With the immediate changes happening within WWE’s NXT brand including a polarising new logo and reports that Vince McMahon and Bruce Prichard will be producing the show going forward, Team SLTD decided it would be a good time to share our thought on the yellow and gold brand, where we think it could be headed and our thoughts on NXT as a whole.
The Wrestling Brian (@callumowen98) SLTD Roundtable Podcast
The releases of Bronson Reed, Mercedes Martinez, Leon Ruff and several others a few weeks ago was a shock, in particular Reed’s as it seemed that he was destined for a run on Raw or Smackdown in the near future, then when a report came out of plans of NXT being changed to a different format, I wanted to write something about all of it.
I’ve covered NXT for basically six years now on SLTD Wrestling, with the predictions articles and have enjoyed the product since around 2014, in that time we’ve seen the rise of Johnny Gargano from one half of DIY to the Heart and Soul of the brand, and one of the most dominant stables in the past decade in the Undisputed Era, however, these proposed changes could tear up everything that has been achieved in the last few years.
Until AEW came around, NXT felt like the show that the diehard hardcore wrestling fans would tune into, however, once the short-lived “Wednesday Night Wars” began, NXT was slowly moving more towards what we see on Raw and Smackdown. DQ finishes nonsensical booking and overuse of your top stars without necessarily making them look as strong as they should be.
In the good old days of one-hour NXT on the WWE Network, we’d sometimes go a couple of episodes without seeing the likes of Gargano, Cole, Ciampa, Balor etc, however, once the show went to the USA Network those wrestlers would become somewhat oversaturated. Now, whilst I agree that the current product is no way near the level it was a few years back, changing it is just a step back and will force away from the fans that have stuck by you.
What’s been said about NXT being ‘full of midgets’ and ‘midgets not getting over’ is just ludicrous. One of your most popular superstars from NXT was Sami Zayn, you know why, because he is a great wrestler who is an underdog that fans could root for and get behind, they don’t really care about Karrion Kross a character much more suited to Raw or Smackdown, and in the kindest of words, who didn’t fit the NXT formula of being a World Champion.
All of this though falls on the booking of the main roster, so many incredible talents from NXT have been called up and within weeks been an afterthought. Damian Priest has been on Raw now for 7 months and in that time has only really feuded with The Miz & Morrison, or Rhea Ripley she’s flip-flopped more between heel and face to the point where it’s difficult to know whether to cheer her or boo her, if the booking of this talent was consistent and more in-line with what we saw with their characters when they were in the supposed developmental show, maybe you wouldn’t need to rebrand it.
I’ll leave you with this NXT from 2014-2019 wasn’t the “developmental show” it was the “A Show”. The show where we saw a phenomenal storyline between two former partners turned fierce rivals, the rise of The Four Horsewomen who have all changed what Women’s Wrestling in WWE is, historic matches like Zayn vs Nakamura, DIY vs Revival and so many more, but as they say, all good things have to come to an end, I’m just not looking forward to saying goodbye.
Kantastic Wrestle Korner (@TheKantastic)
I think this idea that McMahon wants to bring NXT back to its original roots of being a developmental system seems illogical and it’s not very forward-thinking. Doing so sounds like the proverbial “putting the toothpaste back in the tube”.
Having watched NXT since 2015, after all the great matches and stars that have emerged from the brand, culminating in the Survivor Series win in 2019, NXT deserves better than to simply go back to what it evolved from. The fact that the main roster doesn’t treat NXT happenings as “canon” also doesn’t help in establishing these stars once they do get the call-up.
If he thought that his company’s developmental system, which McMahon viewed it as was going to compete with an entirely different wrestling company in AEW, that’s not a very smart line of thinking. We will have to see what the future unfolds for NXT in this new direction.
Adam Farrand (@AdamFarrand) SLTD Roundtable Podcast
For me, NXT has been an ‘alternative’, as I mentioned (or will mention) on our Celebrating TNA episode of the SLTD Roundtable, since its current format was launched way back in 2012. I’d stopped watching TNA at that point, didn’t see anything of ROH, MLW or Lucha Underground and I’ve never really got into the products from Japan.
Instead, NXT was this shorter, neater, package of wrestling where the storylines were never lingering and the matches were always good, if not great. We’ve seen some of my all-time favourites such as Finn Balor, Seth Rollins, Johnny Gargano, Ricochet and Kevin Owens get their starts in NXT not to mention other great movements such as The Four Horsewomen and the reign of The Undisputed Era.
The majority of WWE’s best matches and moments from the past decade have come from NXT so, if it ain’t broke, why fix it?
The simple answer is that WWE thinks it’s broken because it was beaten by AEW in the Wednesday Night Wars. Because, you know, we’re not allowed to like both companies/shows and, let’s face it, many may have tuned into Dynamite because NXT was always easier to get access to later on the WWE Network.
So what becomes of NXT? I agree with what was reported about the current ‘look’ of NXT being too dark so I’m not all that bothered about how they may look to brighten things up, my main concern is what the show will become.
We don’t need another Raw/Smackdown copy. On our SummerSlam predictions podcast, Mike said NXT was always the wrestling show. Right now, it still is and it needs to stay that way. Everyone looks to a Takeover to be a reliable and solid presentation of some superb wrestling, the minute a Takeover is deemed merely to be ‘ok’ is the minute NXT, as we know it, is over.
