By John Moore, ProWrestling.net Staffer (@liljohnm)
NXT TV
Live from Orlando, Florida at the WWE Performance Center
Aired November 1, 2022 on USA Network
[Hour One] Vic Joseph and Booker T were on commentary. Alicia Taylor was the ring announcer…
NXT started off with NXT Champion Bron Breakker making his entrance to the performance center ring. Breakker took the mic and said that Halloween Havoc was a monumental night for the locker room. He congratulated Wes Lee for climbing the ladder to win the North American Championship. He also congratulated Julius Creed for protecting his brother’s career. Kit Wilson and Elton Prince, Pretty Deadly, interrupted Bron Breakker and made jokes at Breakker’s expense.
Pretty Deadly entered the ring. Breakker asked Pretty Deadly what they want in a fake English accent (which kinda sounded like fake Australian). Prince mocked Bron for constantly winning. He said their defense last week was bigger and deserves a parade. Wilson said that they deserve more pomp and circumstance than Bron or Wes. Wilson said Wes acts like he’s in a Lifetime series. Wes Lee made his entrance and told Pretty Deadly to shut up. Lee thanked Bron for the congratulations. Prince said he doesn’t respect Wes and they need to talk about Pretty Deadly now. Bron said Pretty Deadly needs to quit bitching. Lee said he does think that Pretty Deadly have beautiful hair though.
Bron looked at Prince’s hair and agreed with Wes that it looked like the hair of an Angel. Bron said he’s willing to let Pretty Deadly have the spotlight. Wilson said thanks to “Bronson”. Lee gave a formal introduction to Pretty Deadly. PD did a pose. Pretty Deadly did their signature “Sideplate check”, and hip thrusts. Bron talked about the usual WWE pattern about someone always interrupting the champion’s show opening promo. Lee said he and Bron want to go after the tag titles. Lee talked about being a former champ, and how Bron never had the tag title. Bron asked Pretty Deadly for a title shot. Bron said he and Wes will be the new chanps.
Prince said this moment can’t get any worse. Queue, R-Truth made his entrance and did his What’s Up theme. Vic Joseph plugged Truth vs. Waller for after the break…[c]
John’s Thoughts: An okay segment. Nothing too special. As Bron pointed out. This is a WWE formula. I hope they don’t go the route of the two top singles wrestlers embarrassing the tag team champions in a tag team match (hey, Lee is a vulnerable babyface champ). I hope they move quick towards setting up Lee and Bron’s next feud. I wouldn’t mind if they set up Carmelo Hayes to be the one to take the belt off Bron, but we’ll see what WWE has in mind for Bron’s next feud.
R-Truth was apparently still doing his What’s Up song back from break. Grayson Waller made his entrance…
1. R-Truth vs. Grayson Waller. Truth gave Waller a soft slap to start. Waller fired up and pummeled Truth with strikes. Truth came back with a back elbow and lariat. Joseph noted that Lee and Breakker vs. PD for the titles was made official. Truth took down Waller with a side headlock. Waller got to his feet and hit Truth with a shoulder block. Waller did the “You can’t see me”. Truth tripped up Waller and put him in a headlock.
Truth hit Waller with a huracanrana and hip toss. Waller hit Truth with an STO. Truth recovered and caught Waller with a right hand. Truth caught Waller with a Tope Con Hilo, but his foot caught the top rope so he didn’t get as much air as you would have hoped. The show cut to PIP commercial with the ref checking on Truth.[c]
The camera solely focused on Waller during the break as Waller was drawing heat from the crowd. Medics were shown checking on Truth. This is an odd Picture-in-picture, because it’s just cuts between Waller stalling for time, and Truth getting checked on. Waller did a spinneronie during the break. The ref called for the bell when the show cut back. Alicia Taylor announced Waller as the winner via ref stoppage.
Grayson Waller defeated R-Truth via ref stoppage in 7:14 (closer to 4 minutes because they could have called the match before the PIP).
Waller took the mic and bragged about beating a veteran. He said NXT is Waller’s house and ain’t nothing gonna change that…
John’s Thoughts: Ooof. That was awkward. I don’t think it was a work because it looked like Truth didn’t get the air he wanted to. It could have ended up worse if his head caught the apron, and thank God it didn’t. I hope this wasn’t a big injury for Truth. That was an awkward Picture-in-Picture too, because they had Waller have to try to fill in 3 minutes of time just doing random things. Prayers out to truth and I hope he gets better.
