Tag: NXT

WWE NXT Preview 5/24/22

Tonight’s WWE NXT 2.0 broadcasts live from the WWE Performance Center.

The following line-up is announced for tonight:

  • NXT Champion Bron Breakker vs. Duke Hudson
  • NXT Women’s Champion Mandy Rose vs. Indi Hartwell
  • NXT Tag Team Champions Pretty Deadly vs. Roderick Strong & Damon Kemp
  • Edris Enofe & Malik Blade vs. Channing “Stacks” Lorenzo & Troy “Two Dimes” Donovan
  • Alba Fyre vs. Elektra Lopez
  • Wes Lee vs. Sanga

WWE NXT Preview 5/17/22

Tonight’s WWE NXT 2.0 broadcasts live from the WWE Performance Center.

WWE NXT Preview 5/10/22

Tonight’s WWE NXT 2.0 episode will feature fallout from last night’s NXT Spring Breakin’ special.

What Happened After NXT Spring Breakin’ Abruptly Went Off The Air

The show ended with two hooded figures staring down an unsuspecting Bron Breakker.

NXT TV special Spring Breakin’ took place on Tuesday night. Cameron Grimes kicked things off by successfully defending the North American Title, and Nikkita Lyons and Cora Jade successfully saw off Natalya and Lash Legend. The show ended with Bron Breakker defending the NXT Title against Joe Gacy, a match that ended with the title still around the second-generation star’s waist.

After the match, Gacy was on his knees in the corner as two hooded figures in red masks stepped up onto the apron. However, it was at that point this week’s NXT 2.0 came to an abrupt end. If you went to bed wondering if that was intentional, no, it wasn’t. There was a whole segment planned after that, but the show clearly overran and it wasn’t shown on USA.

Instead, WWE had to settle for posting the footage on Twitter, which you can check out below. The clip begins with the hooded figures who were watching from around the arena descending on the ring and attacking Breakker with a steel chair. The two anonymous people in red masks then proceed to put the boots to the NXT Champion.

Gacy then directs the two of them as they remove a barbed wire-clad stretcher from under the ring and proceed to place Breakker onto it. The pair then slowly carries the champ out of the arena as the clip fades to black. That’s presumably where WWE actually planned on ending this week’s broadcast, more than 90 seconds after the USA feed was cut which resulted in a rather jarring end to the show.

That ending implies the issues between Breakker and Gacy aren’t over.

Source: TheSportster

WWE NXT Spring Breakin’ Preview 5/3/22

The special Spring Breakin’ edition of WWE NXT 2.0 will air tonight on the USA Network, live from the WWE Performance Center in Orlando, Florida.

Roderick Strong Reportedly Requests WWE Release

Roderick Strong has reportedly requested his WWE NXT release, but the company has him factored into upcoming creative plans.

Strong has requested his release “multiple times” in the past several months, according to Fightful Select. However, word is that WWE has denied the request.

The veteran pro wrestler is said to be frustrated with many things within WWE over the past year, which led to him asking for his release.

WWE reportedly pitched a name change to Strong, but he was opposed to the idea. There were many people within WWE who were surprised that Strong was not included in the NXT releases made last Friday as he’s made it clear he wants out of the company.

Strong went to England in March for a quick run in NXT UK, defeating Wolfgang on the March 17 taped episode, then coming up short against NXT UK Champion Ilja Dragunov on the taped episode that aired on April 7. Strong lost to LA Knight and Tommaso Ciampa in SmackDown dark matches this past January, and took a WWE Main Event loss to T-BAR that same month, but there’s no word on if he’s being considered for a main roster run. His last NXT 2.0 TV singles match was the loss to Solo Sikoa on March 22, and then he competed in the Second Chance Triple Threat the following week for a spot in the NXT North American Title Ladder Match at Stand & Deliver, which also included A-Kid and the winner, current NXT North American Champion Cameron Grimes.

Strong reportedly re-signed with WWE shortly before The Diamond Mine stable debuted last year. Original plans called for Strong to be in the group with wife Marina Shafir, manager Malcolm Bivens, trainer Hideki Suzuki, Tyler Rust, and Arturo Ruas, but less than one year later Strong is the only member of the originally pitched stable to remain with the company.

WWE recently began a storyline where Strong said he wanted to make changes to The Diamond Mine so they don’t fail like The Undisputed Era did. WWE released Bivens last week, along with 9 other budget cuts, and now the group consists of Strong, The Creed Brothers and Ivy Nile.

Strong has reportedly remained professional in his handling of creative week-to-week. It was also noted that WWE officials currently have no plans to release Strong as he is factored into upcoming creative plans.

