The Street Profits (Angelo Dawkins and Montez Ford) are a highly energetic, charismatic, and athletic team. They enter the arena and the fans go insane. It’s what we all want: to connect and enjoy ourselves. In that regard, the panel made a good choice for the WWE Backstage Breakthrough Superstar of the Year.
The @WWE Men's Tag Team of the year is: @TrueKofi, @WWEBigE, & @XavierWoodsPhD, The New Day (BAY-BEE)!#WWEBackstage pic.twitter.com/BTYvRpf2DJ
— WWE on FOX (@WWEonFOX) December 25, 2019
Unfortunately, the Street Profits haven’t done anything of note. Yes, they cut some awesomely entertaining promos and have put on some great matches, but those matches, televised at least, have been few.
Welcome to the number one controversial aspect of these awards in my eyes.
The competition was more deserving of the award
This isn’t going to sit well with some, but when we look at the names of the other nominees and consider what they accomplished this past year, this choice becomes a bigger head scratcher.
Ricochet
Okay, this is the obvious choice to win the award. He won NXT’s Breakthrough Superstar award last year, then made his first in WWE’s main brands a memorable one. He’s a superhero. He does what we see superheroes do in the movies, video games, and our imaginations.
He epitomizes the athletic grace we expect from professional wrestling, and had a fun rivalry with AJ Styles that saw him capture the United States championship for a time. For him to be passed over is a shame and a shame. But there’s more to it than this. He’s reportedly shown irritation at WWE labeling him (twice now) a breakthrough star when he’s been wrestling for seventeen years. While this may have played a part in his not winning the award, there are a couple of others that have proven themselves.
The Viking Raiders (Erik and Ivar)
The Viking Raiders were up for a couple of awards, and lost on all of them. These are some of the few losses they’ve suffered since joining Raw, but unlike the tag team award, this was one they should arguably have won.
After vacating their NXT tag team championship at joining Raw full time, they continued their path of destruction over the various jobbers set before them. One of their early wins that is often forgotten was over the Raw tag team champions at the time, Curt Hawkins and Zack Ryder. Since then, they’ve won the Raw tag team championship from the Robert Roode and Dolph Ziggler and have entered a heated rivalry with the OC.
Nikki Cross
While not as flamboyant or exciting as the other nominees, Nikki Cross started out as an enigma and became a Woman’s Tag Team champion wit Alexa Bliss. Known for her Tasmanian devil persona in the ring, she started out hot and fast, running around like we’d expect her to. Whether it’s booking or Alexa Bliss’ influence, she’s calmed down considerably and has grown as a wrestler. The problem with her is WWE creative didn’t seem to know what to do with her when Bliss was injured, so she’d pop in here and there in matches and would steal the occasional one.
She’d be third on this list when looking at accomplishments in the WWE, but there’s no denying she’ll grown and start to take over in the years to come. Who knows, we may be talking about her winning one of these awards in the future.
Off to start a new year
That’s about it for this string of articles, though I may return to flesh out my thoughts on a couple of these winners and/or nominees.
While this doesn’t officially close the year out, it gives us a chance to look ahead and see what the new years brings us. It could be an exciting one we’ve all been waiting for. Never say never.
