NXT – June 14, 2011 – Same Old, Same Old

NXT
Date: June 14, 2011
Location: Dunkin Donuts Center, Providence, Rhode Island
Commentators: Todd Grisham, William Regal

Tonight is week fifteen, matching the longest season (season 1) of this show so far.  With the recent arrest of Lucky Cannon, there’s a chance he’s gone tonight.  That was definitely shocking news.  Not that he got arrested.  It was shocking that someone actually knew who he was.  My money is on someone not named O’Brian going home tonight because someone hates me.  Anyway let’s get to it.

The opening video is about Lucky Cannon and his interaction with Maryse over the course of the season.  Also last week the $3,500 purse Cannon got her was destroyed thanks to that pesky leprechaun.  If that was read out of context, it might make you think wrestling fans are really stupid for watching this product.  By reading it in context, we know for fact that they’re stupid for watching this.

Maryse brings out the rookies.  Oh and Striker is there with her.  Cannon is here with a different coat.  O’Brian is here with no apparent reason.  Young is here with the hair that will not die.  O’Neil is here with no Pro due to the attack by Truth last night.  Wait Striker just said eliminations, as in PLURAL!!!  Oh I’m all aflutter now.  The Redemption standings are as follows: O’Neil has nearly double what the other three combined have.  Maryse dashes my hopes by saying it’s just one elimination tonight.

The challenge is Talk the Talk and you get thirty seconds to say who should be eliminated.  Cannon says O’Neil for riding the coattails of his pro.  He has no charisma and won’t draw money.  The show is all about him apparently.  O’Neil makes fun of Cannon’s robe and says he’s smart.  Cannon has won nothing apparently and is just running behind Maryse.  Can you blame him though?  Still a bad promo, but far better than anything O’Neil has ever said.

O’Brian says Young should be gone because he’s had his opportunity already.  Young blew his chance and has already main evented Summerslam.  That’s a very good point and proof why Young either should be on the main roster or should be fired, depending on where you stand.  Young says he’s the best and that they should just give him the crowd now.  YES!  LISTEN TO THIS MAN!  Young jumps O’Brian and leaves.  Think that’s our main event?  We do the judging and Young gets the loudest pop actually but they call it a tie with O’Neil.  O’Neil does clearly get the biggest pop on the second try so I can live with that.

Darren Young vs. Yoshi Tatsu

This has the potential to not suck.  Tatsu works on the arm a lot and that’s about it for the start of this.  Remember when Tatsu was this hot thing on ECW?  How in the world has he fallen that far that fast?  We’re three and a half minutes into this now and there’s been nothing but the arm work so far.  Tatsu fires off some chops in the corner so Young punches him in the face.

Dropkick sends Young to the floor but he catches a DDT on the apron to Tatsu to take over.  Here comes JTG as we take a break.  Back with Young holding a front facelock and JTG is on commentary now.  Regal gets on JTG about various things and it stuns me that people actually liked JTG at some point.  Chinlock goes on by Young as this isn’t incredibly interesting.

Regal and JTG do their usual schtick and it’s kind of funny as always.  Young hits the chinlock some more to waste even more time.  How is it possible that this show is already halfway over?  Tatsu breaks the hold and takes Young down to start his comeback.  Some kicks abound and up he goes.  And speaking of go, there goes my feed.  By the time it’s back Yoshi is hammering away with nothing but strikes.  What a shock.  Double knees in the corner and a spinwheel kick get two.  Shining Wizard gets two.  Yoshi goes up but Chavo distracts him, allowing Young to pull him off the top for the pin at approximately 13:50.

Rating: D+. Based on just what I saw, this was pretty weak.  There’s no real point to having these guys fight and that’s what makes this show not work.  They can have these pointless matches all they want but the matches get really dull after awhile.  Tatsu and Young have no reason to fight and that becomes apparent after 12 minutes of them fighting.  Weak match and boring to boot.

Maryse tells Lucky that her purse can be repaired.  Lucky says he’ll take care of it and she says she gave the purse fixers Lucky’s credit card.  Ok then.

Titus O’Neil vs. Lucky Cannon

Pre-match, Cannon promises to beat up Horny when he gets back.  Power vs. speed for lack of a better term here.  Titus throws him around so Cannon runs.  In old school heel fashion, Cannon gets a shot in to Titus as he comes back in and takes over.  Apparently O’Neil is distracted due to the lack of small green clothed men.  I give up.  Legdrop gets two for Cannon.  Chinlock goes on and the fans aren’t all that thrilled.  Lucky does the dog bark as this needs to end.  Titus starts his comeback and hits a clothesline and there’s the dog bark.  Clash of the Titus ends this at 6:46.

Rating: D+. Well this match happened.  That’s about all there is to say here.  O’Neil is a good power guy and probably has done the best this season, which means he probably won’t win.  Weak match here which has been a theme tonight so far.  I’m not thrilled with this show at all as you can probably tell.  The problem is the same as earlier: how many times can we see these people have matches?  It gets really annoying really fast and it did about three months ago.

In one of the only funny lines of the night, Todd says elimination is next.  “One of these four superstars’ dreams are crushed tonight and it’s all your fault WWE Universe!”

Elimination time and Lucky is gone in 4^th place.  The reactions are great here, with Striker looking STUNNED.  No real shock due to what happened this weekend (he was arrested for impersonating a police office of all things) but rather annoying because O’Brian is STILL around.  Hopefully this ends soon though.  Lucky says he should be on Smackdown instead of on here and Titus leads us in the goodbye song.  Maryse says she appreciates the stuff but the purse was a fake and slaps Lucky to end the show.

Overall Rating: D. I really didn’t like this week as the in ring stuff is right back to where it was a few weeks ago.  Somehow they fit about twenty minutes into this show which is rather impressive for a 50 minute show, and will likely approach Impact in terms of overall ring time.  Not much here at all this week and another boring show.

Results

Titus O’Neil won the Talk the Talk Challenge

Darren Young b. Yoshi Tatsu – Slam off the top rope

Titus O’Neil b. Lucky Cannon – Clash of the Titus

Lucky Cannon was eliminated in 4^th place

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