American Bash (and if you have access to it, listen to the Post Game Show from this show which I think I listened to about six months ago and it still held up after 6 years). I did not mind the fact that the announcers were trying harder to get each other to laugh then convey what was going on during the show.
I thought Matt Striker was on top of his game tonight. He got in a lot of good references on the show and his best was when he called Cole ‘Clark Griswold in lederhosen’.
If Michael Cole had a red neckerchief, he would have been ready to run with the bulls in Pamplona.
I like the addition of the stipulation leading into the first elimination that the person who won the most challenges would get immunity. I do hope that it will be needed for the person who finishes last, but with Naomi winning both challenges and if she does not have any major problems, she should be safe without the added immunity.
I wonder how Michael Cole will cope without having his man-crush The Miz on the show as a pro. I guess he has latched onto the Vickie caravan for this season. Maybe Cole will bring the giant cardboard WWE Magazine cover with the Miz on it to join him and Josh at the announce table.
I was very surprised that they did not edit out what happened after the first match. It made Maxine and Naomi look bad to wrestle after the match ended. The show was taped so why expose their rookies.
Was it wrong for me to want to hear Naomi during her promo after winning the second immunity challenge after saying ‘I’m so excited’ and pausing, continue with ‘I’m so scared’?
I hope they bring Maryse onto the show to be in a segment with Aksana just so see who can be more over the top with their accents.
After the first show, I think they have given us a clear favorite based on her performance and the way that she was received by the crowd in Baltimore. Winning the two challenges helped Naomi and was enough to put her in the lead. Of the other rookies, I thought AJ stood out based on her promo and presence. They have separated themselves from the other four and it is up to them to maintain that advantage.
1st Place: Naomi
2nd Place: AJ
3rd Place: Aksana
4th Place: Maxine
5th Place: Kaitlyn
6th Place: Jamie