Vic Joseph and Booker T checked in on commentary. They sent the show to Vic Joseph having a sitdown interview with the entire Schism faction. Joseph pointed out that Ava Raine is the talk on social media. He asked her “why the Schism”. Ava said nobody knew it was her and she showed everyone they were wrong. She said she’s been around WWE all her life, yet nobody took the time to know her. She talked about having surgery while she started with WWE and it was Joe Gacy that was the only person that reached out to her.
Ava said it’s not fair that Joseph isn’t asking Jagger and Rip why they joined. Joseph asked Gacy if he loves the national attention Schism is getting with Ava joining. Gacy said he’s missing the point. Ava isn’t joining to help Schism. Gacy said Ava is here because they accept her for who she is. Fowler talked about how they are being talked about more like other factions in the past. Fowler offered Joseph a smiley pin. Reid continued to prop up the Schism. Joseph presented a tweet where Cameron Grimes said that Ava is brainwashed by the Schism.
Ava said she sees more than Grimes ever saw. Ava said Grimes isn’t past the Schism, he just hired Gallows and Anderson to beat them up. Ava talked about how Gacy will beat Grimes next week in their final week. Gacy said the Schism is 4 roots one tree…
Javier Bernal was trying to gloat in front of Enofe and Blade. They were all standing in front of the office of Shawn Michaels. Odyssey Jones exited the office and said that he’s the opponent of Javi. Javi didn’t like this…
Kiana James was shown heading to the ring from backstage…[c]
John’s Thoughts: An ok first promo for Ava Raine and I’m going to wait and see if this ends up breathing new life into The Schism (Which is definitely the most boring act in all of pro wrestling to me). What I do like is that they are seemingly changing up their look a bit, which is needed. Fowler seems to have kept his Schism look, but Gacy and Reid are dressing more casually, with Reid even growing his beard back out. Gacy is also starting to look closer to the character he was playing when he was in Combat Zone Wrestling.
Indi Hartwell argued with Zoey Stark and Nikkita Lyons in the locker room. Hartwell told Stark to suck it up and not pout just for losing the match last week. The Locker Room had to pull both women apart when they jawed at each other…
Andre Chase was hyping up Thea Hail backstage. Hail got sad saying that something wasn’t right, nobody can hold the flag (Bodhi Hayward got released by WWE). Duke Hudson showed up and acted more caffinated than usual. Hudson led Hail to the ring and swung around the Chase U flag…
2. Thea Hail (w/Andre Chase, Duke Hudson) vs. Kiana James. James hit Hail with a knee to the gut. James used an armwrench to slam Hail to the mat. James worked on Hail for a bit with methodical offense. Booker T claimed that Chase U is one of those illegal universities. Hail escaped an elbow stretch with an armdrag. Hail tripped up James and hit her with a blockbuster. James reversed a crossbody with a body slam. James hit Hail with her twisting Paydirt finisher. Hudson put Hail’s foot on the bottom rope for the break. Chase sent Hudson to the back for cheating. James hit Hail with another Tornado Paydirt for the victory.
Kiana James defeated Thea Hail via pinfall in 4:20.
When Chase went to check on Hail, he was punched in the back by Charlie Dempsey. Dempsey tried to put Chase in a submission, but Duke Hudson ran out to chase away Dempsey. Hudson helped both Hail and Chase to their feet…
John’s Thoughts: A bit bittersweet. Sucks to say Hayward go because he was actually a really fun part of the Chase University act. His personality really shined. If I had to guess, either he didn’t want to continue in WWE, or his in-ring wasn’t progressing as much as the coaches would have hoped. Whatever it is, I hope he finds success down the road. Back to here, it looks like they might be going the comedic route with Hudson this time. Maybe it’ll be a good chance for him to show more personality, but I thought he was already showing good personality after the Grimes feud? Here’s hoping they stick with something with Hudson. They can always change him up on the main Roster because I don’t see goofball Hudson being what they want on Raw or Smackdown.
