Tuesday, July 12, 2016

Fave Five 7/4/16-7/10/16

1) The Revival: The best match of the week was easily the 2 out of 3 falls NXT Tag Team Title main event. The Revival and American Alpha are two of the best tag teams in the world and they have showed why this year. After a really good match at TakeOver: Dallas, they bested it with an awesome one at TakeOver: The End, trading the titles. This week, they finished off their series with a tiebreaking two out of three falls match. The Revival won and remained the champions in what was the second best match of the trilogy. I love how, in a world where everyone is talking about wrestling evolving and getting with the times, two tag teams went out and had excellent matches by going 80's tag style.

2) Broken Matt Hardy: There was absolutely no reason for TNA's Final Deletion to entertain us the way it did. Matt Hardy and Jeff Hardy are two guys that are WAY past their primes and two guys that I'm not interested in seeing in high profile matches or returning to the WWE. However, what they did this week was all kinds of awesome. This storyline was so incredibly over the top and TNA did the right thing with it. They realized that for it to work, you had to go all the way. This was one of the most ridiculous things I've ever seen and I was massively entertained by every second. Matt's win wasn't even why I really put him here. His delivery on each line, facial expression and mannerism was spot on. Give me the Final Deletion over food fights and shit like the ROH Global Wars ending every day of the week.

3) Son of Havoc: Ultima Lucha Dos began this week and the first installment focused on Dario Cueto's "4 A Unique Opportunity" Tournament. While the best match of the evening saw Cage and the Mack in a Falls Count Anywhere rematch from the original Ultima Lucha, Son of Havoc was the star of the night. He beat and bloodied Texano in a Boyle Heights Bar Fight to advance to a finals against the Mack. The match with the Mack was short and disappointing but Havoc pulled out the win to win the tournament. It was a defining moment for a guy that lost a ton of singles matches early on before finding his place in Trios matches. Dario's opportunity was a choice between $250,000 or a Lucha Underground Title shot at Ultima Lucha Tres. Havoc picked the latter but then lost the opportunity when he lost to the debuting Dr. Wagner Jr. Still, it was a strong showing for Havoc.

4) American Alpha: I realize that they didn't win back the NXT Tag Team Titles but that's okay in this situation. They main evented NXT TV this week and once again took part in an awesome tag team match against the Revival. They deserve a ton of credit for participating in tag team excellence. These guys are incredibly good and, along with the Revival, are among my picks for the five best tag teams in wrestling (reDRagon is first if you wondered). Give me these 80's style tag matches any and every day of the week.

5) Zack Ryder: Won as part of the Raw main event before beating former World Champion Sheamus on Smackdown.