Is the empire crumbling before our eyes?

[Matt D]

One match. One payday. Put Nyla over. Promoted well it could get buzz. AEW needs just a constant flow/stream of buzz and this could fill a slot and get some media if they do it right.

[Superstar Sleeze]

Nia Jax is so much better than Nyla it is not even close. Nyla is one of the worst power wrestlers I have ever seen in my life. She wrestles so small. The amount of bumping she did for Riho was so terrible. There's a difference between Vader bumping for Sting and for the size of someone like Riho. An easy example of a great, extreme David vs Goliath match is Undertaker vs Rey Mysterio at Royal Rumble 2010. Undertaker was not going over on Sunset Flips for Rey Rey. It is not just Nyla. I just watched Britt Baker go over for a Northern Light Suplex from Riho. It is just disrespectful to the interesting stories they can tell. If you dont respect size differences then you ruin the uniqueness of everyone. What makes Rey interesting is how he figures out how to get people into the 619 without disrespecting the size differential. In addition to wrestling small, Nyla also has very weak offensive commensurate with her size. The notion of Nia jobbing to her makes me very sad.  

I know I am the lone Nia Jax fan apparently on the planet, but I think she has been grossly underrated. Look I wish she was safer of course. I dont want anyone to be injured, but how is she any different than Stan Hansen who was notoriously unsafe. It seems hypocritical to decry one not the other. Stan Hansen has two points in his favor: 1. it is always easier to watch things historically rather than watch an injury happen in real-time. 2. Injury reports were more scant and a lot of his opponents most likely just worked through it so we dont know the extent of how much damage Hansen did. 

Is Nia Jax as good as Hansen or Vader? Hell No. Is she the best American Power Wrestler of her generation? Hell Yeah! Her match with Rousey was terrific and grossly underrated. Her work around WrestleMania against Tamina was some of the best Mid-South Hoss Battles I have seen in a while. I loved her shoot-style shit against Charlotte. Her run in the Men's Royal Rumble was super fun years back. Nia Jax trucking fools when it was safe was super fun. Another underrated aspect of Nia Jax is her verbal selling. She was one of the best verbal sellers, male or female in recent memory. It is not even the my hole stuff which was fun. Her last appearance when Shayna "broke her arm" is some of the most compelling acting I have seen a wrestler do in a long time. It really made the viewer feel uncomfortable at what was about to happen and feel sympathy for her. It was really strong. 

Is Nia Jax dangerous? Yes. There is a way to be a great power wrestler and be safe. She needs to work on that. Outside of the danger, Nia Jax is a great pro wrestler. She is the best Goliath I have seen in US wrestling since Awesome Kong's run in TNA. Her offense looks like a million bucks, she knows how to modulate amount she bumps for a given opponent, she knows how to have heated battles with opponents with struggle and is a great struggle. 

I would be really sad if Nia Jax never wrestled again, but I understand her personal reasons and also it doesnt seem like she is wanted. In a world that doesnt have any great female power wrestlers, it would be a big loss, but  again if she is having mental health troubles and no grassroots fanbase I would understand hanging it up.

 

[El-P]

31 minutes ago, Superstar Sleeze said:

Nia Jax is so much better than Nyla it is not even close. Nyla is one of the worst power wrestlers I have ever seen in my life. She wrestles so small. The amount of bumping she did for Riho was so terrible. 

That's a totally prescriptive view of how she *should* work as opposed to what she actually does and how it is executed and how it is accepted. The Riho vs Rose matches were and still are some of the best AEW women matches in the company's history. Yes, Roses bumps a lot. That's her choice. The idea of working "big" or "small" really doesn't register for me at all.  Whatever works work. By that reasoning, Vader was a really shit worker, because it's not like he was bumping a lot for Sting, he was bumping a lot for small Fujinami in the 80's and for Owen in WWF and for everybody really. That was his style and actually what made him stand out and part of what produced so many great matches. And did that hurt his aura at all ? Of course not. I'm not saying Nyla is close to Vader, but really who is anyway.

