who's more believable in the main event to you? nxt/aew edition

[Novembruh]

Cole's probably 5'10"

Either that or Daniel Bryan is much shorter than I thought.

Forced perspective is giving him some height, and in this show alone dude went from towering over Bryan to being noticeably shorter than Hunter to being barely taller than Bryan in the ring. They were working overtime to make him look tall.

 

[DoubleJ13]

The only thing that Page has over Cole is height & weight.

If Page was never brought in to Bullet Club/The Elite nobody would give half a shyt about him

 

[Metal Face]

 

[Novembruh]

But on the real... we live in a world where Adam Cole makes Daniel fukking Bryan look like a 'body guy'. That's... Yeesh. I'm not going full Billy Graham here and shyt, but I'll say this: Cole needs to be given more consistent promo time. Dude can talk, and honestly it's all that's gotten him over his whole career, but the constant UE as a unit thing is just gonna hurt him long-term.

Let him go out there and bury someone. Talk some big shyt. Win some matches after talking some big shyt. Some with UE, but also some without. Dude needs to go on a TV Title-style tear of defending the title against mid-tier opponents every other week for a couple months at minimum. Let the competition be mid-tier, or even some squashes, and then let him posture about how he's the first true 'fighting NXT champion' who goes out there and competes... all while ducking Ciampa.

Because without doing something like that, where they add levels to his dikkbaggery, he's gonna flop once people connect that he doesn't have a look and isn't half the worker most of NXT is at this point. Be high on him all you want and give him his own DX-style thing, but the HBK comparison talk dries up when you remember Michaels even at peak-DX fukkery could still go out there and put on a match dolo and have people talking about it the next day.

Cole has the potential to be a much better talker than HBK, but his work is literally the weakest in UE. Either shield him from that exposure by letting dude talk, or send him out there for a few months against 'good hand' type people and let him try and accidentally fukk around and put on a great match with a name small enough in comparison that people can assume it was mostly him, even if he's really being carried.

But the E isn't gonna do that. And as bland as Hangman Page is in the grand scheme of things, dude has gotten to go out there and work with PAC, and Jericho, etc. And at bare minimum, that's gonna help him long-term more than Cole using his special meter for run-ins and people liking to punctuate his name with 'Baybay'.

If they ran a few months of Cole vs say... Oney Lorcan/Danny Burch/fukking Sean Maluta/whatever and then the next week give him a promo to talk himself up as being a worldbeater by fukking them up, rinse repeat, dude's either gonna end up Bo Dallas in NXT status where the crowd literally turns on him, or he's going to end up fukking made and people will be foaming at the mouth when Ciampa finally takes dude's head off and wins the title. It might even get people back behind Gargano if the UE run-in gets cut off by Johnny running out with a kendo to assist.

I say that to say... Cole's ceiling is higher, but Page's floor is higher. And until I see commitment to shoring up the weaknesses in Cole, Page can literally coast and end up in a better position, because he's insulated in an environment that's gonna work with him and for him.

Dude needs to get in the goddamned gym though. Whether it's weights, or doing fittyleven hours of cardio with Roddy, or going to the mats/pads with KOR/Fish and adding another element to his work style, dude needs to step it up.

(I just realized, if you took the strengths of all of UE and put it into one person, they'd be a fukking amazing wrestler.)
(Because they'd literally be Daniel Bryan.)

 

[FromStLouis]

You gotta let Cruiserweights be Cruiserweights - but at the same time you have to remove that glass ceiling.

Becky didn't have to eliminate Braun Strowman to main event Wrestlemania.

It shouldn't take Adam Cole pinning Brock Lesnar for him to breakout either.

I enjoy a David vs Goliath match as much as the next person but Rey vs Andrade was main event worthy too.

Why couldn't that have been for the WWE World Cruiserweight Championship?

 

[JOHN.KOOL]

Adam Cole, Page may look better physically but Cole makes up for it with his character and mic/promo work.

 

[MenacingMonk]

Overall, I'll go with Page. The only area Cole has him beat is promos. Both are about the same in the ring, but I'll go with Page since he doesn't spam big moves like Cole (Destroyer, Last Shot).

I don't care for neither, but Cole is mostly, maybe only, over because of a catchphrase. If Cole never did it, and Page ended his name by saying BAY BAY he'd be as over as Cole.