A Mid-Card Championship For NXT

[Jack-Hammer]

I haven't read anything as of yet in regards to forums rules specifically regarding spoilers, I imagine that such things will come about later on as Sly and KB are still really just getting the forum together. At any rate, this was broken on WWE.com minutes ago so WWE is sort of "spoiling" it for us.

According to the site, William Regal announced during tonight's NXT TV tapings that the NXT North American Championship will be introduced at NXT TakeOver: New Orleans. The inaugural champion will be determined via a ladder match consisting of Ricochet, EC III, Adam Cole, Velveteen Dream, Lars Sullivan and Killian Dane.

Well this suddenly came out of nowhere. If this involved the main roster, there'd have most likely been some buzz about this for at least a few weeks but they usually keep things pretty tight lipped when it comes to NXT. The line up for this match looks to be pretty wide open, though I'm sure a favorite or two will emerge over the coming weeks via episodes of NXT.

[Theo]

Count me in. I think the NXT roster is plenty deep to host a midcard championship. I'd even say there's enough talent to increase the show time to 90 minutes, but lets not get ahead of ourselves.

Honestly I could say pretty much any of these six guys winning. EC3 or Ricochet would have to be considered the favorites as they are the newest addition to the roster. Cole is arguably the biggest name in the match, so you have to figure his chances are pretty high as well. I'm going to count out Dain and Lars as they will be there for the big guy spots and add some destruction. And that leaves us with Velveteen Dream. If I was a betting man and had to place money on someone I feel is going to win, he's my pick. His character is picking up momentum right now and a championship victory over the names above would fit the whole "what's my name" thing he is running with. Plus I think he would make the best champ of the group as he is the most interesting of the pack.

[Uncle Sam]

This idea is very "first reply to a thread about what additions you'd like to see NXT before everybody points out it's a bad idea." There are three main problems.

Firstly, who of the six competitors reported to be in the match for the title - Dream, Dain, Cole, Ricochet, EC3 and Lars - aren't worthy of the NXT title? Midcard titles are inherently nonsensical (you'd have a North American champion in, say, judo, as well as a world champion because they're adjudicated by different organisations and you only have a big international competition every other year - the best judo competitors don't travel around the world together and compete against each other every week like professional wrestlers do) but let's park my more pedantic tendencies for a minute. Those are all main event players, not just in NXT, but potentially on the main roster. It's entirely possible for a professional wrestler to hold two belts at the same time but this just feels like an excuse to keep top talent away from the main event. One of NXT's best aspects is how concise it is, and how logical it is, and how pushes up the card come at organic times. There's no need to double the distance between bottom of the card and top.

Then, there's already a second title for male competitors in NXT, the UK Championship, and they've been doing a great job at making it different, not lesser - a rare feat indeed. Granted, an odd amount of non-UK competitors have been challenging for it of late, but matches for it always feel significant, partly because they're rare, partly because of Pete fucking Dunne. Another belt, one decidedly lesser than the main NXT title but evidently on the same level as the UK Championship, makes the UK Championship look less special and - if I can indulge my paranoia for a little while - risks pushing it off cards completely.

Finally, the women of NXT still only have one belt. Which is fine, they only have enough people to support one belt. But steps to improve gender equality seem disingenuous when you lavish the male competitors with belt after belt and the female competitors still only have one to compete over. My progressive solution: stop making needless god damn belts.

But I'm sure the belt will look pretty sweet (it's not the main roster so it won't be, I dunno, the UK Championship but turquoise) and NXT has a track record of turning things that I'm doubtful of into roaring successes, so here's hoping we look back on this as another thing on the long list of things I was laughably wrong about. Who knows, maybe this is just a long game to get Pete Dunne to murder the eventual champion and eat the belt like a particularly large, leathery piece of linguine. That I would be on board with.

[Yaz]

Sam makes a fine point about the silliness of midcard titles. They are an accepted part of wrestling, but they often make little sense. Sure, tag team titles are fine, they represent a different form of wrestling. Same with a Hardcore title. A Cruiser/Lightweight title, at least adds in a weight division. Having a midcard title that has no distinguishing features from the World Title, aside from the level of push the wrestlers competing for it achieve, has no point.

This is going to stick around for two big reasons though. 1) People will see a title match and assume it is a big deal, drawing in more casuals. Casuals like shiny trinkets. 2) It allows the writing staff to be lazy. Instead of writing compelling midcard feuds, they can just throw a random belt into the mix and forget having actual reasons for the two men to fight.

[Uncle Sam]

Can you really label anybody that pays $13.85 (or $9.99 if you're in the United States) a month to watch this show a "casual" though? The point of NXT has become to appeal to the more, ahem, distinguished wrestling fan.

[Spidey]

I think we've finally ran out of ways to say "This belt is 'Merican". So kudos to WWE running the gamut there.

[Yaz]

Can you really label anybody that pays $13.85 (or $9.99 if you're in the United States) a month to watch this show a "casual" though? The point of NXT has become to appeal to the more, ahem, distinguished wrestling fan.

Appeal to more casuals would have been the better phrase. At the end of the day, it is still about making money and bringing in the most viewers will do that.

[Jack-Hammer]

Sam makes a fine point about the silliness of midcard titles. They are an accepted part of wrestling, but they often make little sense. Sure, tag team titles are fine, they represent a different form of wrestling. Same with a Hardcore title. A Cruiser/Lightweight title, at least adds in a weight division. Having a midcard title that has no distinguishing features from the World Title, aside from the level of push the wrestlers competing for it achieve, has no point.