31 minutes ago, Superstar Sleeze said:

She is the best Goliath I have seen in US wrestling since Awesome Kong's run in TNA. Her offense looks like a million bucks, she knows how to modulate amount she bumps for a given opponent, she knows how to have heated battles with opponents with struggle and is a great struggle. 

Ok now I'm personally offended !  Nia is clumsy as hell, nothing she does looks any good (that legdrop spot has to be the most pathetic looking ever), her timing is not very good, and her execution is ok at very best. She's got the easiest job in the world because let's be real, playing big monster who doesn't bump much is the easiest thing to do, and she's not even good at it. She's like, decent, when she's in with someone who will make it look decent. I often compared her to Eagle Sawaii and really, she was not even there, and Sawaii is like a fourth rate Nakano. Awesome Kong ? Come on now, it's like comparing the Miz to Misawa. 

[sek69]

I'm always going to be sympathetic to someone dealing with mental health issues, but at the same time you can't be surprised she's not super popular when she has such a storied track record of being sloppy and dangerous.

I do think if she were to go somewhere like AEW and was able to take advantage of some real training instead of the garbage they do at the PC she probably would show Tay Conti levels of improvement and be the Awesome Kong level of monster.

[El-P]

47 minutes ago, Matt D said:

One match. One payday. Put Nyla over. Promoted well it could get buzz.

Negative buzz, for sure. She's up there at the top of the list of people I *don't* want to see in AEW (or elsewhere, really).

[Matt D]

1 minute ago, El-P said:

Negative buzz, for sure. She's up there at the top of the list of people I *don't* want to see in AEW (or elsewhere, really).

Good thing they don't have to worry about you then.

[El-P]

9 minutes ago, sek69 said:

I do think if she were to go somewhere like AEW and was able to take advantage of some real training instead of the garbage they do at the PC she probably would show Tay Conti levels of improvement and be the Awesome Kong level of monster.

She has no shot whatsoever if she trained with Chigusa Nagayo for a hundred years. She's 37, she's been pampered her all career because of who her cousin is, she has no will to improve as showed by her actually declining work over the years and she obviously thinks she's a big star.

4 minutes ago, Matt D said:

Good thing they don't have to worry about you then.

I think I'm actually pretty representative of the tastes of the core fans of the promotion and I highly doubt the AEW audience in its majority would be excited about Nia Jaxx showing up. 

[NintendoLogic]

I don't want to see Nia within a million miles of AEW. First of all, she's a terrible power wrestler. Her inability to lift up even much smaller opponents is a big part of why she's so unsafe. How many times did she dump Asuka and Kairi on their heads while going for routine power moves? I shudder to think what she'd do to Nyla. Even setting aside the safety issues, I have zero confidence that she'd do the job professionally. Remember when she put Lana through tables week after week and then when Lana finally got payback, she turned it into a joke with the "my hole" comment? She has no respect for her craft and is an anti-vax loon to boot. Hard pass from me.

[sek69]

To be fair, the "my hole" stuff was scripted, it's not like she was going into business for herself. Maybe you could say she was overdoing it because she knew how stupid it was, but it wasn't like she was HBK'ing it up out there.

[El-P]

Totally unrelated, Jeff Jarrett was seen at WrestleCade TNA Tribute show doing the Flair strut with Jay Lethal. I thought he was still employed by WWE but apparently he left in January of this year, very quietly. That's interesting, as a lot of old TNA guys were hired in the last past year or so as agents, the latest being Petey Williams just a few weeks ago (well and of course Sonjay Dutt actually left for the hot new company in a very Jarrett way). 

[strobogo]

Nia Jax is not good at anything, and would be a negative to any company she could go to due to her not only being not good at anything but regularly injuring people. She had a 6 year run and the only memorable things were punching Becky's face off, the match with Ronda, and MY HOLE. 

[rovert]

4 hours ago, Matt D said:

One match. One payday. Put Nyla over. Promoted well it could get buzz. AEW needs just a constant flow/stream of buzz and this could fill a slot and get some media if they do it right.

I think this is a fair idea. 

