Tuesday, April 5, 2016

Fave Five 3/28/16-4/3/16

1) Shinsuke Nakamura: WrestleMania weekend always features some big moments. I know that Roman Reigns won the WWE Title but a lot more than just accomplishments goes into picking my top choice. Shinsuke Nakamura made his long awaited debut at TakeOver: Dallas and more than stole the show. Nakamura got to be himself and faced Sami Zayn in what should go down as a classic. It was the best match I've seen in the WWE since Bayley vs. Sasha last year and not since Punk/Cena at MITB 2011 before that. Nakamura got a big win and came off like a major star throughout the entire match. On a weekend full of good to great wrestling, this was easily the best thing I saw the entire time. If you haven't watched the match already, go do so. Nakamura is a star.

2) Zack Sabre Jr.: One of the only guy to have multiple wins over WrestleMania weekend was Zack Sabre Jr. Will Ospreay and Ricochet did so as well, but only Sabre went 3-0. First, he took on Ospreay in an absolutely thrilling match that should be big in helping get the greatness that is British wrestling, over in America. That was at Evolve 58. At Evolve 59 he continued his "Best in the World" series by defeating Matt Riddle in another highly touted match. Then, to top it all off, at the WWN Supershow "Mercury Rising", Sabre beat the one man that he hasn't been able to defeat, Chris Hero. It was a huge weekend for Sabre, who should be nearing another shot at the Evolve Championship soon. 2016 might just be the year of Sabre.

3) American Alpha: Again, there were plenty of good to great matches throughout the weekend. Charlotte won a great women's match and nearly made the list. However, I'm going with American Alpha here. They got things kick started for the WWE by opening TakeOver: Dallas with a win in a great match against the Revival. It not only marked the first NXT Tag Team Title win for the duo but it also showed that NXT was finally set to give the belts to the right team. They never did it with Enzo Amore and Colin Cassady but putting the straps on Chad Gable and Jason Jordan was absolutely the right move.

            4) Roman Reigns: Normally, winning the WWE World Title at WrestleMania would easily earn you the top spot. However, as noted earlier, this list is about more than accomplishments. The quality of that main event match was pretty bad, hurting Roman Reigns' chances of ranking higher. Still, he did win the main event of Wrestle freaking Mania, so I couldn't completely leave him off. Reigns captured his third WWE World Heavyweight Title in the span of five months, complete with a cocky smile to the fans as he celebrated. For the first time of those three title wins, it seems like this one will actually lead to a sustained run with the title. I'm curious about how they play this and who his challengers will be.

5) Zack Ryder: If you would have told me a week ago that I'd be putting Zack Ryder ahead of the likes of Sami Zayn, Sasha Banks, Kevin Owens, Asuka, Finn Balor, Will Ospreay, AJ Styles and tons of others, I would have laughed at you. I even wrote in my predictions that Ryder had no chance to win the Intercontinental Title. But he did. Ryder overcame Owens, Zayn, Stardust, Sin Cara, Miz and Dolph Ziggler to capture his first Intercontinental Title, capping a great match with a feel good moment for the fans who have seen Ryder get a whole bunch of nothing since the start of 2012.