Would WWE be better off without NXT?

[LaGoosh]

The only point of NXT:UK was to kill off the British indie scene. Now that's happened they might as well bin the whole thing. No chance it ever has or will turn a profit or be successful. 

[BomberPat]

1 minute ago, LaGoosh said:

The only point of NXT:UK was to kill off the British indie scene. 

I still don't think that was even it; it was about WOS Wrestling, not the indies, which are never going to be anything close to a threat to WWE. They either didn't want a wrestling show on UK TV that had a better timeslot than they did, or didn't want a show on UK TV that treated wrestlers as TV actors with all the employment rights that entails. Probably a little of both.

Either way, it doesn't seem to serve any purpose other than being a holding pen now. I've watched it from time to time since Ben Carter debuted, and while it's an easy watch it's just utterly lifeless - that's partly due to the lack of an audience, but the booking is dire and it's a half-way house, best of neither world, between NXT and BritWres. It's clear that they don't have any future plans for 99% of the roster outside of NXT:UK, so I do wonder what the point of it all is, and how it somehow survived two rounds of "budget cuts". 

Worst of all, it's an abysmal proof of concept for the whole global expansion idea. If they can't make an NXT sub-brand work in a scene with a lot of history and an existing talent base, and by utilising people heavily involved in an independent wrestling boom in that country, what hopes are there of NXT India or NXT Middle East ever amounting to anything worthwhile? And if they ever get around to launching NXT Japan or NXT Mexico and do the same thing of barely paying lip service to the wrestling culture of that country while creating a homogenised WWE product, God help them.

[LaGoosh]

8 minutes ago, BomberPat said:

14 minutes ago, LaGoosh said:

The only point of NXT:UK was to kill off the British indie scene. 

I still don't think that was even it; it was about WOS Wrestling, not the indies, which are never going to be anything close to a threat to WWE. They either didn't want a wrestling show on UK TV that had a better timeslot than they did, or didn't want a show on UK TV that treated wrestlers as TV actors with all the employment rights that entails. Probably a little of both.

Oh yeah definitely. But there's also no way WWE saw UK indies drawing big crowds at Wembley and SSE Hydro and didn't think "well we better nip that in the bud pretty fuckin' quickly".

[Your Fight Site]

I think you need to first thing what “better off” means. “Better off” how? Financially? Yeah, probably. But I imagine the money saved not producing NXT each week is peanuts compared to WWE’s bottom line (no pun intended). But losing a show that occupies a weeknight prime time slot? No. It’s serves as brand awareness. It serves an indy-like alternative to WWE’s “main” products in RAW and SmackDown. If WWE binned off NXT, those viewers probably aren’t going to start watching RAW and SmackDown. They’re not going to visit WWE’s website, which means they’ll lose visits and in turn advertising revenue. Those fans aren’t going to buy replica belts or generic logo-on-black t-shirts and therefore lose merchandise revenue.

Edited April 29, 2021 by Your Fight Site

[theringmaster]

I wonder if wwe regret starting NXT UK? WOS , for all intention and purposes, failed (personally i thought it was brilliant). The bubble would have burst eventfully and even if it never, last summer speaking out movement would have burst it.

 

In hindsight, a one off tournament every year would have been stronger. It will still give UK talent something to aspire and allow WWE to keep an eye so they sign up the stand outs (Pete Dunne, Toni Storm etc)

[chokeout]

It wouldn't help them because they have shown time after time that they don't seem to have any set system in place to move people from NXT to the main roster and introduce new characters. 

They have exact viewing figures for NXT, they know what percentage of their fans watch the show, compared to the main roster and yet the majority of the people who are bought up get the "Hey, that's xxx from NXT", no vignettes, no explanation of who or what they are outside of a half dozen soundbites as they walk to the ring and then they flounder for a few weeks, probably because they are accused of not being able to connect with a crowd that was never given a reason to care about them.

For a business that used to thrive on vignettes to peak interest in new talent coming in (to the point Foley and Jericho devote sections to it in their books) they just don't care any more. Debut them and figure it out as we go, Riddle being the most recent example.

Who was the last NXT talent, male or female that came to the main roster with a fully formed character (and by that I don't mean specifically using their NXT gimmick, but explaining who they are before they get there)

[Supremo]

This image says everything you need to know about Raw’s ability to utilise younger talent. Shut down NXT tomorrow, move all of their roster to Monday nights, and bar a very select few it’ll just mean an even bigger group of useless pricks chasing R-Truth.

[CleetusVanDamme]

Overall, I don't know and don't pay much attention to NXT at all, but NXT being a thing definitely hurt the main shows by by getting "big" enough to have guys like Joe, Nakamura, Roode and Balor etc have runs there before getting called up. There's no way they'd not have been a bigger deal and helped freshen up the main shows debuting like AJ did, instead of largely coming up stale or without momentum and with losses already under their belt.

Part of why Omos is the most interesting thing in the company rn is that he's got to skip NXT (TV-wise) and nobody's seen his full hand yet. I hope others will get to as well. Everyone coming up the same way is poison.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[BomberPat]

8 minutes ago, CleetusVanDamme said:

Part of why Omos is the most interesting thing in the company rn is that he's got to skip NXT (TV-wise) and nobody's seen his full hand yet. I hope others will get to as well. Everyone coming up the same way is poison.

Strowman was the same - debuted straight to main roster TV. The big lad with Apollo is similar, only worked NXT house shows, then brought to TV (under three separate gimmicks so far, but still). Clearly when it comes to big lads, they can still recognise the shock value inherent in having someone show up without any priors.

[The Dart]

Reginald too.

It’s good to see some debuts who haven’t come from NXT.  Hopefully it happens more.

[LCJ]

NXT often means you already know exactly who the next wrestlers on Raw and Smackdown are and what they’re going to be like which kind of kills some of the suspense for me. Back in the OVW days, only the locals would see the TV most of the time. I’m guessing that WWE are making extra ad revenue by having NXT as a two hour show and have sold the TV show around the world so financially, they’re probably better off with it. Quality wise though, NXT is quite a boring show these days but you could probably say that about WWE in general now.