Setting the Bar High: Ranking Every Match from the NXT TakeOvers before WrestleMania
As WWE's minor league brand soars in popularity and swells in roster size, NXT has found itself moving out of the tiny arena at Full Sail University and into the same buildings that host things like Monday Night RAW, SmackDown, and some pay-per-view events.
Each and every time that happens, whether it's the Friday or Saturday before that weekend's big main roster event on Sunday, the NXT crew seems to be daring the stars of WWE's red and blue brands to follow what they just did, a trend which started with NXT TakeOver: Brooklyn, but which really kicked into gear at NXT TakeOver: Dallas, the same weekend as WrestleMania 32.
Thus far, NXT has only presented two TakeOver events during WrestleMania weekend, with NXT TakeOver: New Orleans becoming the third; today we rank the matches where NXT dared WWE to up their WrestleMania game and tried to become the WrestleMania weekend MVPs.
#10 Austin Aries vs. Baron Corbin
Two men made their NXT in-ring debut at NXT TakeOver: Dallas; one man stole the show before he and his opponent even touched, and the other was Austin Aries.
The match wasn't bad, necessarily, and calling it the lowest-ranked match on a WrestleMania weekend TakeOver special is not an attack; however, the match did not come across as anything completely special and the two men failed to really click in a way that made Aries' "underdog" win truly click ("underdog" in quotes because promo packages had painted him as the legendary professional wrestler coming to show up the inexperienced Lone Wolf, who has only ever known WWE).
Fans who had not followed Aries throughout the independent circuit and during his time in TNA were left baffled at the pomp and circumstance that accompanied his debut; again, the match was not bad, but it was also not befitting the weeks of hype that surrounded A Double's debut in a WWE-owned ring.