Source: Wrestling Inc.

Dakota Kai, Dexter Lumis And Malcolm Bivens Among 10 Released from NXT Contracts

WWE released 10 performers from their NXT contracts Friday, including Dakota Kai, Dexter Lumis and Malcolm Bivens, according to Fightful’s Sean Ross Sapp.

Persia Pirotta, Harland, Draco Anthony, Paige Prinzivalli, Sanjana George, Mila Malani and Raelyn Divine were the other performers who also reportedly received their releases.

Kai, who had been under contract with WWE since 2016, spent her entire tenure in NXT and was a two-time NXT women’s tag team champion.

The 33-year-old Kai is a native of New Zealand who went by the name Evie on the independent scene before signing with WWE, winning championships in popular women’s promotions Shimmer and Stardom.

Kai was popular as both a face and a heel during her NXT run, but she is perhaps best known for teaming with and later feuding with Raquel Rodriguez.

Raquel and Kai held the NXT Women’s Tag Team Championships together twice, including as recently as earlier this month when they dropped them to Toxic Attraction.

Rodriguez seemingly reacted to the release of her friend on Twitter:

Bivens signed with WWE in 2019 and managed multiple acts. Most recently, he was the mouthpiece for Diamond Mine, which features Roderick Strong, The Creed Brothers and Ivy Nile.

Sapp added that WWE had asked Bivens to re-sign with the company in February, but he “made it clear” he didn’t want to.

Bivens went by the name Stokely Hathaway before joining WWE and spent time in Ring of Honor, Evolve, MLW and other independent wrestling companies.

AEW star MJF and Impact Wrestling star Moose were among the wrestlers Bivens managed before he went to WWE.

Bivens managed the tag team Indus Sher and singles wrestler Tyler Rust in NXT before finding his greatest success as part of Diamond Mine.

After news of his release broke, Bivens tweeted the following video, utilizing his signature sense of humor:

Lumis, 38, signed with WWE in 2019 after previously competing in Impact Wrestling under the name Samuel Shaw.

He became a cult favorite in NXT thanks to his on-screen romance with Indi Hartwell, leading to a storyline wedding. Collectively, Lumis and Hartwell were known as InDex.

Given NXT’s renewed focus on younger and less experienced Superstars, Lumis may have been a victim of circumstance due to his age.

Pirotta, a 25-year-old native of Australia, signed with WWE last year and spent much of her time in WWE teaming with Hartwell, who is a fellow Aussie.

Persia and Indi had recently started a storyline where they were in relationships with Duke Hudson and Lumis, respectively, and forced them to compete together as a tag team.

Harland, whose real name is Parker Boudreaux, played college football as an offensive lineman at the University of Central Florida.

He signed with WWE last year amid comparisons to a young Brock Lesnar and served as Joe Gacy’s on-air disciple. Harland recently disappeared from WWE programming during Gacy’s feud with NXT champion Bron Breakker.

Anthony’s most high-profile angle in NXT saw Gacy and Harland trying to recruit him, only for Xyon Quinn to step in.

That led to a match between Anthony and Quinn on the April 12 episode of NXT, which Quinn won. That marked Anthony’s final NXT appearance.

Source: Bleacher Report

The full list of released NXT Superstars is as follows:

  • Malcoml Bivens
  • Dakota Kai
  • Dexter Lumis
  • Harland
  • Persia Pirotta
  • Draco Anthony
  • Sanjana George
  • Mila Malani
  • Raelyn Divine
  • Blair Baldwin (referee)

Dakota Kai signed with WW in December of 2016 following a successful stint on the indies as well as a well-received run in Japanese promotion Stardom. Kai competed in the 2020 Women’s Royal Rumble match. With Raquel Gonzalez, Kai won the first-ever Women’s Dusty Rhodes Tag Team Classic and was an inaugural NXT Women’s Tag Team Champion.

Dakota Kai posted the following on Twitter:

Above everything, thank you all. I am so overwhelmed at all the love and support. The DMs, txts, tweets.. you all have my heart. I love you. I am thankful for being able to meet, work, and intertwine with so many beautiful people, people I looked up to, people I learned from.. I met some of my best friends over these last few years that will remain in my life forever. I don’t know what’s next for me. I chose ‘Evie’ at 17 years old. That chapter is shut.. just know this; I’m far from being done.

Backstage News On The WWE NXT Meetings Where Female Talents Were Reportedly Asked To Dress Sexier

New details have been revealed on the WWE NXT women’s division meetings that Warrior Wrestling Women’s Champion Athena (fka Ember Moon) called “stupid” in a recent interview.

