BWOTW: 30/1/17 - 4/2/17

Hello and welcome to this newest edition of 'Noah's Best Wrestling of the Week' AKA 'Okay Then'

Sure

Let us now, as is the norm, look at the past week in news form;

1. Randy Orton is the 2017 Royal Rumble winner. He was the betting favourite, which I have no idea where that came from with him having not shown any real interest in the Rumble the past few weeks, but okay then. At the minute we're slated for Orton versus Cena at 'Mania (uugghhh), but we have Elimination Chamber coming up so things might change
2. Championship changes galore! Bobby Roode is the new NXT Champion, The Authors of Pain are the new NXT Tag Team Champions, Neville is the new WWE Cruiserweight Champion, Gallows and Anderson are new RAW Tag Team Champions, and finally, John Cena is the new WWE World Champion. Shake up fever over here in the WWE.
3. Samoa Joe debuted in the Royal Rumble and won like everyone wanted on Monday Night RAW, attacking Seth Rollins in what appears to be some sort of allegiance with Triple H. That brings us to our next story...
4. Seth Rollins has re-injured his knee being assaulted by Samoa Joe. It sounds like the injury occurred when he went down for the Coquina Clutch, with it going anything but smoothly. Reports say it will be around 8 weeks to recover, which means he could be missing a second WrestleMania in a row. Get well soon, Seth.
5. Like I said, we've got Elimination Chamber coming up, and the participants in the marquee match have been announced. John Cena will defend his newly won championship in the Chamber against AJ Styles, Bray Wyatt, Baron Corbin, The Miz and Dean Ambrose. They've also got a big tag match slated for the event, and I'm hoping this gets added into the Chamber as well.
6. Corey Graves will no longer be commentating for NXT. However, he will be succeeded by WWE's newest announce team addition, Nigel McGuinness! 
7. Chikara's King of Trios is coming to Brummy-Brum; Birmingham, England! I might just have to look into going.
8. Akira Tozawa has debuted on 205 Live, and it appears he will be feuding with Brian Kendrick. I forgot how cool his theme is;

And now for the intersect in this Venn diagram of a wrestling blog, it's the matches!

NXT TakeOver: San Antonio

Best Match on TakeOver: San Antonio: Shinsuke Nakamura vs Bobby Roode - NXT Championship Match
Honourable Mention(s): Andrade 'Cien' Almas vs Roderick Strong

Kicking off Rumble weekend for us here on BWOTW, its NXT TakeOver: San Antonio, with Shinsuke Nakamura taking on Bobby Roode with the NXT Championship on the line. 

I think this is hands down Roode's best match in NXT so far, and it was certainly a breath of fresh air on Nakamura's part following his number of clashes against Samoa Joe over the past half-year or so. What made this a lot different from those matches was that we have Roode being dastardly in his tactics, as well as having his own over the top personality. There were instances where the two would exchange taunts, it made all the difference to having just one person being like that.

Roode did a great job of countering Nakmura's offence and working out how to take advantage of things. My favourite moment of Bobby's ingenuity is this instance of playing possum;

We had an injury angle that I thought worked in some aspects, and in others not so much. Nakamura hurts his knee dropping a knee to Roode on the apron, he then continued to sell it really well, and made it very believable. He hit the Kinshasa, then immediately clutched it in pain and dropped to the floor, again I thought that was great. However, he was down for ages and being attended to by doctors and even had Matt Bloom come out to check on him. I get that it gave Roode time to recover, and in effect protecting the move, but it did drag a tad. 

Roode picks up the injured Shinsuke and gives him 2 Glorious DDT's to finally put the man down long enough for the pin. And there you have it, Bobby Roode is new NXT Champion! I haven't looked at the tapings spoilers, so I have no idea who he'll be facing at Orlando; Kassius Ohno? Will they have Nakamura heal in time? Not too sure.

WWE Royal Rumble

Best Match on RR: AJ Styles vs John Cena - WWE World Championship Match
Honourable Mention(s): Kevin Owens vs Roman Reigns - WWE Universal Championship Match

It's Royal-Rumble o'clock now and we have this match up I was majorly excited for; AJ Styles versus John Cena for the WWE World Championship. 

Although I think I prefer their match at SummerSlam last year to this one, it was still a barn burner. There were a few things that were quite similar to their prior encounter, but its not like it was disappointing or detracted from the quality at all. These guys going at it in any capacity has always been a great watch, though I'm confident I could watch AJ Styles daily and not complain. Styles did pull out some new counters that were just the coolest; Cena got him up for his slam after the shoulder tackles, and AJ flopped out like a salmon and huricanrana'd Cena away. Slick. And no matter how many times you see a Phenomenal Forearm, its always amazing;

I had some curiosity as to how Cena would wrestle in this match, with a more cocky heel-like side to him being put across on TV, and I feel there were some noticeable changes in his work. There were a couple instances where he just straight up clocked AJ on the schnoz with a big overhand right. Plus, he nailed AJ with a couple consecutive clattering lariats, flip-turned his world upside down. He stood there pumping every hunk of meat that would flex on his body like a damn bull about to charge, absolutely terrifying. Remind me to never piss of John Cena, or face him in a championship match. 

They had a whole sequence trading submissions and wriggling their way out, throwing in a figure-four leglock and a cross armbar in there alongside their usual repertoires. Cena also performed what is most likely his most fluid Code Red yet, hopping straight up and getting a full rotation in a split second, props to both men for that piece of magic.