This is going to stick around for two big reasons though. 1) People will see a title match and assume it is a big deal, drawing in more casuals. Casuals like shiny trinkets. 2) It allows the writing staff to be lazy. Instead of writing compelling midcard feuds, they can just throw a random belt into the mix and forget having actual reasons for the two men to fight.

Maybe I'm setting myself up for disappointment, but I've got faith in Triple H. I mean, he's been in charge of NXT for all this time and we've seen how much of a treat NXT is so I don't expect any bad habits from the main roster to rub off on him over the addition of another championship.

I'm also wondering if this means WWE is moving forward on something more permanent for the UK Championship in terms of the program that was going to be produced once upon a time in the UK.

[smarkmouth]

I'm going to try and be optimistic on this as well. While I could expand on the pros of NXT keeping the championship picture simple, a midcard championship was absolutely inevitable. We could hope against it, but we had to know it was coming sooner or later. Triple H hasn't given me many reasons to think that NXT wouldn't do something like this if it couldn't pull it off well.

One concern I will indulge a little here is that I hope that midcard rivalries don't fall to the creative wayside. NXT has built some really excellent midcard feuds, I suspect that's because without a championship to fight over, the creative team has been forced to think outside the box about why these wrestlers are fighting. Would Velveteen have obsessed for Aleister's acknowledgment into the point of violence? Would Tomasso Ciampa's rage have forced him rip out the heart of NXT by getting Johnny Wrestling fired? Or would we just get a few more North American Championship contests?

Fuck, now that I articulated it, my pessimism outweighs my optimism.

[Undying]

I would have preferred just keeping the UK title as a special attraction during takeovers. Doesnâ??t have to be on NXT every week but Dunne coming in every few months or so to defend it like he does now is good enough.

It was mentioned already but mid card titles just offer nothing of value anymore. The intercontinental title used to be the stepping stone to the World Title. It was a great way to test the waters so to speak with an and coming main eventer. Now for as long as I can probably remember itâ??s been seen as something to keep the other main event guys busy because the world title scene is occupied. Miz has done a great job and is clearly trying to up its prestige but if the creative team sees it as nothing more than a way to throw some guys together that they canâ??t think of anything else for, then he can only carry it so far.


Itâ??s not to say NXT wouldnâ??t make this North American Championship mean something important, it just feels like a way to give other guys something to do that should otherwise be wrestling for the top title.

[klunderbunker]

I know the general answer is going to be something about having too many times, but here's the thing: NXT has managed to make almost anything work. They know how to do great things with almost anything and if they give this the time (which they will), it's going to work. NXT has a solid midcard and a lot of those people need something to do. I don't hate this idea and it has some potential, though it likely spells the end of the UK Title.

[mooseman]

I'm all for a mid-card nXt title however instead of the "North American" title I would have gone with 'The Network" title similar to the old TV title. With the rule to make it different than the other nXt titles is that it is to be defending every week. Add 30 minutes to the show.

[Darkest Timeline]

One way I could see this belt being valuable is that it could offer a wider array of talents the opportunity to hold gold in NXT. Lets face it- the expansion to the current touring and Takeover format has basically necessatated that the main title holder be a guy who already possessed international clout, name value, and drawing power prior to entering WWE. Not since Dallas has a mostly WWE creation been champ. The champs aren't developmental talents, they're guys who are on temporary NXT stays to polish themselves in the WWE style. Guys like Lars or Velveteen represent something different, they are mostly creations of the WWE machine, and it would be nice to see an extra stage to showcase that type of home built talent, instead of locking them under a glass ceiling.

[Undying]

The ladder match for the North American Championship has been set for Takeover and the participants are EC3, Velveteen Dream, Adam Cole, Lars Sullivan, Killian Dain and Ricochet. That's quite a group of talent and i'm having trouble picking a favorite to win. EC3 sounds like the best option on paper as an arrogant wrestler winning a title is always entertaining to see and I feel he can do a lot more for it storyline wise. You also have Velveteen Dream who became one of the most must see wrestlers on NXT seemingly over night with a classic against Aleister Black and another outstanding outing against Johnny Wrestling. Adam Cole needs a big win sometime soon as he hasn't had much luck since picking up the win for his team in WarGames. Then you have the debuting Ricochet and two monsters in Lars and Dain.

I'm going with EC3, but I wouldn't complain about really any of these guys winning the title. There's really not a bad option and that makes me excited.

[Jack-Hammer]

A video has been released of Triple H revealing the NXT North American Championship belt. www.wrestlinginc.com/wi/news/2018/0403/638565/triple-h-reveals-wwe-nxt-north-american-title-belt-video/

My first impression, based on what we see in the video, is that it's definitely on the ugly side. Maybe it's something that'll grow on me and I'll get into more once better images from different angles are shown. How a title looks isn't the most important thing in the world, but Triple H is pretty hit and miss when it comes to designs. There just doesn't look like there's a whole lot of symmetry between the title plates and the leather strap itself. The strap sorta puts me in mind of a real old school design, sort of like how the strap for the Mid-Atlantic United States Heavyweight Championship looked during the 70s. I figured they'd work the actual North American continent into the design but I dunno, I'm just sorta underwhelmed by the whole thing right now.

Still, what matters really is making good use of the title and champion so if that's good, it's all good.