Why NXT doesn't produce stars from zero

[Wariowokecancel]

I was listening to Meltzer about how NXT isn't really building any stars from zero.

He said they run too many drills and some wrestlers only wrestle 20 times a year instead of 170 times a year. They don't get enough experience with live crowds.

Got me thinking - having NXT as part of the official WWE Universe makes it impossible for wrestlers who are shitty (as they will be for the first half decade unless they're Kurt Angle) to get the work and experience they need. A WWE product shown to a live or TV audience needs top quality wrestling and production instead of the gritty shitty day to day wrestling grind that the territories gave to kids. These leads to the situation that the kids aren't on shows or tv because they aren't top quality BUT they can't learn to be top quality because they're not on shows or tv. Chicken and egg.

The barrier to start learning anything apart from drills is too high - which means the WWE raids indies and Japan for dudes already have all the skills and experience to be trusted with shows. Which leads to Nakamura, Aries, Joe, Young, etc appearing on house shows for 200 people. Meanwhile you aren't getting anybody really built from zero (there are exceptions but not many).

Wouldn't a feeder org that wasn't branded WWE and didn't have the pressure of having to be top notch and on tv BUT with WWE resources be much better? Cornette created a generation of huge WWE stars running a smoker org on a shoestring like a traditional territory with all the grind and grit that entailed.

 

[SocraticMethod]

Why would it be better for the WWE to run a feeder org rather than letting the indy feds do the work early on and then pick and choose the guys they see the most promise in?

I'm not sure that I agree with the premise that they're not building stars form zero anyway. Bray, Roman, Big E, BRAAAAUUUUN!!!, Alexa Bliss, Charlotte have all been ground up after signing developmental contracts with WWE, no?

 

[sleepwalk]

Wouldn't a feeder org that wasn't branded WWE and didn't have the pressure of having to be top notch and on tv BUT with WWE resources be much better? Cornette created a generation of huge WWE stars running a smoker org on a shoestring like a traditional territory with all the grind and grit that entailed.

This is, essentially what Smokey Mountain, USWA, ECW, were and RoH has been for a while, yes. But it seems like HHH and Vince have gone one further and taken a page out if Hollywood's book. In the film and TV industries, they have a concept called "holding." "Holding" is contracting a person and their intellectual properties with little to no opportunity for (or even interest in) using them.

This allows them to offer guys like Cesaro, KO, Sami Zayn, Samoa Joe, Seth Rollins, etc, more money than they would make at RoH, PWG, and the occasional Japan trip to live in Orlando and do classroom work while wsiting for a call up that may not come. Look at RoH ten years ago and you'll see half of the main roster (plus Nigel McGuiness) killing it. The production value wasn't there but why let them become a threat elsewhere? Why not cement the idea of "This is the top and, if it doesn't happen for you here, it must be you."? You don't have to be great to be the best. Just be the only show in town.

 

[BotchMan]

OVW produced more stars in two years from nothing than NXT has ever done

 

[Michaelangelo]

Need a PED factory with open mics

Overseen by Scott Steiner

 

[GraveyardFilla]

From the little of Meltzer I've listened to he seems like a dumb fuck.

That being said I don't think the best way to manufacture talent is through micromanagement. You end up with a bunch of automatons.

 

[Pliny Pete]

Isnt that what theyre doing with Evolve, ICW, Progress etc.
Gabe Sapolsky has said straight out that WWE "supports" Evolve, which I assume to mean financially, so Im sure Vince is kicking down money to the other indy groups under the Floslam umbrella too
I figured thats why they invested in Floslam in the first place, to help rebuild the territory system and the talent pipeline that they destroyed in the 80's

 

[Wariowokecancel]

Why would it be better for the WWE to run a feeder org rather than letting the indy feds do the work early on and then pick and choose the guys they see the most promise in?

I'm not sure that I agree with the premise that they're not building stars form zero anyway. Bray, Roman, Big E, BRAAAAUUUUN!!!, Alexa Bliss, Charlotte have all been ground up after signing developmental contracts with WWE, no?

Exceptions exist like I wrote ('recent' stars are Braun/ Bliss/Corbin/Charlotte) but a shitload of 'NXT' alumni actually came from back in the day FCW which was a territory throwback, not the slick NXT product.