Whilst I wasn't ecstatic to see Cena leave with the gold, I have to admit that the ending sequence was brilliant. Cena's Okada-like roll into the AA was awesome and got an audible reaction from me.


Now comparison there have been a fair amount of comparison between this match and Okada/Omega, and I can see why with both of them being great bouts, and also they were both in January. To me, you can't really compare them, they both serve different purposes and are made for different audiences with different wants and needs. I think I might prefer just a smidge more, but I do have my irks with the heavyweight style matches in New Japan. 

Nevertheless, whichever way you look at, I'd say you should definitely give this a look-see.

Monday Night RAW

Best Match on RAW (30/1/17): Kevin Owens vs Braun Strowman - WWE Universal Championship Match

Bit of a surprise of how much I enjoyed this, Monday Night RAW gave us the Universal Championship match between Kevin Owens and the challenging Braun Strowman. This wasn't a huge match, and it didn't even finish properly, but it had me more intrigued than the majority of RAW this week. 

Before the bell, Braun chokeslammed Chris Jericho through the announce table, so immediately we have Owens going through this match with a hopeless 'oh shit how do I win this' attitude, something we don't tend to get with heels. Speaking of which, Owens felt very much like a babyface in this match, taking the brunt of an exhaustive assault from Strowman, and having flurries and comebacks that received some big cheers. 

It was interesting to see this contrast in Owens's presentation, and it made me optimistic that one day we might see a good face run from him, akin to that of his final days in Ring of Honour, where he's still a nasty bastard, he just is to the bad guys. 

Nice bit of variety here on RAW, I wouldn't say it's a must-see, but if you feel like something a little different from KO, its worth a watch.

SmackDown! LIVE

Best Match on SD! (31/1/17): AJ Styles vs Dean Ambrose

This week on SmackDown! LIVE, how many people can we fit around the announce table?

We're on SmackDown! LIVE now, and we've got 'The Phenomenal One', AJ Styles taking on Dean Ambrose ahead of the two of them competing in the Elimination Chamber on the 12th. Whilst I can't remember a whole lot about this match, it was definitely good. I'm by far not his biggest fan, but there just seems to be something about watching Ambrose that makes me shut off or just totally forget. Who knows? 

I mean, he's sound and I understand the appeal, but his usual stuff just doesn't do it for me. I know I say this pretty much every time he appears on this blog, and I apologise if you guys have heard this before, but I can't get over it. His clotheslines, his scrapping punches, his elbow drop and his fucking rebound lariat, none of it really appeals to me. I appreciate it when he varies it up, with this being a pretty cool example;

However, he did through something else new into the mix and managed to piss me off; he only went and did Neville's bloody submission move. Mate, we've spent the past month and a half making this move look like a killer, and you just slap it on half-assed with no real effect. Fuck off. Neville, use a double underhook DDT that gets kicked out of at 1.9, show him who's boss.

Overall, a good match here, whilst I have my grievances with Ambrose, Styles was tip-top in this match, so if you enjoy watching AJ, I should think you'll like this match, same with if you're an Ambrose fan.

205 Live

Best Match on 205 Live (31/1/17): Cedric Alexander & Jack Gallagher vs Neville & Noam Dar

Just like half of the crowd, we're sticking around for 205 Live after SmackDown! now, and the best match that we were offered this week was the tag team contest between the team of Cedric Alexander and Jack Gallagher, and Noam Dar teaming with the new Crusierweight Champion, Neville.

Again, a match I can't remember a whole lot about. However, I do recall Neville being very shouty and berating everyone, including Dar. Plus, he did a lot of shit-kicking. He knocked Gallagher around, he knocked Alexander around, and he wanted to knock Dar around. 

I honestly can't really think of much. I know the end saw Neville abandon Dar in the ring, allowing Cedric to hit literally all his moves on him for the victory. I guess you can describe it as something we've become accustomed to on 205 Live; has some nice moments but by and large pretty forgettable. 

NXT

Best Match on NXT (1/2/17): Tyler Bate vs Oney Lorcan

It's Tyler bloody Bate! His first in-ring appearance on WWE since the United Kingdom Championship Finals, and he's facing up against Oney Lorcan on this episode of NXT. We started off good and proper with a nice lock up, and then we started off our rough and tumble match with a bang;

From then on we had a pretty heavy, stiff striking match-up, with Lorcan unloading an ungodly amount of European uppercuts to Bate, as well as a barrage of chops to his progressively more red chest. Bate got his licks in though, utilising a similar arsenal on the strike front. 

We got to see all the things that made the universe fall in love with young Tyler, his roll kick, the airplane spin, the Tyler Driver '97, and of course, his waves. It was great to see Bate again, been wondering when he'd pop up next and didn't you just love his surprise appearance in the Royal Rumble and praise be that it was sooner rather than later. I can't wait for some proper UK division programming, but I will gladly settle for popping up on NXT for a bit. 

I really enjoyed this match, and I'd definitely recommend adding it to the watch list, especially to those who enjoyed the UK Championship Tournament.

Also, this was Corey Graves' final time calling NXT, and they put together this lovely video package;

Ring of Honour

Best Match on ROH TV (Episode 280): Marty Scurll vs Juice Robinson - ROH World Television Championship Match

Tilting our gaze now to Ring of Honour, we had a belter of an episode this week; there was a great three way tag team match, a Decade of Excellence tournament match of Jay Lethal against Jay Briscoe, but the best of all was Marty Scurll defending his TV Title against Juice Robinson. In case you didn't know, Juice Robinson is CJ Parker from NXT (that one Owens debuted against), now in New Japan.

