Is A.O.P as champs The Ascension 2.0?

[The Lach is very tired]

Does anybody else get the feeling that having Authors Of Pain as NXT Tag Champions mean they are heading into a bit of a dead period in the Tag division? The Ascension held the tag titles in NXT for ages simply due to a lack of teams & with everyone expecting The Revival to be coming up & TM-61 out of action having them continually beat DIY does nothing for either team.

I can see them keeping the titles until after the Dusty Classic, using the time between then & now to build some teams from within (The Ealy Brothers & Heavy Machinery for example) or raiding the indies for some other teams in time for the classic.

[EoE: Well There's Your Problem]

At least there's a semblance of a division around them. For a lot of The Ascension's run as champs, they were literally the only team in the division.

It is a bit heel-heavy at the moment, though. With TM61 inactive, the only face team that get regular TV time at the moment are DIY, in contrast to the heel side that have the Authors, Revival and occasionally Sanity. On the plus side, Heavy Machinery have a lot of potential, and there's some good reviews for the Dawkins/Ford team on the house show loop. And there's still Moss/Sabbatelli, The Ealy Brothers and maybe The Bollywood Boyz if they're desperate.

[Slammy Award-Winning Cannibal]

Authors of Pain are freak athletes in their early 20's (!!). They're not Ascension 2.0. Good lord do they ever have bright futures as singles stars.

[A Platypus Rave]

Mar 10, 2017 6:58:02 GMT -5 EoE: Well There's Your Problem said:

At least there's a semblance of a division around them. For a lot of The Ascension's run as champs, they were literally the only team in the division..

Yep,

Ascension were the tag champs especially for as long as they were because there were no other teams.

I mean at the first NXT special they faced Too Cool and at the first Takeover they faced Kalisto and Ricardo in his Jobber gimmick of El Local.

[This Player Hating Mothman]

We've seen a big push of the tag team division as time goes on, which I think has to do with Triple H's time coming closer and him being significantly more into tag team wrestling than Vince is, so I don't think we'll get anything quite as bad as The Ascension's reign over nothing was. It becoming the prototype for a Triple H-overseen product kind of guarantees that, as the Ascension were kind of on the back end of NXT going from token developmental league to A Thing.

[Heinz Doofenschmirtz]

I think AoP needs a tweak of their look but then they'll be leagues above the Ascension. But then they'll get to SDL or Raw and they'll go the way of all the other tag teams on those rosters, straight to limbo.

[A Platypus Rave]

Mar 10, 2017 12:22:13 GMT -5 Heinz Doofenschmirtz said:

I think AoP needs a tweak of their look .

Yeah, I still think it's too soon to be doing the Swat Gear after the Shield pretty much made that theirs... and since Roman is still wearing it.

[Heinz Doofenschmirtz]

Mar 10, 2017 12:24:44 GMT -5 A Platypus Rave said:

Mar 10, 2017 12:22:13 GMT -5 Heinz Doofenschmirtz said:

I think AoP needs a tweak of their look .

Yeah, I still think it's too soon to be doing the Swat Gear after the Shield pretty much made that theirs... and since Roman is still wearing it.

I'd love for them to start taking bits from each of their backgrounds to add to their look. Rezar could look at some historical Albanian warriors. Akam could add touches from something like this

[A Platypus Rave]

I'm pretty sure swords are illegal in the WWE

due to the incident with the beserker >_>

[Andy Martin]

I think they're already better than Ascension. And as someone already mentioned, having an actual division helps now too.

[Deleted]

Mar 10, 2017 14:10:12 GMT -5 A Platypus Rave said:

I'm pretty sure swords are illegal in the WWE

due to the incident with the beserker >_>

As per Article XI, Section III of the Tunney Accords.

[thetower52]

Not tell they beat Too Cool

[Deleted]

Well, unlike the Ascension... AOP are some big, mean, tough looking dudes. I never got that out of the Ascension.

[Citizen Snips Has Left]

Mar 10, 2017 6:58:02 GMT -5 EoE: Well There's Your Problem said:

At least there's a semblance of a division around them. For a lot of The Ascension's run as champs, they were literally the only team in the division.