McKenzie Mitchell interviewed Josh Briggs, Brooks Jensen, and Fallon Henley about how Bron Breakker and Wes Lee are challenging for the tag team titles. They were excited to see who won. Fallon Henley was handed an envelope which she read. They didn’t tell us what it said…
Odyssey Jones made his entrance to the WWE Performance Center ring…[c]
Bron Breakker and Wes Lee were psyching each other up in the locker room. Robert Stone showed up to taunt Bron Breakker on behalf of Von Wagner. Stone tried to vouch for a title match for Wagner. Breakker told Stone to tell Wagner to face him face to face instead of sending his errand boy. He then told Stone to walk away or be stuffed in a locker…
3. Odyssey Jones vs. “Big Body Javi” Javier Bernal. Jones worked on Javi with a wristlock. Jones hit Javi with a nice body slam. Jones did a few Judo rolls over the back of Javi. Jai managed to land a few blows on Odyssey’s back. Odyssey managed to put Javi in an electric chair. Javi escaped and hit Jones with a few chop blocks on the injured leg. Javi put Jones in a sleeper. Jones went into the ropes several times to break it.
Jones tossed Javi like a boulder. Jones caught Javi with a shoulder block. Jones hit Javi with a hip tackle. Jones picked up the win after a Bossman Slam.
Odyssey Jones defeated Javier Bernal via pinfall in 3:20.
John’s Thoughts: Good to see Jones back. Not a huge fan of him being supper grinny and happy to be here (a la babyface Mark Henry and Finn balor). I’m still hoping for the day we see a mean streak from him because this man has the potential to be an extremely entertaining monster. He was okay in the ring and I’m looking forward to seeing how he develops.
Toxic Attraction were all shown heading to the ring from backstage…[c]
[Hour Two] Toxic Attraction made their entrance for Mandy Rose’s one year championship celebration. There was a couch and tables set up in the ring. The tables had pictures of Mandy Rose on them. There were also two random “waiters” holding trays of champagne. Jayne took the mic and said that Rose proved everyone wrong for a whole year and how Rose is the most dominant women’s champion in NXT. Gigi Dolin talked about how Rose is superior to everyone in the locker room, man or woman.
Jayne and Dolin continued to hype up Rose. Jayne introduced a Mandy Rose video packages. The video package showed highlights of Rose’s WWE career (which included her with blonde hair on the main roster). After the video, Rose thanked Dolin and Jayne for the video. Rose said she’s not bad for “being a piece of eye candy”. Rose said that’s what people thought of her two years before NXT, as a “centerfold bitch”. She said she made the choice to come back to NXT to rebuild herself and it was the greatest decision of her life.
She thanked Dolin and Jayne for helping Toxic Attraction to rise to the top. She said merch and ratings are up. Rose said nobody thought she would hold on to the title. She said the title belongs to the greatest women’s wrestlers in the world. She said “put some respect on my name” isn’t a catchphrase, it’s the damn truth. She talked about running through the locker room while wearing red bottoms and looking good. Rose said nobody is going to kick her out of her title reign.
All of a sudden, random smoke spewed from the ring. Alba Fyre showed up and hit Jayne and Dolin with teh random pictures. Jayne and Rose escaped the ring. Fyre sent Dolin through the table with a Gory Bomb. Fyre said she’s taking out Gigi Dolin this week, taking out Jacy Jayne next week, and coming for the title in two weeks…
McKenzie Mitchell interviewed Apollo Crews, who looked like he was wearing Tyler Bate’s chef’s uniform. Apollo Crews reiterated that he wanted to go against Bron Breakker, but he thinks Bron sees him as a bad matchup for him. Apollo said Bron isn’t even mentioning Crews. Von Wagner showed up and said that Crews may be a matchup problem, but Von Wagner is a problem (on the mic, i kid, i kid). Von said Apollo may like to look at the future, but when it comes to the title, Von Wagner is the future…[c]
John’s Thoughts: Seriously, why do they still give Wagner a mic? He looks good now. Just let Stone or someone else talk for him. Anyways, I thought Mandy Rose cut one of her better promos in WWE. She wasn’t just repeating the same “I’m better than you” line that she usually repeats. She had some conviction. I’m not a big fan of them going back to the well with Alba Fyre. The buildup and match at Halloween Havoc was underwhelming, but that was also probably due to Rose having to take a leave of absence. I also wasn’t a fan of how Fyre just showed up with a puff of smoke here. I was kinda hoping for Roxanne Perez, Blair Davenport, or someone else.