Athena spoke with Chris Van Vliet to discuss various topics in a new interview this week. At one point she talked about how hurtful her NXT situation was, and how she saw the downfall once WWE Executive Vice President of Global Talent Strategy & Development Paul “Triple H” Levesque was gone following his cardiac event. This is where Athena described meetings where she says female talents were told how to dress like NXT Women’s Champion Mandy Rose.

She said, “When you care about something, not just for yourself but for everyone involved, it hurts so much more because, for so many years, I’ve been not about myself. I’ve been for the match and other people. To be told that I’ve done nothing wrong and I was taken off TV for doing nothing wrong, it hurt so bad because I was so happy walking into work. I remember when Shotzi left, I remember going to my makeup artist and saying, ‘I am so unhappy.’ We would have to sit through stupid meetings about how we’d have to dress sexy. I remember looking at someone else (and laughing). I cater to children. I’m not about to wear fishnet booty butt-cheek shorts because we had a two-hour meeting about how to dress like Mandy Rose. That’s not fair. Mandy is absolutely phenomenal and an amazing person, but not everyone is Mandy Rose. I started seeing this downslope as soon as Hunter was gone. For the first bit, we didn’t know why, we just knew he wasn’t there. I got so angry. I was sitting there thinking, ‘I did nothing wrong. I didn’t piss off Vince.’ They take Shotzi away, Hunter is gone. ‘You guys promised me this wouldn’t happen. You promised I wouldn’t be lost in the shuffle. I went on this losing streak to help you guys out and build other talent so I could get a reward.”

Fightful Select has revealed new details on the “stupid meetings about how we’d have to dress sexy” that Moon mentioned. These talent meetings were held back in October of last year.

WWE brought in fashion expert Melanie Pace to conduct the meetings back in October 2021. Pace bills herself as an Orlando-based on-air style expert, a fashion stylist, and a virtual stylist. She also works out of other cities, and serves as a wardrobe stylist, and personal shopper.

Pace took to Instagram and posted a few photos from the WWE Performance Center on October 18 of last year, and captioned it with, “Quick trip back to Orlando! Fashion talks with the best at @wwenxt [heart emoji]”

The meetings were reportedly held under the guise of “fashion consulting” and “fashion aid” as a way to play up the fact that the women on the NXT brand were larger-than-life Superstars. It was noted by one NXT wrestler how this was a stark contrast from before as people on the NXT roster were originally encouraged to wear either just their ring gear, or an available merchandise shirt.

Another talent noted how they were encouraged to dress similarly backstage, and didn’t outright say that “dressing sexier” was spoken aloud, but it was implied.

Several members of the roster expressed displeasure with the meetings, and blamed them on WWE Talent Relations head John Laurinaitis as they started taking place when he regained power. The meetings were seen as one of the big changes following Triple H’s departure when he took time off for his health last fall. While talent put the blame on Laurinaitis, it has not been confirmed that he came up with the meetings.

It looks like the meetings were not mandatory as numerous women reportedly refused to attend. The photo below from Pace shows at least 15 chairs set out for the wrestlers.

Athena was with WWE from September 2015 until her release on November 4 of last year. She had stints on the main roster and in NXT, and left the company as a one-time NXT Women’s Champion, and a one-time NXT Women’s Tag Team Champion.

Athena returned to the ring at Warrior Wrestling #19 on February 12, wrestling a Time Limit Draw to then-Warrior Wrestling Women’s Champion and current AEW Women’s World Champion Thunder Rosa. She also worked Warrior Wrestling #20 on March 12, in a Triple Threat with Rosa and Skye Blue. She took a loss to Mia Yim at the WrestleCon SuperShow, took another loss to Swerve Strickland at TWR Swerve’s House on April 16, and then returned to Warrior Wrestling for their WW 21 event on April 23, defeating Blue and Shazza McKenzie to capture the vacant Warrior Wrestling Women’s Title.

Source: Wrestling Inc.

WWE NXT Preview 4/26/22

Tonight’s WWE NXT 2.0 episode will air live from the WWE Performance Center in Orlando with the go-home build for next Tuesday’s NXT Spring Breakin’ special episode.

WWE NXT Preview 4/19/22

Tonight’s WWE NXT 2.0 episode will air live from the WWE Performance Center in Orlando, Florida.

Tonight’s NXT 2.0 episode should also feature an appearance by new NXT Tag Team Champions Pretty Deadly, who won a five-team Gauntlet last week to capture the vacant titles.