Very good match here. Consistent action and well paced wrestling made for a highly entertaining contest. I have to admit, Robinson was much better than I was anticipating him to be, in actual wrestling capabilities and his moveset. He did a big, cool powerbomb at one point with Marty properly bouncing off the mat hard. 

Scurll's villainous antics forever play a key role in his matches, with him just being an arrogant prick at points, as well as being the rules along with Robinson's fingers. I can't get enough Scurll, this signing with ROH has made me a very happy boy indeed, and his champion status has elevated that feeling higher.

I would certainly recommend getting round to watching this, as well as the episode as a whole, 3 great matches in one go. As always, you can watch ROH TV for FREE at both www.rohwrestling.com/tv/current or on the Fite TV app.

EVOLVE 76

Best Match on EVOVLE 76: Chris Hero vs Keith Lee

Taking us back to San Antonio now, it's Chris Hero's final EVOLVE weekend before becoming a full-time NXT competitor. Here he is in this one facing off a debut for the company, and a man we've seen before in Ring of Honour, it's Keith Lee.

We've got big lad versus big lad, so I went in thinking it wasn't going to be the paciest of matches. That was true in some moments, taking things a bit slow, but there were times when these guys cranked it some and started bouncing off them ropes like nobody's business. In fact, I felt that this match was probably a bit faster than most of the card. As I watched I did feel that a lot of the show was plodding along a bit, encouraging me to skip through, but this managed to maintain my attention.

Now, probably the most notable detail about this match was that not only did the top rope break from Hero rebounding off it, but so did the second one after an attempted moonsault of all things from Lee. Only one rope remained by the end, managing to stay out of theses two's way for long enough, the real sole survivor this Royal Rumble weekend. 

Good match here in what felt like one of the lesser EVOLVE shows I've watched, but hey, you take some of the good and some of the bad, and there you have it. 

EVOLVE 77

Best Match on EVOLVE 77: Chris Hero vs Zack Sabre Jr.

It's the next day and it's EVOLVE 77! When I say the next 'day' I really mean it, with this match bathed in the sunlight of the Texan afternoon. You could see the dust in the air floating along. First time seeing something like that I must say. Not quite first half of WrestleMania 31 blinding, but bright enough that you could annoy someone by reflecting it off your watch.

The match itself took to the outside a fair bit, right by the fans, and Hero even tossed Zack into a guy at one point, landing on the litter of the concessions stand. Sabre was fighting from the backfoot for the majority of this match. Whenever he managed to wrap up Hero in a submission hold, Hero would hulk up and power out or find some technical way out of it. 

Zack did exchange strikes with the big man, but mostly ended up landing the many, but not the big. He'd throw a bunch of forearms, and then get floored by a straight jab. Not too sure what he was expecting going into a fight with a man named 'The Knockout Artist'. 

I've seen Hero pull out the Tombstone Piledriver before, but he hit one in this with more tenacity than ever. He spun him round and without delay dropped to his knees and flattened the top of Sabre's head. Vicious. 

The end was tense as all fuck, with Hero's Death Blow not managing to get a 3, and then the following Gotch-style piledriver attempt countered into Sabre contorting Hero's arms and a leg to force a submission. Nasty stuff.

Great match this, and a nice send off to Hero as he travels to Orlando in the hopes of doing better than the first time around, which I am confident will happen, mainly because Chris Hero ain't nothin' to fuck with.

The Verdict

Best Match of the Week: AJ Styles vs John Cena - WWE World Championship Match - Royal Rumble

Yes, this week's best was the Royal Rumble's match of Cena vs Styles. It was fantastic in my eyes, and was just a pleasure to watch. Shout outs to Hero/Sabre and Nakamura/Roode also, with both being great matches too and very much worth a watch.

And with that one done, here's what the leaderboard bares a striking resemblance to. Now, for a segment I'm running short on, it's 'The Best Wrestling Quote of the Week';

'HYAAH' - Akira Tozawa

That's all from me for this week folks, thank you for joining me on this journey everyone. I hope you enjoyed, and feel free to chat with me on the past week in wrestling, or anything about pro wrestling whatsoever. Art is best discussed. I do hope that the next few days are great for you guys, and I hope to see you again soon!

BWOTW: 12/12/16 - 17/12/16

Hey ho there readers, and welcome to 'Noah's Best Wrestling of the Week' AKA 'Worth 1,000 Eva Marie's'

Since Ellsworth's betrayal, Dean has found a much cuter companion

But before we get neckdeep in this shiznits, lets have a quick looksee at what stormed the headlines this week;

1. HOLY SHIT WHAT!? WWE have announced the United Kingdom Championship! January (fuckin' January!) will see a two day tournament to crown the first ever champion. Not only that, it appears there will be a new weekly show, and Nigel McGuinness will be on commentary! GAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH (I'm doing a special on this so stay tuned!)
2. Chris Hero is reportedly coming back to WWE, but there is some debate over he will be known as that or his previous NXT name, 'Kassius Ohno'. What with Kevin Owens being known as 'KO' now, I think there's a strong case for keeping the Hero name
3. Booker T is running for Mayor of Houston, Texas. I wonder if they can dig it.
4. 2016 decided to claim one more victim as Zack Ryder got injured on SmackDown! You bastards!
5. Its being reported the new TNA owners have reached out to Jeff Jarrett to come in and help out. I dunno how much truth there is to it, but supposedly there might be some sort of re-branding with Global Force Wrestling. Fucking hell guys, GFW ain't worth it at this point.

