Would you be surprised to hear that Vince McMahon has zero clue what’s going on in NXT? No, of course you wouldn’t, because you’re not out of touch. According to Dave Meltzer the calling-up of the NXT four was seen as such a cluster fuck because Vince didn’t even know who they were.
According to Meltzer, Vince “…isn’t that clued up on NXT”, so he asked for the four best wrestlers, regardless of what’s going on with the brand. There is a major NXT announcement coming with today’s tapings; who knows what that’ll be.
One of the big highlights is the lack of overlap with NXT and the main roster, as seen by the Monday crowd. Yet ,there is some overlap and now fans are freaking out over what the call ups of Johnny Gargano and Tommaso Ciampa mean. The two have been involved in a two-year program, that was just reaching it’s culmination before Vince fucked it up.
You’d be right to assume Triple H was not happy, nor was he even consulted. Vince just called them up. Without talking to the brand executor of NXT, Triple H.
Part of the reason, according to Dave Meltzer, was The Undertaker agreeing to do the Starrcast II event, yet I doubt that. The other reason is the increase threat of AEW. Again, Vince is delusional, so I doubt that.
The idea of ratings though holds the most water. The numbers have been bad for a long time, and Fox has an expectation of the numbers being at a certain point. So, what does that mean for the WWE? Get them numbers up, or you lose out on a lot of money. All television networks have the ability to cancel a show at any given time. They may agree to X-number of episodes, but that’s not usually the case for live-t.v.
With Fox having a hard line on ratings for the WWE, allegedly, you know Vince is aware the numbers suck and are looking for anyway to goose the ratings. This appears to go hand in hand. No word yet on why these four, plus the previous five NXT call-up’s still don’t have a permanent show though.
In Other News…
Jeremy Botter of Bleacher Report (Who? Exactly) is reporting that Daniel Bryan is penciled in to face Kevin Owens at WrestleMania. Sure. Owens was a name mentioned prior to the report, so it’s always possible, though other names included Sami Zayn, and he’s basically just riding out his contract at this point.
By now it’s old news but still just as hilarious as Tye Dillinger wants ‘fuck-all’ to do with the WWE going forward. The WWE veteran has formally requested his release from the company and even announced it on Twitter. Despite Joey Ryan’s piss-baby response to the news, most in the industry were pretty happy for Dillinger finally taking control of his career and making a change. This was expected by the WWE and no word yet if he’ll be granted his release.
Quick Hits – Kota Ibushi formally declared he turned down an AEW deal and is exclusive to NJPW. IMPACT Wrestling appears to have less restrictions on Pursuit, according to Eli Drake.