Powell’s NXT Hit List: The Rock’s appearance, Trick Williams vs. Oba Femi vs. Eddy Thorpe for the NXT Championship, Roxanne Perez vs. Giulia for the NXT Women’s Championship

By Jason Powell, ProWrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)

NXT Hits

Roxanne Perez vs. Giulia for the NXT Women’s Championship: A hot opening match that was capped off by a crowd pleasing title change. Whenever someone drops a title in NXT, it typically leads to speculation that the former champion could be main roster bound. It’s been nearly three years since Perez arrived in NXT. There’s not much left for Perez to do in NXT. And with the transfer window apparently in play (are they ever going to explain how it works?), it seems like there’s a good chance to Perez will be making the jump soon.

The Rock’s in-ring promo: t seemed like Rock had a basic outline of what he wanted to say, but he opted to go out there and mostly wing it. He took issue with the criticism of his character suddenly being nice to Cody Rhodes on Raw, and once again told viewers to sit back and enjoy the ride. Here’s the thing. We want to enjoy the ride, but we also expect it to make sense. The Final Boss and Cody characters hated each other the last time they appeared on camera together, but suddenly they were best buds with no explanation on Monday. Worse yet, the broadcast team just had to act like it was business as usual and not ask the obvious question of what in the hell happened that made these characters friendly. Putting that aside, Rock did a solid job of putting over the NXT audience in his own way. He seemed rushed at the end, but he was able to take things home before the show went off the air. This was not a memorable Rock promo, but the simple fact that he appeared on the show felt like a really big deal for NXT.

Trick Williams vs. Oba Femi vs. Eddy Thorpe for the NXT Championship: So what was the point of adding Thorpe to the match if the plan was for Femi to pin Williams clean? Thorpe arrived late due to a pre-match beatdown by Femi. The first thing he did was pull the referee out of the ring when Femi had Williams pinned. I’m surprised they didn’t go with Williams covering Femi during that sequence to give Williams a bit of an out. Rather, it came off like Femi was dominant because he could have pinned Williams at that point and ultimately did pin him to win the match. The match wasn’t memorable, but I like the idea of kicking off a new era with Williams and Giulia winning titles on a night when The Rock made a special appearance, which will presumably drive up the viewership count. The confetti shot looked great and the cameras following the new champions as they headed back to the Gorilla Position is one of the new times that I didn’t have to force myself to pay attention during a picture-in-picture break.

Stephanie Vaquer vs. Kelani Jordan vs. Cora Jade vs. Lola Vice in a four-way for a shot at the NXT Women’s North American Championship: The show opened with back-to-back matches that showcased the strength of the NXT women’s division. It was a good night for the recent additions with Giulia winning the NXT Championship and Vaquer winning this match. One concern is that the same wrestlers seem to be going after the NXT Women’s Championship and the Women’s North American Title. This seems to defeat the purpose of a secondary title being for the wrestlers who are a tier below the “world title” level.

The Rock and Ethan Page: As much as the segment was about The Rock and Ava having a moment together, the way Ethan Page was utilized really stood out. A lot of Rock humor requires someone to play the butt of his jokes. I was concerned that Page was going to end up in that role when Rock showed up in Ava’s office. It’s a badge of honor for many wrestlers to be taunted by Rock, but Page is a serious heel these days and it would have been a mistake to cast him in that role. Rather, Page looked Rock in the eye and didn’t seem out of place while sharing the camera shot with him. Okay, so Rock oddly slapped Page’s ass while Page was making is exit, but it could have been worse. This segment felt like a win for Page, all things considered.

Gigi Dolin, Shotzi, and Tatum Paxley vs. “Fatal Influence” Fallon Henley, Jacy Jayne, and Jasmyn Nyx: A mild Hit. Ladies’ night (or at least ladies’ hour one) continued with the third consecutive women’s match to open the show. It was my least favorite of the three and yet was still a solid six-woman tag. The issue about there not being a difference between the level of wrestlers that challenge for the women’s titles was on full display. Shotzi, who had a run on the main roster, pinned NXT Women’s North American Champion Henley. More on that in a moment.

NXT Misses

Lexis King vs. Charlie Dempsey for the NXT Heritage Cup: This was a standard match as opposed to the usual rounds system. The match was fine. The ongoing issue is that I just don’t care about the Heritage Cup. They did too much damage to it by making it comedy fodder early on and by having too much outside interference during Cup matches.

Stephanie Vaquer and Shotzi: The logic in this backstage segment with Ava was baffling. Vaquer became No. 1 contender to the NXT Women’s North American Championship earlier in the show. But because Shotzi pinned the NXT Women’s North American Champion, she argued that she should get the first title shot. The logical approach would have been for Vaquer to get a title shot because she literally earned the right to be number one contender, and then Shotzi could face the winner. But this is NXT where they typically make Ava look like a moron. Vaquer’s win means nothing because now she has to face Shotzi in what is essentially another No. 1 contenders match. I guess the winner of that match better hope that Henley doesn’t get pinned by someone else in another tag team match next week.