Out of all the people who have been released from WWE EC3 has to be one of the most successful. He’s up there with Drew Galloway and Cody Rhodes.

It was probably the best thing for him at the time because Derek Bateman was never going to be a world champion.

When he showed up in TNA as the Kayfabe nephew of Dixie Carter you could see he was a totally different person. Very soon he became the world champion and one of faces of the company. It was here that he proved he could thrive as a main eventer.

Towards the end of 2017 it was announced that EC3 was yet another person who had decided to part ways with Impact Wrestling. Immediately beginning speculation of a WWE return. Then came Takeover Philadelphia where not only was he in the crowd but to many people’s surprise he was still called EC3.

This was a positive step because he had gained so much notoriety as EC3 to debut under any other name would be a mistake. Thank god he didn’t go back to being Derek Bateman.

He wouldn’t make his official debut until a few weeks before New Orleans where he was expecting to be handed the North American Championship. His first match back as we know would be given 5 stars not all down to him but he played his part. It goes to show how much of a star he is that he could have won that belt in his first match back and fans would have bought it.

Despite that since then all he’s down is pre taped vignettes and a squash match against Raul Mendoza. I know they way NXT does things not everyone needs to be on TV every week but I would’ve expected more given how he was brought in.

Looking at the stories that are building towards Chicago it doesn’t look like EC3 fits into the current plans. They can’t have him challenge for the North American Championship because it would be heel vs heel. It looks like Sullivan is the one intended to challenge Black but I think it should be EC3.

EC3 can easily be slide into that main event role simply explaining that he is EC3 and does what he wants. He and Black could put on a good match and the loss wouldn’t harm him all that much.

If there’s no plan for him why is he even in NXT? He could easily debut on the main roster tomorrow. Hopefully better than his former Impact Wrestling counter part Bobby Lashley (what happened to him).

He could believably be put in there against the majority of people on the main roster. The most interesting prospects to me are him vs either John Cena or Daniel Bryan.The later of which excites me given their history in the old NXT.

Maybe WWE have this great long term plan for him that we don’t know about which starts in NXT. Hopefully they do because in terms of top stars EC3 is in the top 1 Percent.