Wade, I wanna get your thoughts you talked about being part of the very first
incarnation of NXT, which is drastically different from what we now know
is NXT 2.0, even the NXT that really kind of blew up.
What are your thoughts in sort of the evolution of the brand from you being
an OG so to speak of the NXT brand to,
what it has grown and evolved into today as NXT 2.0?
>> Yeah, I mean, I'll be honest with the eight of us who are on that first
NXT Season 1, the entire concept of it, I think universally we hated it,
the concept of first of all we're termed as rookies.
Which the vast majority of us on that show had been working in the wrestling
business for at least kind of six years or something at that point.
I know you did the Indies, before you ever came anywhere near FCW and
I know you're a pretty big deal on the indie scene in the UK at the time.
And I was kind of working on that scene.
I was on the outskirts of in a different area, but we'd all been traveling around
for thirty pounds a night and being lucky if you could actually
pay your gasoline at the end of the day and you came away with a small profit.
And we done that for years, so we were kind of upset that we're being billed as
kind of rookies guys who weren't deemed, to be allowed even in the locker room,
we were changing that hallway.
So it wasn't just this storyline of us being rookies and
nobodies in the business.
We were actually treated like that behind the scenes for
long >> And it's totally different concepts for
anybody that's listening to this, who may not be familiar with the original NXT,
it was almost like a game show format, it really had very little
to do with sports entertainment or the wrestling side of things at all.
It was a lot of really bizarre stunts and competitions and things, I mean,
we got some pretty heavy hitting stars out of it ultimately, but very, very
drastically different from what we know and watch now on Tuesday nights at NXT.
Who has caught your attention Wade, since you've been back,
who's really sort of taken on the fan side of you as a competitor in NXT?
>> Well, I think you just needs to go back a couple of weeks to NXT WarGames, and
I think I'd probably say my favorite match of the year in NXT was the men's
WarGames match.
I think at this point in my career,
I look at things a little differently than I did when I was younger, and I look
more at the kind of future of the business and the business work that's being done.
And what I really liked about the men's WarGames match,
is the victors in that match with the new 2.0 stars,
Bron Breakker, Grayson Waller, Carmelo Hayes and Tony D'Angelo.
And I think what was achieved in that match with those guys winning,
is that we have four guys right there, who for
the next five years plus are gonna be mainstays not only of NXT, but
they're also gonna be eventually moving on to SmackDown and Raw.
And I like what was achieved in that match in that we've
established these four new guys who let's face it.
Three months ago, nobody had heard of any of them and now they're all bona fide main
event level superstars here in NXT and beyond after that.
So I really enjoyed that, I especially like Bron Breaker.
I think everybody's talking about him right now.
He has a great lineage that he's come from and he's just an absolute natural.
He's maybe only had 10 matches in his entire career and he's
already competing at a main event level with guys like Tommaso Ciampa admittedly,
who's gonna kinda help him and walk him through a lot of things.
But I mean to be able to step up that quickly is quite incredible,
as I know from my own experience of trying to do that in the past,
it's such a difficult thing to pull off.
And he's nailed every single opportunities, he's got.
So Bron Breakker is the one big standout for me
>> Is all about Bron's,
it's all about the rest of team 2.0, but
we've sat in the back taking a curtain down and have gotten ready for the shows.
And you even told me, holy crap,
this is Bron Breakers fifth match and it's in WarGames.
I mean, how much credit do you give not only the superstars themselves but
also the coaching staff in NXT?
>> Yeah, it's quite remarkable and
that really is a big difference that I've noticed even from my time,
when I was coming up to Raw, Smackdown as a new superstar.
I was put into a lot of positions where it was singles win and
on occasions, I swam on occasions, I sunk but I think the level of
coaching since my days has just stepped up to a different level.
I think we had three coaches when I was in FCW,
now here they must have 10 to 15 of them in the regular rotating guys in and
out and guys get >> So
many of them are bona fide main inventors like it's invaluable.
Could you have imagined Wade,
when you first walked into FCW having Shawn Michaels at your disposal?
I think it gets glossed over sometimes and I'll admit being guilty of this,
the fact that we had access to Dusty Rhodes was invaluable.
I mean, I know what Dusty taught me as a competitor but even more so,
after my career ended after I got shut down.
Dusty was the one who sort of opened his office to me and said, hey kid,
come with me.
What do you need to learn?
What do you wanna learn?
And I literally got to show the audacity for the last year he was here.
And the lessons that I learned and
the knowledge about the business that he imparted was incredible and
now we unfortunately don't have Dusty Rhodes but you've got Shawn Michaels.
I mean, you got a who's who of coaches grooming the future now,
which is exciting for the business as a whole.
>> Yeah, it's guys who have done it all before and you're right about Dusty and
I was the same as you.
I came to this country and I'd never cut a promo in my entire career.
I mean, promoing, wasn't something that I felt comfortable with.
It wasn't something that I ever thought was gonna be.
A big part of my career now, it's not really a thing for me.
The British guys in general, historically,
I don't think have been the best that promos, if you go back to the indie scene.
It's just not something that British people tended to find naturally having
these big, boisterous personalities that a lot of the Americans and
the brashness of the Americans they seem to have an easier way with it.
But working with Dusty, he brought that out of me completely and in all honesty,
the promo side of things even to this day, obviously, was the biggest aspect of
my career that got me pushed forward winning NXT Season 1.
Being the leader of the Nexus, being Bad News Barrett,
if you look at all the high points in my career, they are all correlated to my work
on the mic which directly goes back to the work I did with Dusty Rhodes back in FCW
>> I just wanna keep on keeping on doing
what I do, doing what I love and
have an FCW the best it can be in young men like Wade right here.
>> So I owe him a huge debt of thanks and
you're right having guys like Shawn Michaels and Triple H here,
being able to lean on them in this day and age, it's so invaluable for
these youngsters who are coming up now >> No doubt, somebody's
gonna talk them into the seats right, I mean Dusty taught us nothing else [LAUGH]
>> Yeah, more than a man, so much but
just working with him every Wednesday in promo class.
And that was a big part of the way that I went from being new guy,
bottom of the class to okay, this guy's in the upper echelon now,
this is the guy we need to put some work into.
It was that promo class with Dusty Rhodes and
how I was able to stand out every week.
[MUSIC]
>> Like once you hear?
Catch full episodes of After the Bell on Spotify.
Follow us now and never miss an episode.
[MUSIC]