They aired another answer machine message from the WWE Performance Center from SCRYPTS. This time, scrypts talked about having fury. Someone was shown spraying graffiti on the PC walls…
Entrances for the next match took place. Joseph announced Chance and Carter vs. Stark and Lyons in a rematch for the tag titles for next week…
4. Indi Hartwell vs. Zoey Stark (w/Nikkita Lyons). Hartwell took down Stark with a shoulder tackle. Stark came back with a shove. Stark shoved Hartwell to the corner and gave Hartwell powerful strikes. Stark hit Hartwell with a springbaord crossbody. Hartwell avoided a basement lariat and hit Stark with a series of body slams. Hartwell dumped Stark to ringside with a lariat. Stark was throwing a fit at ringside. The show cut to regular commercial.[c]
Hartwell rallied at Stark with Elbows and an Uppercut. Hartwell got a nearfall. Stark came back with a shortarm lariat. Stark tripped up Hartwell and hit her with a corkscrew slingshot senton for a two count. Stark put the boots to Hartwell and had to be calmed down by Lyons and the referee or else risk disqualification. Hartwell recovered and gave Stark shortarm lariats. Stark came back with a superkick.
Stark dumped Hartwell to ringside. Lyons tried to tell Lyons to throw her back in the ring but Stark kept sending her into the announce table. Lyons convinced Stark not to give Hartwell a power bomb through the table. Hartwell gave Stark a Yakuza Kick and basement forearm for the win.
Indi Hartwell defeated Zoey Stark via pinfall in 6:30 of on-air time.
Joseph noted that Hartwell is on the best singles winning streak of her career…
John’s Thoughts: Good match in-terms of character development for Zoey Stark. The focus of the match was Stark losing her cool and being unlike herself. Lyons played the role of peacemaker well enough. While they seem a bit aimless with Indi Hartwell, they are racking up wins for her. Curious to see where that goes.
A vignette aired for the former Donovan Dijak/T-Bar. DIjak turned on a tape recorder talked about how his eyes are no longer shileded, and how he has unfinished business. He said a new high order of justice is coming upon NXT. He said it’s all about his authority…
Valentina Feroz asked Sanga to be in her corner. Sanga was about to encourage Feroz until Veer Mahan showed up. He reluctantly refused. Veer said here, they take Sanga’s kindness for weakness. He asked Sanga if the people honor him? He said that’s why he’s here, to help Sanga get honor…
Cora Jade made her entrance…[c]
Stark was still trying to control her anger with Lyons backstage. Katana Chance and Kayden Carter showed up to gloat in the faces of their challengers. Lyons held her back…
An ad aired for the NXT Deadline PLE…
Valentina Feroz made her entrance looking a bit mopey due to Sanga not being there…
5. Cora Jade vs. Valentina Feroz. Jade shoved Feroz mockingly. Feroz pressured Jade against the ropes. Jade gave Feroz a sweep and a “ha”. Feroz hit Jade with a series of armdrags and a meteora. Jade retreated to ringside. Feroz slammed Jade’s head on the apron. Jade came back with a dropkick to prevent her from entering the ring. Jade slammed Feroz around the ring. Jade continued to dominate Feroz witn trash talk thrown in. Feroz countered a lariat into an inside cradle for a two count. Jade came back with a lariat.
Feroz fended off jade with boots. Jade avoided a crossbody. Jade hit Feroz with a running senton. Jade hit Feroz with a DDT for the victory.
Cora Jade defeated Valentina Feroz via pinfall in 3:37.
Jade brought her cane in the ring and taunted Feroz. Wendy Choo ran out wearing a dinosaur onesie. Choo took a shot to the gut, but recovered and pummeled Jade with strikes. Jade ran away when Choo tried to hit her with kendo stick strikes…
John’s Thoughts: So, we’re done with Perez vs. Jade? For now? I’m okay with that. I’d like to see both women go on to separate feuds especially since their feud chemistry wasn’t the greatest. I did like Cora Jade in this enhancement match though. During Halloween Havoc, I talked about how it felt like she lacked urgency and wrestled at a snail’s pace during her heat segments. Here she showed more urgency and engagement. “Engagement” is the key and she needs to interact more as a heel to make this heel run work.
