Month: July 2015

The Spotlight On WWE Beast In The East

Tom Lynch Uncategorized , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

 Good Morning and Happy 4th of July to all of my fellow Americans.  I just got finished watching a live WWE Network Special “Beast In The East” which aired live from Tokyo, Japan and I have to say, this show was a lot of fun.  It was really fun to wake up before the sun came out here in New York at 5AM, run out to get bagels and coffee and enjoy a WWE show to start my Independence Day.  I might add that before the show began, I watched the Finn Balor “The Demon Revealed” special that aired on the live feed right before The Beast In The East and it was fantastic.  If you haven’t seen that documentary go out of your way to watch it as it is a perfect prelude to the Beast In The East Special.  However, that’s another discussion for another time, let’s get into some of the highlights of WWE: The Beast In The East.

Highlights:

 The Demon Rises: I’ll be honest, when I heard that NXT Takeover would be in Brooklyn, I wasn’t 100% sure that they would do the title change here but, looking back, it was absolutely the time to do it.  One of the coolest things for me was to see the entrances of both Balor and Owens with the ladies presenting them with the flowers, to flooding the ring with streamers (which is the first time I’ve ever seen this at a WWE show) it just felt like such a big match feel for the NXT championship.  Kevin Owens was immediately established as big time heel by throwing the flowers into the aisle way and doing all he could to win the match by countout.  The crowd was solidly behind Balor from the beginning until they finally got the moment of Balor winning the title which was a feel good crowning moment for Balor.  This was the best match on the card (though Jericho and Neville was close) as there was such a good build throughout the match and so many good false finishes, including Owens kicking out of the coup de gras and Balor kicking out of the top rope senton.  With Balor now the NXT champion, Owens can make the full transition to the main roster and Balor can lead NXT into the future. The title change also added to the importance of the show, especially because the NXT title is changed so infrequently.   It was also a nice tough to see Hideo Itami in the crowd, showing support and having Tatsumi Fujinami coming out to crown the triumphant Balor.

 Brock Lesnar: Brock Lesnar came off like a really big deal on this show as he returned to Japan for the first time, as a WWE Superstar, in 12 years.  The show was build around Lesnar from the name of the show to Brock entering the building being shown as if he was the biggest star in the company to the great video package showcasing Lesnar.  I was actually surprised to see the fans get behind Kofi as much as they did, it really shows me how much traction the New Day is getting. The match itself was complete domination, which I expected that it would be, however, I would have preferred to see Xavier Woods face Lesnar as I feel they’ve done a good job protecting Kofi since the New Day formed.  That said, John Cena and the Undertaker both got destroyed by Brock Lesnar so there is no shame in that whatsoever.

 The Main Event: I was surprised to see that the tag match closed the show here as the show was built around both the NXT title match and Brock’s return but, say what you will about John Cena, he was absolutely adored by the Japanese crowd who reacted as if Cena was the huge star that he is.  I felt that this was a unique tag match in which all four men worked really hard.  It’s cool that WWE continues to have Cena and Ziggler loosely related as they’ve had each others’ backs for a while.  It reminds me somewhat of Tugboat and Hulk Hogan from back in the day.  I also thought it was nice to see Bad News Barrett get a main event spot and look good doing it.  A fun match that sent everyone home happy and ended a strong show the right way.

 44 Years Young: Holy cow did Chris Jericho and Neville tear down the house to kick off this show.  The two went back and forth for over twenty minutes in a great match.  Chris Jericho, in particular at 44 years old, did a great job in keeping up with the younger Neville and there’s still so much that he can contribute to the business, even in a limited capacity.  From doing small things like demanding that the referee “Ask Him!” while performing every wristlock or chinlock to coming up with innovative reversals, Jericho was on fire tonight.  I feel that Chris has taken some criticism lately and I’m not sure why because he does a great job in making the younger stars look great every time that he returns.  I know some will complain that Jericho won but the loss didn’t hurt Neville at all.  If anything, it felt like a star making performance for Neville that he was able to hang with a legend like Jericho in the way that he did.  Making stars doesn’t mean that you have to lose every match you’re in because by doing so it gets to a point where victories don’t mean as much against that guy taking the loss.  Kudos to both of these men and I would love to see the two work a program if and when Jericho makes a return to WWE.

Closing Thoughts:

 In the end, I really enjoyed this show as top to bottom every match was good to great.  There were only five matches on the broadcast, which meant that everything got to get time to develop.  From the divas to the main events, it was clear that everyone worked hard for the respectful Japanese crowd.  It was also nice to see the unique setup from to the different pieces of raw footage from the city of Tokyo showcasing the fans dressed as the Superstars to the different look and feel to the show, it was cool to see.  I have to add that I really enjoyed the commentary on this show, which I assume was recorded live in WWE Headquarters as I didn’t see the announcers at ringside, as both Byron Saxton and Michael Cole worked hard and did a great job. Lastly, the Japanese crowd was also very respectful, they did what you’re supposed to do in a classic sense, being behind the good guys and booing the bad guys, which was actually refreshing to see.  I hope that WWE continues to showcase different live events from unique settings like this in the future.