Mouthing Off (@MikeJC821) Dynamite Weekly
The future of NXT has been a hot topic in recent weeks. Reports of NXT going back to the system of old, where the goal is to make new stars instead of signing them, but what does that mean? In layman’s terms, it means gone will be the signing of the likes of Finn Balor, Kevin Owens, Sami Zayn etc. to help carry the brand and eventually get them a spot on Raw or Smackdown down the line.
Basically, the plan going forward will be instead of finding wrestlers they will be focusing on athletes. Consider someone like an Odyssey Jones, for example, a former football player who didn’t really have huge aspirations to be a wrestler but what scouted and brought in to be made by WWE. So if you are 6’2-6’5 and about 250-275 pounds, are a former athlete with no former wrestling training that’s who WWE wants. That’s who the company will be built around for future years because Vince McMahon had a hand in making them and moulding them and that’s more important than actual star power (to him).
This is not the NXT we’ve grown to care about, the NXT we’ve grown to love and cherish is the NXT that is basically the WWE’s own alternative, NXT was the wrestling show under the WWE umbrella, as opposed to the entertainment of Raw and Smackdown. With NXT going a similar route to Raw or Smackdown but more as developmental, we have to question what the point of all the progression NXT went through only for it to regress back to what Vince likes instead of what we like.
What we like doesn’t matter to Vince McMahon, WWE is not a company for the fans anymore and hasn’t been for a very long time. NXT as a “third brand” was a pipe dream by Triple H and fans alike, but not to Vince McMahon because it’s not his. Or at least it wasn’t. This past year NXT was put on national television and that is an immediate sign this show is not developmental anymore this is the third brand, but to Vince McMahon, it was the brand that should be “beating AEW ” when that shouldn’t be the goal. Why can’t all these wrestling companies just work at the same time, why is it always, we need to be the best in town and destroy everyone else? NXT was no match for AEW and everybody knew that except Vince McMahon, sensing a theme here?
If NXT is meant to be “developmental” it shouldn’t be on national television, your top woman in the entire company shouldn’t be using her royal rumble win to challenge for that belt if you have no plan to acknowledge that win as part of her title history. Vince McMahon doesn’t get our NXT because it’s not his, he doesn’t get that NXT is the wrestling show that WWE fans want because he doesn’t care about wrestling. There are already people who only watched NXT for that reason and if it’s going to become Raw and Smackdown lite with no real name value and only people that WWE “made” it’s going to lose those viewers too.
It started this week, NXT was taped and taped the next two episodes as well, and at the forefront was guys like LA Knight asking for a title shot even though he loses a lot, and we’re spending time acknowledging that one of the women’s tag teams is on TikTok and that’s the only thing interesting about them, and in three weeks we’re having a “wrestling wedding” between a partially sane woman and mute man. It’s already slowly turning into a show that is not for us. So what’s next for NXT? My guess is it won’t be on national TV by January, they will never ever leave the CWC and you have organic shows like TakeOver Brooklyn anymore and the things that made NXT special will just be gone, and Vince McMahon will have everything he wants, and with each passing week less and less people will watch it because it won’t be the NXT we grew to love anymore and it will be just like Monday Night Raw, absolutely pointless…
Tybo Talks (@TheTyboLedson) SLTD Roundtable Podcast
As a huge fan of both the early days of NXT and of everything Triple H has done with the brand these new changes are a hard pill to swallow. The very thing that made NXT special and must watch was because it was WWE’s alternative to WWE. NXT caught lighting in a bottle and produced some of WWE’s best content in the last decade. The worst thing is that all feels like a knee-jerk reaction to AEW’s Wednesday night dominance.
It’s worth mentioning AEW is still new and fresh, of course, people are going to be checking it out but AEW Dynamite is their flagship show going up against WWE third brand. Not only that but this ‘Wednesday Night War’ is a myth. The way people consume TV programming these days is completely different from the late ’90s. The WWE Network allows for people to watch content at any time, not just one time on a Wednesday.
I think the hardest thing to understand is that NXT is a proven money-making commodity. It has been built from the ground up to rival WWE’s flagship shows and is beloved by fans. So why knock it back to a ‘developmental’ brand? This is the thing (more than anything else) that makes zero sense to me.
If you are so hell-bent on having a brand that is ‘developmental’ create one. Don’t rip the heart out of something that already exists and try and jam it into something different hoping that people will still love it. WWE more importantly has the resources and money to create something brand new. Let NXT be NXT, and (this is just off the top of my head while I’m writing this) create a new WWE Network show, you could even call it something like ‘Proving Ground’, have it completely stripped back and have a single title. Somewhere like this is where new guys should learn their craft, they shouldn’t be doing it on global TV on NXT.
I am usually very optimistic about what WWE do and I try to give them the benefit of the doubt a lot of the time, but it feels like we have seen this before. It seems like time and time again WWE and Vince can’t handle a successful third show. It has happened before with ‘WWECW’ there were so many big plans and Vince couldn’t help himself but mess with the formula and eventually killed it, same with 205Live and now it’s happening with NXT.
Honestly, I really hope we are all wrong and this new NXT is something different but something just as special. Only time will tell…
There are Team SLTD’s thoughts on the ‘New NXT’, we would love to know yours. why not comment below or tweet us @SLTDWrestling.
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