And now for the tinsel on this Chistmas tree of a wrestling blog, it's the matches!

Monday Night RAW

Best Match on RAW (12/12/16): The New Day (Big E & Kofi Kingston) vs The Club (Luke Gallows & Karl Anderson) vs Sheamus & Cesaro
Honourable Mention: The New Day (Big E & Xavier Woods) vs Chris Jericho & Kevin Owens vs Roman Reigns & Rollins

We begin this week with Monday Night RAW centring its focus on the New Day and their quest to etch their names into the history books as the longest reigning WWE Tag Team Champions in history, topping that of Ax & Smash, Demolition, a duo with one of the best entrance themes ever.

This was New Day’s night. Whilst their title run may feel a little stagnant, there’s no denying that they deliver some awesome matches. Pitted against The Club and Sheamus & Cesaro, this too fell under that bracket. We started off with Kofi and Cesaro, showcasing some nice, fluid action to kick start this match. Cesaro was a goddamn machine in this contest, destroying so many things so very well;

Just noticed the last couple times seeing this, Cesaro hooks the leg as he lands with the crossbody; fuckin' slick mate.
I also felt that Gallows and Anderson had a particularly good showing in this contest, getting some big shots in and coming very close to winning the titles, landing double-team manoeuvre after double team manoeuvre. 

In the end however, Sheasaro were inches away from claiming the gold, well bronze, but the power of positivity came knocking and took them back. 

New Day also had another great match in the main event versus two thirds of The Shield, Seth Rollins and Roman Reigns, and the turbulent team of Chris Jericho and Kevin Owens. This episode of RAW certainly reminded me that, New---Day Rocks.

SmackDown! LIVE

Best Match on SD! (13/12/16): Dean Ambrose vs Luke Harper vs The Miz vs Dolph Ziggler - No.1 Contender's Match for the WWE World Championship

Looking to SmackDown! now, and the show stealer here was the elimination fatal-four-way to decide the next challenger for AJ Styles's WWE World Championship. Ambrose. Harper. Miz. Ziggler.

Harper was hands down the MVP of this match. As soon as the bell rang, his tirade of destruction and head rocking began. Superkicks, lariats, suicide dives, the works. Out of all of this, I think my favourite was his 'Get Fucked' boot. 

That's not to say that everyone else under-performed, the other three had their moments and added something to the match. Dean threw in some roughness, Dolph some explosive sequences and Miz some heelish antics.

Overall, I really liked this match. Well paced, everyone looked good in it, no-one was wasted. With Harper's dominance, it's given him a new flavour of danger he's been lacking for a while, glad to see him properly being used. Good stuff.

205 Live

Best Match on 205 Live (13/12/16): Rich Swann vs TJ Perkins

Non-title match headlining 205 Live here, with Cruiserweight Champion Rich Swann facing TJ Perkins. 

I can't remember a whole lot about this match, so please forgive me, but that can be seen as telling of the quality of this match. It wasn't bad per se, just not massively memorable. We had their fairly standard quick grappling with a few high spots dashed in every now and then. 

I hate to say it, but it was a bit of a 'more of the same' type match, what you might expect of these two on an episode of 205 Live. Hopefully the title match at Roadblock will give some zest to the title picture.

WWE Tribute to the Troops

Best Match on TttT: Dolph Ziggler & American Alpha (Jason Jordan & Chad Gable) vs The Wyatt Family (Bray Wyatt, Luke Harper & Randy Orton)

U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!

What with me being British I suppose this show isn't directed at me, but I love wrestling, and big ups to the armed forces. 

Anywho, here we are with a nice six-man tag of The Wyatt Family taking on American Alpha and Dolph Ziggler.

I'm really digging Orton in tag team matches, him being in the ring with these guys is very beneficial. With Orton being a big money player, them looking like a threat and doing legitimate damage on him only elevates the teams he's against. 

All of the Wyatts in a match at once is awesome in my opinion, the dynamics are great, the Harper/Bray following, the Orton/Bray growing teamwork and the slight Harper/Orton animosity.

Alpha are always cool to watch, and I think they've added some new tandem offence to their repertoire. I thought Ziggler meshed quite well with these two, making a nice little team for this one-off match-up.


When it came to the climax, we got to see the super cool Sister Abigail throw into the RKO, and Gable sold it like a motherfucker;




Just noticed how annoyed the ref is in the start of that gif, giggles were made. Taking everything into account, nice match. 

NXT

Best Match on NXT (14/12/16): Bobby Roode vs Oney Lorcan

We're trucking down to Florida now, taking in the sights at Full Sail for this episode of NXT. This episode did feature the Nakamura/Joe steel cage match from the Australia live event, but it really didn't do anything for me. What I was really entertained by though was the match between the glorious Bobby Roode and Oney Lorcan.

Not a massive match, but I really liked it. We had Roode playing his role of big-shot dick really well, slapping the head of Lorcan, taunting him throughout. I'm glad to see Lorcan being used more regularly, and as a bigger contender. Just being put into this match and having a chance at NXT Championship elevates him. 

