Legacy Arena – Birmingham, AL – Tuesday, January 15, 2019
General Manager Drake Maverick recaps the three qualifying matches for the WWE Cruiserweight Championship match coming up at Royal Rumble. Kalisto beat Lio Rush to qualify, and Rush has issues with the rest of the Lucha House Party being at ringside, so tonight he’ll take on Lince Dorado. Plus, Buddy Murphy has issued a non-title open challenge.
Vic Joseph, Nigel McGuinness, and Percy Watson are on commentary.
~MATCH #1~
Lio Rush defeats Lince Dorado at 10:34. It takes a little time for these two to find a groove together, working through some awkward early sequences. Rush works to ground Dorado, who fights back by trying to fly around and quicken the pace. Not much to say about this one, and Rush gets the win with the Final Hour. Kind of an awkward display here, as they just didn’t click. Good win for Rush though.
Rating: **
Rush attacks Dorado in the aisle after the match, but Kalisto and Gran Metalik come out to make the save.
Backstage, Kayla Braxton gets a word with Noam Dar. Tony Nese quickly interrupts his interview time, and says that Dar was lucky when he beat him last week. Dar taunts Nese, and Nese challenges him to a rubber match. The Scottish Supernova quickly accepts.
Elsewhere, Drake Maverick has a referee go check on Lince Dorado, and TJP comes in to talk to the GM. TJP wants to accept Murphy’s open challenge. Maverick says no tonight, but he will grant him an opportunity sometime in the future. You could say he owes him one, PAL.
Each of the three challengers set for the Royal Rumble – Kalisto, Akira Tozawa (w/ The Brian Kendrick), and Hideo Itami (w/ Ariya Daivari) get a quick inset promo to talk about the upcoming title match. Next week, they will face each other in a Triple Threat Match.
~MATCH #2~
WWE Cruiserweight Champion Buddy Murphy defeats Humberto Carrillo at 15:25 in a Non-Title Match. Murphy gets on the mic and puts himself over, then calls out his opponent for tonight. Carrillo gets absolutely zero reaction from the audience. What a terrible way to debut someone. They battle back and forth, with Carrillo showing off impressive agility. Murphy uses his power and cunning to fight back and take control. Carrillo shows impressive agility and resilience. Late in the match Murphy appears to have injured his knee, and Carrillo shows respect before Murphy reveals he was FAKING IT. They have a spirited little exchange to finish off the match, culminating in Murphy hitting Murphy’s Law to get the pin. Boy this just didn’t accomplish anything at all. Carrillo got almost no reaction, Murphy having to go to such great lengths to defeat him didn’t feel right for the dominant champion.
Rating: **¼
JZ Says
A rare whiff of an episode, nothing that happened here significantly advanced any angles and neither of the matches were particularly good. Hopefully the Triple Threat next week will ensure this doesn’t become a trend.
