In this my latest installment of "Top 5…", I have decided to change things up a little bit. In tribute of my recent trip to Orlando for NXT, I want present "Top 5 Best and Worst Things About Attending a WWE NXT Live Event at Full Sail University".
This recent trip marked my second consecutive "Takeover" special, and TV tapings the following night. Myself and my partner in crime, and fellow contributor here at Cheap-Heat.com , Eric Arrington, couldn’t help but notice how unique and different the NXT crowd is than any other wrestling crowd we have ever experienced.
No knock on these fans, I’ve become a regular so I have to include myself in this critique. With that being said, I honestly hate this group of fans. They’re the "smartest" and "hippest" fans out there, if you ask them, or listen to them. But hey, who am I to judge. Being engulfed in this monster for the last few days spawned this idea for an article. So here it is, the Top 5 Best and Worst Things About Attending a WWE NXT Live Event at Full Sail University."
Top 5 Best Things
5) You’re in Florida. - Face it, if you had to go to any state to watch wrestling Florida or California would have to be at the top of the list. How can you argue with a tropical climate for a wrestling vacation? Know what else is in Florida? Really attractive women. The shows are held on the campus of a University in Florida, if nothing else you stand a good chance of seeing a pretty lady while waiting in line. Can’t beat those odds, chances are better there than at most of any other wrestling show.
4) The Venue. - I personally have been to many independent and large scale wrestling shows all over the country, and have experienced about every different type of venue you could imagine. I can honestly say that I absolutely LOVE the NXT Arena at Full Sail. It has all the benefits that you get from the small indy venue feel, but yet you still get the high end WWE production value. The best of both wrestling worlds.
3) Food Trucks. - Man, the fat kid in me loves these things, and the fat kid in me has experience with food trucks all over the country as well. Haha. So, I can tell you that these are some top notch food trucks. There are usually different food trucks there on Thursday than there are to choose from on Friday, so you get a nice variety of food choices if you take in both days of NXT shows. Don’t pass up the Korean BBQ Taco Box Truck, trust me.
2) The Crowd. - You get to be part of one of the most infectious and enthusiastic wrestling crowds you will found anywhere outside of a PWG show. You get witty and hot chants that break out, and they carry on and continue for the duration of the show. The fans LOVE this product. They are invested in everything that NXT puts out. You see the same faces there every time. Thats the type of fan that loves this business, and love the product that they are watching. They’re quick to let the wrestlers know how they feel, and are usually pretty funny in the process. The hot crowd is contagious. The wrestlers feed off of it. When you have a crowd that is hot and loud and hanging on every move, you see the benefit and results of that in the ring. The workers feel it, they know it, and they get into this more than we do. Trust me. The opposite happens when the crowd gets cold, it sometimes makes the match in the ring almost unbearable to watch, because you as a crowd can suck the life out of a match and a workers performance as well. I see it happen all the time. The NXT crowd usually is good to stay hot and that keeps these moments from happening. However, I have a lot more to say about the crowd a little later.
1) The Wrestling. - It is pretty hard to argue against the quality of wrestling that NXT has been putting out. These are the same match-ups and wrestlers that the smarks of the internet have been in love with and busting online nuts over for years and years, and they are at their best physically and have had the best training possible, so it makes sense to see that level of wrestling we have been. My only negative is the lack of gimmick matches to date. Other than the Ladder Match between Bo Dallas and Adrian Neville, I can’t recall any others. I get that it makes the draw that much more when it happens, just saying sometimes a little variety can make things better.
So… with anything good there always comes some bad…. and some of the bad here is almost unbearable. So here to compliment the Best of List, is:
Top 5 Worst Things
5) The Rules. - I made a huge stink this last trip over a "wwe rule" that apparently clashes with a "full sail rule". Nobody there cared enough to clarify and explain the situation to me in any way. I was unhappy and nobody approached to attempt to appease me or handle the situation any differently that it was unfolding. Then when I asked to speak with somebody else, nobody was able to find anyone of importance or even cared or bothered to try, who knows. Allow me to explain further:
I traveled about 12 hours in a car to make this trip. I called well ahead of time and double checked with whoever I was directed to on the phone to speak with about my camera. I have a nice professional style digital camera, with a nice professional lens. I have taken this camera to multiple WWE Live Events, house shows and Raws, never had my camera violated any "WWE Rule" as I was told at Full Sail at the security check point, about my camera. I asked the difference, how this camera was against WWE policy now, when it wasn’t on December 8th in Greenville? No answer, told go away, and was tried to be ushered back out the front door through the line I just stood in for over 3 hours. Not happening, I demanded further explanation since I specifically called ahead and asked, and was told that it was fine. Another woman approached, and took me out the side door, nobody answered me, nobody tried to appease me, I just got taken outside and told to put my camera back in the car. Not a big deal cell phones can do the same job, so whatever. It is the PRINCIPLE OF THE THING.