I tell ya, Lorcan kicked some shit out of Roode in this one, working pretty stiff with his chops and uppercuts. He looked like a real threat taking it to Roode in a pretty major way.

Whilst Roode was on the back foot for what seemed to be the majority of the contest, her sure did make his shots count. There are few things in this world prettier than a Bobby Roode spinebuster;

Ring of Honour

Best Match on ROH TV (Episode 273): Candice LeRae vs Deonna Purazzo

It's a special episode of ROH TV this week, dedicated to the Women of Honour. If I had my way I'd just have the women alongside the rest of the roster on the regular TV show, but hey, I ain't booking.

But anyway, here we are with a good match between Candice LeRae and Deonna Purazzo (yeah, that one who has been on NXT a few times). Quite a mat-based match here, slow and methodical. Deonna focused on the left arm of Candice, weakening it for her Fujiwara armbar. LeRae did have some flurries, landing a pretty sweet looking suicide dive amongst other things. 

It was a good match, but I feel the rest of the episode wasn't that great, which is a shame considering how little the Women of Honour get this spotlight. 

As always, you can watch ROH TV for FREE (zero dimes!) at www.rohwrestling.com/tv/current or on the Fite TV app.

Lucha Underground

Best Match on LU (S3E15): Jack Evans vs PJ Black vs Son of Havoc vs Angelico

This week had more action from the Battle of the Bulls to decide the next challenger to the Lucha Underground Championship. We had Mariposa, Jeremiah Crane, Killshot and Dante Fox doing battle in a great match, but I felt this was beaten in quality by the fatal-four-way between PJ Black, Jack Evans, Angelico and Son of Havoc.

Incredibly fast paced this one, no two ways about it. There was bound to be something awesome going on no matter what point of the match you look at. It's been a while since I've seen Angelico in action, possibly since last year's Battle of Los Angeles tournament, and he's not lost a step.

I'm loving Son of Havoc more and more as I watch him, he's a very entertaining guy. He works best when he's against people like himself in these three competitors, super agile and lucha heavy. 

EVOVLE 74

Best Match on EVOLVE 74: Catch Point (Tracy Williams & Fred Yehi) vs Ricochet & Peter Kaasa - EVOLVE Tag Team Championship Match
Honourable Mention: Chris Hero vs Dick Togo

It's another EVOLVE weekend here on the blog, this first night taking place in New York City. The tag titles are on the line as we see Catch Point representatives Fred Yehi and 'Hot Sauce' Tracy Williams taking on the team of Ricochet and Peter Kaasa. 

It's my first time seeing Kaasa, and he looks like 1980s Scott Steiner; long dark hair, singlet, jacked, plus he's on the flippier side of things. He had a springboard corkscrew moonsault that was a thing of beauty. Ricochet however was king of the high flying in this match though, not sure what else to expect. 

I fucking love Catch Point, I think both Yehi and Williams are criminally underrated. Yehi has a great style with his stomps and targeting of hands and feet, and Williams has an awesome ground and pound moveset. 

I was pretty impressed by Kaasa, though I felt sometimes he felt a bit out of place, not as fluid moving as Ricochet or his opponents, but he made up for that with some feats of strength and some pretty moves. 

I thought this match was awesome, with nice sequences between competitors and there were some great 2-on-1 moments, with momentum swinging both ways. I'd definitely check this one out.

EVOLVE 75

Best Match on EVOLVE 75: Drew Gulak vs Tracy Williams

Second night of the weekend and we are greeted by the main event of Drew Gulak taking on his protege, 'Hot Sauce' Tracy Williams, whose praises were written above.

These guys went fucking hard in this one, nasty strikes with extra mustard and some downright horrifying submissions taking place. Drew pulled Tracy's leg behind his head and sweet Nelly I feel tingly just thinking about it. Gulak manipulated those joints pretty damn brutally, I know it made me wince as I watched. 

As a fan of both of these men, so I was a bit back and forth with who I was rooting for, but I think I marginally leaned towards my boy Gulak. This made the tension a lot greater, as does any match where you have a steak in who you want to win, making all the submission attempts even more fist clenching and exciting. 


This match seemed to go on for fucking ages. Whilst at times it did feel like it was dragging and was maybe too much, there was a feeling of 'how much longer can these guys go?' and I was amazed with their endurance. You sure as shit had a pair of red, sweaty men at the end of this and you can hardly blame them, they left everything in that ring with that massive battle. 

The Verdict

Best Match of the Week: Drew Gulak vs Tracy Williams - EVOLVE 75

Like I said, this match was great. Edge of your seat stuff with the way these guys were going, and I think I preferred this over the tag match from the night before because this had a lot more psychology and story-telling to it, with Williams trying to prove he was no longer in Gulak's shadow, and Gulak on the reverse of the coin aiming to prove himself as being better. 

The RAW tag match was also really great and is worth checking out. as well as New Day's second match that night. With Sheamus and Cesaro winning the opportunity to face them at Roadblock on the Tribute to the Troops show, it gives me something to be pretty excited about on this sorta-okay-ish built Pay-Per-View. 

And with that week collected and catalogued, here is how the leaderboard shapes up nowadays. One last thing, it's time for 'The Best Wrestling Quote of the Week', this time in video format! 

