7 Ups And 3 Downs From NXT TakeOver: WarGames

4. Baszler Getting Desperate

shayna baszler
WWE.com

Upon debuting in NXT, Shayna Baszler was dominant, running through everyone en route to winning the NXT Women’s Championship.

She didn’t show any cracks in the armor until Kairi Sane defeated her for the title this summer. Since then, Shayna has had to rely on her UFC Horsewomen stablemates to help her out, despite still being a dominant heel.

Does that mean she’s less effective? No, it means others, particularly Sane, is stepping up more and more to her, which we saw on Saturday with Kairi attacking Baszler at the bell in their 2/3 falls match. Sane not only hung with Shayna, she overcame the odds in the early going to tie the match at one fall apiece before falling short.

Even then, it was Baszler converting an Insane Elbow into a rollup that was the difference. There was no dominant win from the Submission Magician, just an escape with the title. And that made a really good match even better under the surface.

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Contributor
Contributor

Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.