Also, Britt has a back story with Nia. She busted Britt's nose in the opening spot of Nia's RAW debut! 

 

[sek69]

I may be off base, but I get the impression Nia (and everyone else to be fair) thought she had a job for life due to the Rock connection so she's probably thinking why bother going to another company if that didn't save her with Vince. 

[DMJ]

I'm not as down on Nia as others. Really liked the Jax/Rousey matches from Money in the Bank 2018 and TLC 2018, enjoyed her tag work with Baszler, and liked her match against Bayley at Takeover: London. There are some other matches of hers in my database that are in the slightly above-average range too. Granted, they often featured women who I think are/were among the best working in the US, but hey, that just shows that when you put a limited worker in a setting that maximizes her skills and hides her flaws, she can bring value and variety to a match.

That being said, I don't think she'd fit in well in AEW or is a great investment. I'm not saying AEW's women's division doesn't need more star power and credible performers, but at the same time, they turned Britt Baker into a huge star, Ruby Soho still feels more important than she ever did in WWE (even after a relative "cooling"), Thunder Rosa is still a fresh and exciting character, and while I know she's not everyone's cup of tea, that Abadon hardcore match was unique and cool at a time when I don't think there's been a truly unique WWE women's match in years. AEW's track record of creating stars might be strong enough to make Nia a real waste of money when maybe they have somebody already in their pipeline who can get over beyond whatever level Jax's ceiling would be. 

[Blehschmidt]

I would agree that Nia's wrestling skills were very similar to that of Awesome Kong...

[fxnj]

I get not everyone's a fan of Triple H, but I'm a little surprised at how quiet people seem to be on Meltzer talking about his cardiac event being a serious thing that's led to him being kept away from high-stress positions since. This seems like a huge story if true. Seems like it would put serious breaks on the idea of him ever replacing Vince in the company or even moving beyond a figurehead/trainer role again, not to mention probably marking the end of him working 20 minute main event type matches.

[Coffey]

6 hours ago, Superstar Sleeze said:

Is Nia Jax as good as Hansen or Vader? Hell No. Is she the best American Power Wrestler of her generation? Hell Yeah!

[Dav'oh]

7 hours ago, Superstar Sleeze said:

Stan Hansen who was notoriously unsafe

 

7 hours ago, Superstar Sleeze said:

we dont know the extent of how much damage Hansen did

I think Loss made the point a while ago, that for all the mythical status that Stan's eyesight has, when was he ever out of position, when did he injure someone, when did he look lost in the ring? "Hansen's eyesight is so bad he's unsafe to work with" is a typical pro-wrestling exaggeration, to add to Hansen's aura. 

I'm all for people defending wrestlers, but please don't try and bring Stan down to Nia's level of unprofessionalism. 

[PeteF3]

Well, he did injure Bruno. He also roughed up one of the Blackhearts with the edge of a chair but that appeared to be quite deliberate. Still, two known injuries in 25 years working a rough style isn't a bad track record, even if there are more that we don't really know about.

[MoS]

1 hour ago, fxnj said:

I get not everyone's a fan of Triple H, but I'm a little surprised at how quiet people seem to be on Meltzer talking about his cardiac event being a serious thing that's led to him being kept away from high-stress positions since. This seems like a huge story if true. Seems like it would put serious breaks on the idea of him ever replacing Vince in the company or even moving beyond a figurehead/trainer role again, not to mention probably marking the end of him working 20 minute main event type matches.

I agree it's big news, but we have literally zero details other than talent having been asked to not talk to him about business. Meltzer has flat out refused to talk about it, saying it's not his place to talk about it. So anything we discuss would be pure speculation with really no way of knowing how accurate our speculation is. 

[El-P]

Considering how he has looked in the past, it's safe to say Trip took quite an amount of roids in the past. This is never good for your heart condition.

[sek69]

3 minutes ago, MoS said:

I agree it's big news, but we have literally zero details other than talent having been asked to not talk to him about business. Meltzer has flat out refused to talk about it, saying it's not his place to talk about it. So anything we discuss would be pure speculation with really no way of knowing how accurate our speculation is. 