That's all I've got for this week folks, I hope you enjoy the continuing wind down to the holidays and that Roadblock isn't shit. Stay tuned for a BWOTW Special on the UK tournament, but make sure you have a good time whatever you do. Seeya!

BWOTW: 21/11/16 - 26/11/16

Welcome, one and all, to this latest addition to this project of mine I call 'Noah's Best Wrestling of the Week' AKA 'Shinsuke Not-champion-any-mura' 

Fuckin' coooooooooooooooooooool

As customary on this weekly write-y thing, let's first dive into the past 7 days in the form of news...

1. Title changes galore! Samoa Joe is the new NXT Champion (UNBEATABLE POWER OF THE DICK KICK), #DIY are the new NXT Tag Team Champions, Will Ospreay was the new ROH TV Champion, but then Marty Scurll beat him to be the new ROH TV Champion. Looks like the value of gold must've gone up.
2. Expanding on that last one, at Final Battle we are getting Scurll vs Ospreay vs Dragon Lee vs Bobby Fish for the ROH TV Title. Goddamn what a match that should be.
3. Goldberg murdered defeated Lesnar in 1min 26sec. Fucking hell, what a turn of events that was, and I loved it. Not only that, but he announced on RAW that he will be in the Royal Rumble!
4. James Ellsworth is now officially a SmackDown! superstar! What a beautiful journey it has been for this man.
5. Randy Orton has welcomed his new baby girl into the world. The Wyatt Family continues to grow!
6. Meltzer has confirmed that we are getting TakeOver: San Antonio the night before the Royal Rumble. Part of me thinks that might be a bit too soon, though I suppose this isn't the first time we've had this short a gap between TakeOvers ([R]Evolution in November and Rival in January)

And now for the egg in this wrestling blog cake batter, its the matches!

NXT TakeOver: Toronto

Best Match on TakeOver Toronto: The Revival (Dash Wilder & Scott Dawson) vs #DIY (Johnny Gargano & Tommaso Ciampa) - NXT Tag Team Championship Match - 2 Out of 3 Falls
Honourable Mention(s): The whole damn show

SAY YEAH!

These guys once again proved that ‘(Ciampa + Gargano) x The Revival = A Fucking Awesome Match’ and then multiplying that by ‘2 out of 3 falls’, you’ve got a Match of the Year candidate.

I loved this match. The spots in this one were perfectly timed, leaving enough time between to get in some lovely psychology and some old school tag wrestling. The first fall came about after one of the most brutal Shatter Machines I’ve ever witnessed. It was so compact and the angle of Gargano's descent was very steep, with the landing looking super nasty.

The continuation of the working on Gargano's leg was sweet, a lovely call back and made the story of this so much better, especially when we had him reach the ropes when last time he tapped. Beautiful.

My favourite spot was probably in the lead to the third fall when The Revival went to perform DIY's finisher, only to receive a taste of their own medicine;

There was a few pinfalls broken up by tag partners in this one, making it all incredibly tense. Many sighs of relief and frustration filled my living room as I reacted to the endless near-finishes. 

I can't say enough good things about this match. I think it was better than their clash at TakeOver: Brooklyn II and is seriously in the running for 'Best Match of the Year' (make sure to stay posted for my end of year special). Every minute was spectacular, so much tension, the spots were awesome, great psychology with the leg targeting of Gargano and that double submission ending was masterful. I love it!

WWE Survivor Series

Best Match on SS: Team RAW (Kevin Owens, Chris Jericho, Seth Rollins, Roman Reigns & Braun Strowman) vs Team SmackDown! LIVE (AJ Styles, Dean Ambrose, Bray Wyatt, Randy Orton & Shane McMahon)
Honourable Mention(s): Cesaro & Sheamus vs The Usos - Final 2 in the Tag Team Survivors Match

For the past few years, Survivor Series Tag Matches more often than not are a bit thrown together with no proper development. This year I was a lot more invested in it, as well as the women's and tag division ones. I have made clear on here that I haven't really liked how all of Team RAW in each match were dysfunctional and having a lot of in-fighting, putting me firmly in support of Team SmackDown!

When it came down to it, the men's match was fucking awesome. Sure, some shenanigans, but most of the time it they were very entertaining. I would be remissed if I didn't mention that this match had a plethora of high spots that were insane. So, look forward to some gifs and clips of these coming up.

One thing that made this match much better than the other two was the first elimination. Dean Ambrose was the first to go after the better part of 20 minutes. He didn't feel wasted, didn't feel like he was a weak link, and had significance. I appreciate that with the women's and tag team match didn't have the same amount of overall time to work with, but I just felt that that wait until the first elimination made it much more impactful.

Braun was, as predicted by near-everyone, a fucking monster in this match. From his first time stepping into the match to even him leaving after being eliminated, his presence was definitely felt. For example, here he is committing manslaughter on the WWE World Champion, AJ Styles.

They also had him needing to be taken out by a whole host of big moves by multiple people. I've been kinda soured on Orton and the RKO after all the '#OUTTANOWHERE' and memes and stuff, but I have to admit, Orton hit some sick ones in this match, one of which being to the big man himself;



As usual with any match that has 'Shane McMahon' listed as a participant, Shane decided to make like a Voltorb and perform 'Self Destruct', sacrificing a whole lot to put down Strowman even more;

And then, not even that properly put Braun away. He lumbered his way to the ring, but was counted out thanks to good ol' James Ellsworth. I'm glad these two got to interact again, and their little segment backstage earlier on the show did make me chuckle. I feel like Strowman has some good comedy potential in him, luckily that hasn't been done to death yet.

