Last night on NXT programming, Velveteen Dream defeated Johnny Gargano to win the NXT North American Championship. News concerning title changes on taped shows tends to be reported in the media but NXT found a unique way to combat this at the last set of tapings.
The match between Gargano and Velveteen was taped on January 30th from Full Sail and aired last night. NXT is said to have taped two different endings to the match, however, to prevent news of the title change from leaking. First, Velveteen was filmed winning the title and then later they restarted the match and had Gargano win. Last night, they only aired the version with Dream winning clean.
“At the 1/30 tapings, they decided to get cute and tape two different endings for the Johnny Gargano vs. Dream match, with each winning clean,” wrote Dave Meltzer in this week’s Wrestling Observer. “So fans wouldn’t know who won the match until it aired.”
Most websites covering the spoilers from the tapings reported that Dream won the title, however.
NXT North American Championship Statistics
Velveteen Dream is already the 4th person to win the title in its just 10 months of existence. Adam Cole won the inaugural championship and then lost it 4 months later to Ricochet. Gargano then won the title at Takeover: Phoenix before dropping it to the Dream last night on NXT programming.
