4 Ups And 3 Downs From Last Night's WWE NXT (Oct 21)

1. No Gold On The Show It's hard to tell an effective story without seeing the goal that the characters seek to attain, the prize for which the battle lines are being drawn. The challengers received all the attention last night, and most of them were baring their teeth. Alexa Bliss stomped over Payton Royce with new-found aggression and Dawson & Wilder demolished Enzo & Cass in a post-match attack. The announcers did their job of bigging up the challengers, telling the audience that the champs were being put 'on notice' but there was a slight problem with that storytelling. We never got to see any champs. The audience's memory is quick to fade. Without seeing the champions react to such displays of aggression, their impact will quickly fade. Having champion and challenger trade wins with jobbers on separate shows (like the Vaudevillains and D&W have done the past two weeks) is fine, but nowhere near as effective as seeing them share the ring for a staredown, or a nice promo-interrupting beating. As the wise philosopher Kevin Owens once said, "I'll fight, but I fight for a prize" and without a single piece of gold making an appearance, the show glittered a lot less.