Speaking of death, Shane McMahon again, dying;

That must've taken a hefty amount of wind outta Shane-O, seeing as how he was pinned (i.e. couldn't keep his shoulder down and having to be eliminated by referee's disgression). Say what you will about Shane McMahon but Jesus Hiratio Christ he goes all out every time he's in that ring. 

Remember what I said about Randy's awesome RKOs? Number 2...

I really liked that Wyatt & Orton were the last ones for SmackDown!, this match made them look like a proper team, and it has considerably changed my view on this story with them. I figured Orton would sooner or later turn on Bray and the Wyatts, but looks like he's gonna be here a while. 

This teamwork led to this finale of this spectacular match, with Orton sacrificing himself, and Bray capitalising with a Sister Abigail that looked like he damn near snapped Reigns's head off his shoulders.

Overall, this match was like 50 minutes long. Fair fucks to everyone inolved, especially those lasting right til the end, and those who took astounding bumps in the name of sports entertainment. I thought this was super good, probably my new favourite Traditional Survivor Series Match ever. Definitely look this one if you have the time.

As for the honourable mention, Sheasaro/Usos at the end of the tag match was great. Lovely teamwork on both sides, Sheasaro better be getting some titles soon, I'm beginning to really enjoy this pairing. I started off rooting for SmackDown!, ended up cheering on RAW from that part alone.

Monday Night RAW

Best Match on RAW (21/11/16): Kevin Owens vs Seth Rollins - WWE Universal Championship Match - No Disqualification

Still in the Great White North, it's Monday Night RAW. Main eventing us this week, we've got Kevin Owens defending his big red belt against Seth Rollins in a No DQ match. 

Spot heavy match for you here, with it not taking long at all for weapons to become involved. Seth gets table out, cheers. Owens puts it away, boos. Just a little touch there that I liked a lot. The first big thing I thought was cool was Owens doing his cannonball senton with a chair in front of Rollins. Can't recall him doing that before, and it looked damn sweet. 

Owens was getting his ass kicked for a lot of the match, with him groggily stumbling about more than walking after the first few minutes. Poor Owens was just trying to superplex Seth when he got introduced to furniture.

The duo soon took full advantage of the new game mechanics added to 2K17 this year as they headed through the crowd. Rollins took it one step further though, adding some high risk offence to this match with a big ol' dive.

Once we got back to the ringside, we got a little bit of Jericho interference that led to Owens getting the pinfall victory. He also performed one of his coolest and most horrific moves in his repetoire, the apron powerbomb AKA The Zayn Killer.

Nice match here, a good chunk of weapon use and more extreme spots. Good if you're looking for a fast paced little something to fill the time.

SmackDown! LIVE

Best Match on SD! (22/11/16): The Miz vs Kalisto - WWE Intercontinental Championship Match

It's the Money Show now, $mackDown! LIVE.

The Miz is once again popping up on this li'l blog o' mine, defending his championship against Kalisto.

Kalisto took it right to Miz in this one, flurries of kicks and quick action kept the masked man on top for the majority. This wasn't a terribly long match, with Corbin interfering in it, attempting to attack Kalisto, only for him to counter but get given the Skull Crushing Finale by Miz to finish. 

It's nice that Kalisto is getting back on track, receiving a spot on the Survivor Series card for the Cruiserweight Championship, and now getting show as a legitimate threat to the Intercontinental Championship. Hopefully we get going places soon.

Not a huge match here, but it was good for the time it had and did it's job well.

NXT

Best Match on NXT (23/11/16): Aliyah, Liv Morgan & Ember Moon vs Billie Kay, Peyton Royce & Daria Berenato

Just a little taping before TakeOver this week, headlined by the only proper women's storyline going at the minute, with Billie Kay and Peyton Royce finding a partner in Dario Berenato to take on the newfound alliance of Liv Morgan, Aliyah and Ember Moon.

We had Royce and Kay doing some solid double team work, which gives me hope that one day we'll get some Women's Tag Team Championships, but baby steps, seeing as they're the only proper team at the minute. 

Ember did her always cool stuff, springboard, gymnastics, flips, the works. Whilst she hasn't had a whole lot by way of substantial match time, her showing off/time to shine is still very exciting to watch. We keep getting Otunga preaching that Naomi is the most athletic woman in WWE, but to me, Ember is. 

There's one thing I love about Daria; her double leg takedown. It has a mix of power and strength as well as being quite funny to me. Double leg takedown is meant to be a lead into something else, but Daria doing it to straight up destroy someone is awesome. 

Also on this episode of NXT, SAnitY wrecked shop and we got to see Eric Young's fucking deadly finisher;

Ring of Honour

Best Match on ROH TV (Episode 270): The Kingdom (Matt Taven, TK O'Ryan & Vinny Marseglia) vs Team CMLL (Hechicero, Okumura & Ultimo Guerrero) - ROH Six Man Tag Team Title Tournament

It's more action from the Six Man Tag tournament this week, featuring Team CMLL taking on the new and reformed Kingdom. 

I dunno what to make of this new Kingdom so far, I always preferred Mike Bennett to Taven, and I haven't much an opinion on O'Ryan or Marseglia, other than that they're solid in the ring. 