This is all true, but just the very fact that the company is being so tight lipped about this and Dave's non comments makes it seem like this is serious shit. Business feelings aside, heart issues are nothing to fuck around with so whatever it takes for his girls to have a dad as long as possible is the best thing. 

[ragemaster]

1 hour ago, Dav'oh said:

I think Loss made the point a while ago, that for all the mythical status that Stan's eyesight has, when was he ever out of position, when did he injure someone, when did he look lost in the ring? "Hansen's eyesight is so bad he's unsafe to work with" is a typical pro-wrestling exaggeration, to add to Hansen's aura. 

I'm all for people defending wrestlers, but please don't try and bring Stan down to Nia's level of unprofessionalism. 

From Kinchstalkers Puroresu history thread

Anyway, a buildup tag on a July 5 Korakuen show had seen Taue and Hansen square off, respectively partnered with Rusher Kimura and Billy Black. During this match, about half of which aired joined-in-progress, Hansen fractured Taue’s left orbital bone, dislodging his eye. (To this day, Taue says that when his eyes are in motion, “it’s like he’s only seeing out of his right side”.) 

Plus the Vader match and the story about Dan Kroffat, who apparently put stan in a shoot arm bar to calm him down and teach him a lesson. As he was stiffing guys on the tour, after that run in he was better behaved on the tour.   

I think Hansen is one of the greatest wrestlers ever, but not greatest workers as Bret Hart would say, he didn't always work safe and would take liberty's if he thought he could get away with it. 

Even with those story's I think Nia Jax is still far worse and has no business being in a wrestling ring. Part of here issue's is her knees are shot, she did have an operation from memory a few years ago. But she's carrying way too much weight and she can't move well in a ring, for her health she should try to lose some size.  

She hasn't learnt how to work and protect her opponent's in what 7 years? she never will.

Probably a bit mean, but she's not Hansen, Vader, Bigelow, or even a Mike Shaw, she's the Mable of woman's wrestling.

 

[strobogo]

Nia legit not only never improved from her time in NXT, but she actually got worse and worse and more dangerous the more experience she got. She was bad in the ring and bad at promos, and somehow had no presence at all despite being significantly bigger than the entire women's roster. Some of that I suppose you can blame on booking and presentation, but she was usually booked to be pretty dominant and a threat against everyone at all times, but felt about the same as Dana Brooke or something.

[fxnj]

6 hours ago, ragemaster said:

From Kinchstalkers Puroresu history thread

Anyway, a buildup tag on a July 5 Korakuen show had seen Taue and Hansen square off, respectively partnered with Rusher Kimura and Billy Black. During this match, about half of which aired joined-in-progress, Hansen fractured Taue’s left orbital bone, dislodging his eye. (To this day, Taue says that when his eyes are in motion, “it’s like he’s only seeing out of his right side”.) 

Plus the Vader match and the story about Dan Kroffat, who apparently put stan in a shoot arm bar to calm him down and teach him a lesson. As he was stiffing guys on the tour, after that run in he was better behaved on the tour.   

I think Hansen is one of the greatest wrestlers ever, but not greatest workers as Bret Hart would say, he didn't always work safe and would take liberty's if he thought he could get away with it. 

Even with those story's I think Nia Jax is still far worse and has no business being in a wrestling ring. Part of here issue's is her knees are shot, she did have an operation from memory a few years ago. But she's carrying way too much weight and she can't move well in a ring, for her health she should try to lose some size.  

She hasn't learnt how to work and protect her opponent's in what 7 years? she never will.

Probably a bit mean, but she's not Hansen, Vader, Bigelow, or even a Mike Shaw, she's the Mable of woman's wrestling.

 

There's also a relatively famous story of Hansen hitting Kobashi's arm with his cow bell during a house show tag in 1995, which led to him bleeding massive amounts of blood and was the reason behind him having to wear an elbow covering for a while. I also remember an RVD interview on his time in AJPW where he claimed having Hansen as his partner was even more dangerous than having Kobashi and Kawada stiff the hell even out of him as opponents.