I write a lot of these articles, especially wrestling articles, well in advance. I started writing this the day after Adam Cole had his final match with Kyle O’Reilly. It was obvious Cole was leaving, but we were kind of uncertain on O’Reilly’s future in NXT and the WWE. Here’s what I started writing and where I stopped:

The WWE should go all in on Kyle O’Reilly and make him the new Daniel Bryan. Both men are very similar in style. Hard strikes and an excellent submission game. O’Reilly is a feel-good story. Small, overlooked, but has the ability to be champion one day. I never believed in O’Reilly as a singles competitor, but I didn’t think Bobby Fish could either, but I’m loving his AEW work.

Right now, the WWE is devoid of a spark plug in their stories. Roman Reigns and placeholder Big E (I’ll get to that later) are still champion. I don’t think keeping O’Reilly in NXT is a good idea. They are building up too much new talent and I O’Reilly gets gold in NXT he will hinder a lot of new talent progress.

The best thing to do with him is send him RAW

And that’s all I finished on that article. I just witnessed O’Reilly make his AEW debut and stand in the ring with his two best friends. It was an AWESOME moment for the fans, but I find myself a bit pessimistic.

I was never a huge fan of O’Reilly on NXT. Yes, the Undisputed Era was the best thing in wrestling, but Adam Cole was clearly the only one deserving singles run and the rest were just tag team wrestlers. Bobby Fish I fell in love with in AEW because I only recall one singles match, he had in NXT and that was against EC3. Both Fish and O’Reilly we never got to see their full potential. And now that Fish and O’Reilly are back with Cole, are they back to being tag team wrestlers and that’s it? When I say “tag team wrestlers” I mean guys who can only function in a tag team aspect and aren’t unique at all in their own right. Obviously, O’Reilly’s time in AEW is less than an hour, but I do hope they don’t make the same mistakes in AEW with Fish and O’Reilly as they did in NXT.

Simptastic Joe