Team CMLL were my highlight of this match. Hechicero was pretty damn badass in this one, just through sheer dominance and his encouragement to be chopped, taking his straps from his gear down. Ultimo is also real cool, he has this awesome moveset and it gets the crowd very excitable and loud. I'm not massively liking Okumura, he just doesn't appear to do a whole lot, but overall I feel Team CMLL were better recieved and better acknowledging of the crowd this time around. 

Solid match here which saw The Kingdom come out on top, meaning that the finals of this tournament will see them face ACH, KUSHIDA and Jay White for the titles at Final Battle on Friday 2nd December, finally back at the Hammerstein Ballroom. I am so excited to see that arena decked out with wrestling once more. 

Lucha Underground

Best Match on LU (S3E12): Killshot vs Dante Fox

Holy shit we got some crazy stuff in this match. First the WMD match with Marty 'The Moth' Martinez, now this; Killshot is so good at matches for bitter rivalries. 

This was super high paced, with both these men extremely gifted on the athletic side, flips, strikes and leaps aplenty, all the good things you can expect from Lucha Underground. There were a fair few high spots in this one, the most hard hitting of which was this Death Valley Driver off the top rope onto the apron.  

Fox must've felt that one in the morning.

Another awesome moment saw Fox then afterwards kick out of Killshot's finisher, which surprised me as well as those in attendance at The Temple. 

I really liked this match, its just that I'm not retainig much else writing this at the moment, so apologies to you dear reader, I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me. Anyway...

EVOLVE 72

Best Match on EVOLVE 72: Chris Hero vs Tracy Williams

I finally caught a somewhat up to date EVOLVE show! With my return to EVOLVE saw the match of 'Hot Sauce' Tracy Williams (God I love that nickname) taking on Chris Hero. 

We kicked things off straight away with a German suplex from Williams, which was damn awesome if I do say so. As with any Chris Hero match up, you can expect some nasty looking strikes. Tonight was no exception with him landing a plethora of thundering elbows, straights and kicks. However, Tracy also landed his own mean chops that were stiff as mahogany. 

My favourite moment of this match saw Hero drop Williams directly on his head with a mean looking piledriver. However, the crowning moment of this was Williams kicking out after the ref had counted just a 1. I always pop for 1 counts, though I'm glad that they're as rare as they are, lest they be done to death.

The end too had quite a shock factor to it too. Tracy had Hero locked in the Crossface submission hold and made him tap! All of Hero's losses have a certain weight to them, which is a testament to how well he has been conveyed over the years, what with him being booked pretty damn strong, possessing an incredible intimidating form and his new schtick demanding to be introduced as 'The Greatest of All Time'. And we all know, Chris Hero ain't nothin' to fuck with.

EVOLVE 73

Best Match on EVOVLE 73: Chris Hero vs Matt Riddle (Hero/Riddle III)
Honourable Mention(s): Drew Gulak vs Zack Sabre Jr.

It's the end of this trilogy of Hero and Riddle, two men who are just ridiculously good. One thing I wanted to add, first time I've seen Riddle in black trunks, looks kinda strange I have to say seeing as he doesn't wear anything else other than his shorts. 

Hero lands a Yakuza kick to get us underway, because the best tactics involve your boot in the face of your opponent. A lot more grappling and technical wrestling than Hero's match the night before with Williams, with Riddle's MMA coming into play here. 

But, there was still a fuck tonne of booming hits. Hero hit one elbow so hard that it sent Riddle out of the ring and to the floor. Awesome. Responding to these strikes was a great moment for Riddle later on. He stood up to Hero, 'Bro-ing up' as I put it, shouting 'Bro!' as to urge Hero to keep hitting him and hitting him, countering finally with his own mad sequence of strikes. This defiance wasn't throughout though, with Riddle getting laid the fuck out when an elbow met his face off a springboard dive in my highlight of the match.

The ending was goddamn destructive. Hero, renowned for utilising the piledriver, delivered two in a row two put Riddle to bed and finish this awesome match. With each match, Riddle rises in the rankings of my favourites. Bro!

The honourable mention here was a great match too. Gulak faced Sabre in a mat classic, a pure technical wrestling spectacle, with these guys going a good half hour just wrestling. Beautiful stuff.

The Verdict

Best Match of the Week: The Revival (Dash Wilder & Scott Dawson) vs #DIY (Johnny Gargano & Tomasso Ciampa) - NXT Tag Team Championship Match

God what a fucking match this was. All out emotion and nerves overcame me watching this, haven't felt like that in a while now. One of the best tag matches I can remember, certainly of this year hands down. Revival, although I was desperate for you to lose the titles, there is no denying that you have made tag wrestling in NXT amazing to watch.

The Survivor Series match was also incredible, just not as much as the NXT match though. It surpassed all my expectations and was a very memorable match, one of the best main roster matches this year, and in Survivor Series history.

And with that, we can chalk up the leaderboard with these results so that in now looks like this here link.

Get ready for a double whammy now, it's 'The Best Wrestling Quote(s) of the Week'!;

Byron, why dont you take a bus to Alaska and stay there the rest of your life - JBL

Monkeys! MOOOONKEEEYS! - Kevin Owens

That just about does it from me for this span of time we call a week folks. Get ready for another big week next time, with Final Battle and the debut episode of 205 Live! Really looking forward to these, I cannae wait pal. Hope you all have a lovely time and treat yourself, try and make yourself one really good sandwich sometime, you deserve it.