All Photos courtesy of the WWE Network

The Daily Spotlight For 7/3/2015

Tom Lynch The Daily Spotlight , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Hello Everyone thanks for checking out the daily spotlight.  This is the newest addition to thedailyspotlight.com and it’s going to be much more blog style than the usual spotlight reviews that you’ll find on the rest of the site.  My plan is update these as close to daily as I could and this will probably consist mostly of my quick thoughts on the different happenings of my day or the day to day events of my life.  My plan here is to hopefully allow you to get to know more about me, Tom Lynch, the human being as opposed to the writer.  These posts may be themed but will more than likely be much more free flowing.  Don’t worry this won’t take away from my dedication to the other posts that you’ve come to expect here on the site.  I’ll still be provided coverage of many different WWE events, wrestling podcasts, sports, entertainment and everything in between.  However, I’ll also be giving you guys an insight in to my life.  If you aren’t interested I’ve stuck these blogs all the way at the end of the top of the page so you don’t have to click on the menu, but hopefully you’ll enjoy some of what you see here.

– While my girlfriend is fast asleep and I’m preparing for an early rise in order to catch this WWE show on the network, I have the Mets game on in the background.  I’ve become a huge fan of watching my hometown teams play on the west coast.  There’s something nice about watching baseball games in the middle of the night, especially during the summer time.  One of my friend’s told me today that he was done with the Mets.  While I can understand his frustration, as the Mets look like they’re suddenly standing on the ledge ready to freefall to another lackluster season, I can’t imagine leaving a team because of their poor play.  I have always been a fan of the Jets and the Knicks despite the fact that neither team has won a championship throughout my 28 years of living and I always will be.  I was a Yankees fan as well growing up, mostly because my mom was a fan and I was raised to be one.  Eventually, I did give up on the Yankees back in 2009. I still respect the team’s history but I had enough of the Yankee way that if the team struggles, you go out and purchase a new slew of players and try again the next season.  I also got tired of the world series win or bust mindset.  No team wants to lose but it’s tough to win a championship and fanbases should appreciate the ole punchers try.  I also went to the Nationals stadium for the first time in 2008 and I saw a fanbase their to have a good time who was happy to support their team no matter what.  Between the fact that the Nats had one big time player (Ryan Zimmerman) as well as the fun atmosphere and youth associated with the team, they became my adopted team.  This adoption eventually became a full time deal and I’ve become a Nats fan ever since.  As a matter of fact, what a great win for the Nats tonight on Frieworks night over the hated San Francisco Giants!

–  While I recharged the batteries a bit today, I caught up a bit on this season’s big brother.  Big Brother is a summer tradition that I tend to really enjoy but in past year’s have been pretty disappointed by it.  I think it started with the year that they had all of the racist contestants, it just became a less fun to watch that year.  From there, it seems that every time that I pick a player to get behind, they are gone before I can even really started to like them.  Between Nick two years ago, Devin and Zach last season and now Jace this season, it becomes very frustration.  I particularly found Da’Vonne, James and Jason to be annoying in a “Turn Off My Television” sort of way as opposed to a “I want to root against you sort of way”.  It remains to be seen if I’m going to stick around and watch this season, stay tuned…

– I’ll close with this today, it’s amazing how friendships change as you get older.  When you’re in your late teens to early twenties, there becomes a mindset that you really need a lot of friends.  You depend on your friends to be there each week, sometimes multiple times throughout the week.  If you’re friends aren’t around for a while, you start to question there dedication to the friendship and this can cause a real disconnect that could lead to the end or a break in that friendship.  Well as you get older and jobs, relationships and other life responsibilities take the forefront of one’s life, it often isn’t realistic to see your friends every few days, every week or sometimes every month.  Two of my best friends live hours away from me either by car or plane and I could go months without any real communication with them other then text messages and fantasy sports.  Yet what I have realized is that when I do catch up with my friends now, whether it be a great phone conversation or the times I get to see them, it’s like nothing has changed and we haven’t been a way for so long.  So yes, as you get older you may not have as many friends as when you hosted an annual party in your yard and had fifty guests, the friends you do have mean a lot more.

That’s going to do it for me, I’m turning in early, with every intention of give you guys a spotlight review of the WWE in Japan show bright and early on the Network and then another daily spotlight blog for the 4th of July. Until then….