Oh, so I finally make it back to the side door, and get back through the gate and security to find my friends and get my seat, and instead of being one of the first 100 in the door, now I’m sitting not on camera side for the TakeOver Special. So I walk to the top of the steps and the first lady that I have to walk passed on my way to my friends as a camera around her neck…. similar to mine, with a nice huge lens hanging off her neck. My blood boiled. I asked her how they let her in with that… she was confused and said what do you mean? I asked her if she was an employee, she was not. I think it was somebody’s grandmother. How was she allowed in with that camera and I wasn’t? Absolutely fucking bullshit. I flipped out. Nobody would explain to me why she was allowed in and I wasn’t, but I was told that the show was about to go live and I needed to go take my seat. Fuck that.
4) The Seats. - Those bleachers are a killer, especially on the Friday Tapings. I advise getting a seat in the VIP first couple rows on the floor, but that is almost impossible sometimes because you have to be there to get those seats from the table on site. So you have to be at the tapings before Take Over to even have a shot at getting those seats.
3) The Tapings. - They are fun. Don’t get me wrong… just man… those are brutal. You’re there for around 4 hours. They rush it along… you don’t get a lot of the little story that helps bridge each segment and in between weeks, and it just kinda is pushed along abrasively sometimes. By the 3rd Episode of the tapings the crowd starts to suffer. They aren’t nearly as hot, it starts to show badly being there live. You’ve seen a lot of the same guys in a row, which is cool SOMETIMES… if you love Hunico, you’ll fucking LOVE the NXT tapings experience. But if you’re like me, and would rather go piss, or charge your cell phone (I am legit naming things I did during 2 of the 4 Hunico, I mean Sin Cara, matches they crammed down my throat.) then you start to feel it a little more than the rest of the crowd. But hey, thats what you should expect coming into this, because you’re seening a condensed TV product filmed and produced by college kids. Keep it simple, and do it clean.
2) The Food Truck Gamble. - Man, the food trucks are awesome. But… you run the risk of having the spicy korean pork run wild on your about hours 2-4 of the tapings, or towards the end of the Take Over specials. Now, this is kinda off pudding, but seriously… that spicy pork is some business a few hours after you enjoy the hell out of it. One day no problem, the other day, I started having the meat sweats right about the time Sami Zayn is doing his victory lap. Just saying.
1) The crowd. - Its a double edged sword. You have the hotness of the crowd and all the awesome that comes with that. But man, these fans are the worst of the worst, and the best of the best in so many ways. Now I know a lot. I’m a know it all, I won’t lie. But I stand there for 3 hours and listen to some of the most awful shit come out of peoples mouths. It makes me hate us. It really does. Everyone knows everything. They’ve read everything. They’re probably going to read this. I heard people talk about my site standing 5 feet away from me. But man, some of us, some of these fan boys are awful. You can’t talk to them, you get interrupted. You’re wrong before you even finish your statement, you get told about something you’ve already read yourself. AND HALF THE TIME MY FRIEND AND I WERE THE "REPORTERS" THAT PUT THE ARTICLE UP ON LOP FOR YOU TO READ YOU FUCKING ASSHOLE. So please, tell me more about it, and get the information wrong in the process. It really makes this fun and enjoyable. Never once do I mention what I do online, or the person standing next to me that I traveled with does, but if I did, you’d feel dumb, because you know what you know because he does the work, so you can be smarky and cut me off while I’m trying to just make polite conversation because you kept looking at me and wanting to talk to me for 25 minutes.
Everyone knows somebody that is a worker, so they know the business. I love that routine. And please buddy, tell me how you set the ring up for WWE, how you were with them at RAW and Smackdown. If I wasn’t a super nice guy, I’d laugh in most of these peoples faces, but I tolerate it, I often encourage it for my own enjoyment and insides jokes later. But still, something about this crowd can get under my skin. But I LOVE being there, LOVE being in that crowd, and I’m probably JUST as bad to most people, but damn man, if I am, I suck, and I’m sorry to everyone that I know.
With that being said, I can’t wait to go back in April.