It is a bit heel-heavy at the moment, though. With TM61 inactive, the only face team that get regular TV time at the moment are DIY, in contrast to the heel side that have the Authors, Revival and occasionally Sanity. On the plus side, Heavy Machinery have a lot of potential, and there's some good reviews for the Dawkins/Ford team on the house show loop. And there's still Moss/Sabbatelli, The Ealy Brothers and maybe The Bollywood Boyz if they're desperate.

I saw Dawkins/Ford vs AoP at the early February house show loop. They need a little polishing but looked pretty good...and they were INSANELY over based on nothing more than their sneakers.

Mark it down now, FAN: "Red Shoes" will be a big thing before the year is out.

[Magic knows Black Lives Matter]

I haven't seen a ton of AOP but from what I have seen, I feel confident in saying they are approx. 10000000x better than The Ascension has ever been with their cornball asses.

[Xxcjb01xX [PIECE OF: SH-]]

Them fighting DIY and Revival alone in their run put them above Ascension who fought basically nothing for a year.

[EoE: Well There's Your Problem]

Mar 11, 2017 2:00:45 GMT -5 Xxcjb01xX [PIECE OF: SH-] said:

Them fighting DIY and Revival alone in their run put them above Ascension who fought basically nothing for a year.

Looking this stuff up... In their year-long reign as NXT tag champs, do you want to know how many established full-time NXT teams they fought? ONE. That being the only recently-formed Lucha Dragons when they dropped the damn belts to them. Between that, it was guys dropping down from the main roster (Hunico/Camacho), guest teams (Too Cool), singles guys starting feuds with each other afterwards (Neville/Graves, Zayn/Kidd), other NXT guys before they found more well-known gimmicks (Wesley Blake, Buddy Murphy, Elias Samson), a veritable f***load of local jobbers... and the mysterious American Pitbulls. Whatever happened to those guys?

[Deleted]

Mar 10, 2017 9:19:37 GMT -5 Slammy Award-Winning Cannibal said:

Authors of Pain are freak athletes in their early 20's (!!). They're not Ascension 2.0. Good lord do they ever have bright futures as singles stars.

The point had nothing to do with the Ascension's talent, it was about how the Ascension held the tag titles for an eternity doing absolutely nothing with them because there were no other teams.

[Xxcjb01xX [PIECE OF: SH-]]

Mar 11, 2017 2:11:38 GMT -5 EoE: Well There's Your Problem said:

Mar 11, 2017 2:00:45 GMT -5 Xxcjb01xX [PIECE OF: SH-] said:

Them fighting DIY and Revival alone in their run put them above Ascension who fought basically nothing for a year.

Looking this stuff up... In their year-long reign as NXT tag champs, do you want to know how many established full-time NXT teams they fought? ONE. That being the only recently-formed Lucha Dragons when they dropped the damn belts to them. Between that, it was guys dropping down from the main roster (Hunico/Camacho), guest teams (Too Cool), singles guys starting feuds with each other afterwards (Neville/Graves, Zayn/Kidd), other NXT guys before they found more well-known gimmicks (Wesley Blake, Buddy Murphy, Elias Samson), a veritable f***load of local jobbers... and the mysterious American Pitbulls. Whatever happened to those guys?

When asked for comment, Davey Richards replied "None of your Marmalade talking Chicken, I have a Number Seven to Yellow!"

[Slammy Award-Winning Cannibal]

Mar 11, 2017 2:39:01 GMT -5 Lizuka #BLM said:

Mar 10, 2017 9:19:37 GMT -5 Slammy Award-Winning Cannibal said:

Authors of Pain are freak athletes in their early 20's (!!). They're not Ascension 2.0. Good lord do they ever have bright futures as singles stars.

The point had nothing to do with the Ascension's talent, it was about how the Ascension held the tag titles for an eternity doing absolutely nothing with them because there were no other teams.

And since there clearly are tag teams in the division, I'm highlighting their skills as a reason they have the gold. It's been inevitable since I saw them live over a year ago.