5 Ups & 4 Downs From WWE NXT (Aug 12)
2. The Vignettes
WWE did, however, produce a number of fine vignettes.
NXT does this sort of thing way better than both Raw and SmackDown. Throughout the two hours, there were short vids for Adam Cole vs. Pat McAfee, Kushida, Cameron Grimes, Dakota Kai vs. Io Shirai, Finn Bálor, Johnny Gargano/Candice LeRae, Ridge Holland and Timothy Thatcher.
Every single one had purpose, didn't kick the arse out of things in terms of length and either pushed forward a character's motives or their TakeOver XXX involvement. This is definitely something Bruce Prichard should start doing on Monday and Friday nights. He's guilty of ignoring certain workers when they don't have an in-person match or segment.
Prichard has been around the horn, so he knows how valuable these vignettes can be. It'd be nice to see more on them on Raw and SmackDown, especially if they're kept simple like NXT's ones this week. This is a tried-and-tested way of developing talent.