6 Ups And 3 Downs From NXT TakeOver: Chicago

1. Women’s Match Falls Flat

When your titleholder is a dominant, badass heel, you need the challenger to be just as tough and a bit of a daredevil to have a shot.

Unfortunately, Shayna Baszler versus Nikki Cross didn’t meet that goal. The NXT Women’s Championship match has to be termed a disappointment, despite the storyline they attempted to tell, with Nikki unfazed by Shayna and constantly daring her to hit her again. Baszler was tentative at times, but never fully viewed Cross as a threat – and neither did the fans, even though they cheered her on.

Perhaps it’s Baszler’s limitations – she’s an MMA fighter-turned-wrestler with less than three years of wrestling under her belt. She’s capable, but not the prodigy that a young Brock Lesnar was. And Cross was never going to be able to match her with high-impact moves. Once you got past the “Nikki Cross is crazy and playing mindgames” phase of things, there wasn’t much there.

But hey, they can’t all be winners.