Tony D’Angelo was chatting with Channing Lorenzo backstage. D’Angelo talked about how Stacks looked good against Shinsuke Nakamura. D’Angelo gave Lorenzo some encouragement for his match against Hank Walker later. Elektra Lopez showed up and said she likes being her own boss. She said if you thought she was dangerous before, you have to watch how dangerous she is now. Lorenzo wondered if she’s dangerous by herself. D’Angelo said he thinks she is…
Wes Lee and Bron Breakker made their entrance to the PC ring. Joseph noted that this was going to be the main event…[c]
An ad aired for Crown Jewel…
Vic Joseph announced the following matches for next week: Joe Gacy vs. Cameron Grimes, Brutus Creed vs. Damon Kemp in a 5-minute-time-limit match, and Katana Chance and Kayden Carter vs. Nikkita Lyons and Zoey Stark for the NXT Women’s Tag Team Championships…
Pretty Deadly made their entrance. Alicia Taylor handled the formal in-ring introductions for the championship match…
6. “Pretty Deadly” Kit Wilson and Elton Prince vs. Bron Breakker and Wes Lee for the NXT Tag Team Championships. Lee and Wilson traded wristlocks. Lee converted into a headlock. Lee got a two count off a sunset flip and rollup. Lee avoided a sweep with a backflip. Prince tagged in. Lee took down Prince with an armdrag into an armbar. Andre Chase vs. Charlie Dempsey was announced for next week. Bron Breakker tagged in and hit Prince with a standing moonsault. Breakker no sold a slap from Prince. Breakker hit Prince with a backdrop.
Breakker took down Prince with a running lariat. Lee tagged back in and put Prince in a wristlock. Prince managed to end Lee’s momentum with a high flapjack. Bron helped Lee from a double suplex. Lee and Prince hit Pretty Deadly with stereo Frankensteiners. The show cut to picture-in-picture.[c]
Lee had Prince in a headlock back from the break. Lee hit Prince with a nice slingshot huracanrana for a two count. Lee hit Prince with a pop up dropkick. Wilson blind tagged in to blindside Lee in the back with an axe handle strike. Wilson hit Lee with a nice flying uppercut. Wilson mocked Breakker with a bark and hit Lee with a neckbreaker for a two count.
[Overrun] Lee and Wilson traded shortarm punches. Prince tagged in and caught Lee with an uppercut. Wilson hit Lee with a swinging Body Slam and elbow drop. Wilson tagged in. Lee avoided both men. This allowed him to tag in Bron Breakker who cleaned house. Breakker hit Prince with a Steinerizer. Breakker hit both Prince and Wilson with a suplex by himself. Lee tagged in and Breakker launched him into Pretty Deadly. Lee caught Wilson with a superkick.
Breakker tossed around Prince. Lee went for a Final Flash flip, but Carmelo Haynes ran out and shoved Lee off the top rope. Wilson rolled up Lee for the win.
Pretty Deadly defeated Wes Lee and Bron Breakker via pinfall in 11:57 to retain the NXT Tag Team Championships.
Lee hit Melo with a flip dive at ringside. Von Wagner showed up and gave Bron Breakker a Big Boot…
The camera cut to Apollo Crews watching the action on a monitor. JD McDonagh approached Crews and threatened to detach Apollo’s retina. He said he’d see Crews around. NXT closed…
John’s Thoughts: An okay tag team main event. Pretty Deadly continue to look good as heel tag team champs. They can shrug off dirty wins because it feeds into their characters. Lee and Bron were okay, but I didn’t think they had the best chemistry (Bron worked way better with Tyler Bate where they can do their powerhouse Steiner tributes). For now, it looks like based off the final segment they are pairing up Breakker with Wagner, Melo with Lee, and Apollo with McDonagh. McDonagh vs. Apollo can be fun, but I hope the other two feuds aren’t going to be the feuds heading into Deadline because I few like both men can have more epic feuds.
How funny would it be that after facing all these top tier wrestlers, that Bron loses his title to Von F’n Wagner? That better not happen. I would like to think that Breakker will defend his title against Crews, but even then they have to build up Crews a bit. This was a middle of the road NXT. Nothing bad, but nothing really compelling either. This week show looked light on paper with generic talking segments advertised. Next week’s show should be better with decent matches advertised.
Ouch! That was a nasty landing for R-Truth. Here’s hoping he’s ok.
Booker T’s comment that was published about a week ago: ““AEW, they are one bad accident away from something really, really being done about what’s going on in that company and people looking at it from a different perspective.”
The AEW mark using an injury to take a shot at WWE. How pathetic
“Zoey Stark defeated Indi Hartwell via pinfall in 6:30 of on-air time.”
Think you got that wrong.
yep yep… mah bad
happens during live reviews