TheChairshot.com asks the question…What If? Rey Ca$h discusses what if the NXT never changed from Black and Gold!

In my 30 years of wrestling, there has been nothing I’ve enjoyed more than the original wrestling version NXT. I can still remember so fondly hearing those opening cords of that Coheed and Cambria song, back when you could only watch the show on Hulu. These were the early days of WWE’s new Performance Center, and seemingly every major Independent star was being signed and showing up every other week.

Whether it was Adrian Neville or Seth Rollins, Sami Zayn or Kevin Owens, Samoa Joe or Shinsuke Nakamura…this period of NXT means more to me than any other time watching wrestling in my life. Eventually, the show would get so good and so popular that it would become more than a developmental system – it became a de facto third WWE brand! Eventually becoming known as Black and Gold based off of their color scheme, NXT would become the darling of not only the WWE, but all of wrestling.

With Triple H at the helm, running the program and booking the show, there was a care shown to the roster and the show that became undeniable. Eventually, NXT would get so big that it would get booked in major arenas alongside WWE PLEs, get showcased at Survivor Series 2019 as an official third brand, and would get a prime time TV slot. And this is where the story would start to change.

With the creation of All Elite Wrestling, this became the new alternative among wrestling fans, and WWE noticed this immediately, starting a Wednesday Night War by moving the show from the WWE Network online to cable to combat AEW. The fight was never a fair one – NXT, although popular and loaded with top level stars, was always intended to be the developmental show – and NXT lost pretty handily. This loss would not only force NXT to have their day and timeslot moved, but it caused the powers that be to rethink the process.

As previously noted, NXT was always supposed to be a developmental show. Its sole purpose was to give newly trained rookies, Indy veterans, and foreign talent a chance to train, learn, and understand the WWE system. Unfortunately, they became a victim of their own success as they started focusing on established talent more so than the newer crop of stars. Concurrently, the stars that were being called up from NXT to the main roster weren’t having the success that the original crop of stars had. There was a stark disconnect in how NXT stars, booked and coached by Triple H, were used and viewed on the main roster by not only Vince McMahon but the fans as well.

A change needed to be made. Enter NXT 2.0. With Triple H taking time away due to a medical emergency and Shawn Michaels taking control of the brand, the decision was made to rebuild NXT back to what its original purpose was. No more focusing on Indy legends and known entities. The show was now built around relatively unknown, homegrown talent. And it took a while for the new vision to gain traction, but 5 years later, the success rate has been striking.

You can’t watch the current version of WWE (and even AEW) and not see someone who came up from the new NXT 2.0 era. But even with the success, I can’t help but wonder. What if NXT never pivoted from Black and Gold and stayed the course?

The first thing that would absolutely have happened is that there wouldn’t have been a mass exodus of talent, be it because of releases or people not resigning. Adam Cole and the Undisputed ERA come directly to mind. For Cole specifically, there was a fear of him going to the main roster because of concerns that Vince would change him completely and wouldn’t know how to use him correctly. If Black and Gold stays, I believe that it stays on its third brand trajectory.

Another possibility and probably the biggest change is that the new crop of wrestlers that have come from 2.0 wouldn’t be here. With the focus still on established stars, there wouldn’t be the time, care, and focus for these stars. So that means people like Bron Breakker, Carmelo Hayes, Trick Williams, Tiffany Stratton, and Roxanne Perez would likely not have made it.

There’s also the discussion of what would happen with Triple H. He had to step away from the brand due to his medical issue, opening the way for Shawn Michaels to take over, but would Triple H stay the course? This year or so time frame also coincided with Vince McMahon having to step away from WWE. Triple H was the obvious person to take over the creative duties for the main roster, but if NXT was the same as it had always been, would he be so willing to give it up? Would he make it a fully fledged 3rd brand? As we’ve seen with the addition of Evolve, there were always plans for another developmental show at a lower level than NXT, so does Shawn take that over?

The real gem in this entire story and situation is the WWE Performance Center. Whether it was going to be connected to NXT or Evolve, it’s the most important asset the WWE has. So much so that the WWE films NXT from there now. Will the way that they recruited athletes to the PC have changed if Black and Gold stayed? I think the answer is an unquestionable yes. Black and Gold looked for something drastically different than 2.0, and they were competing with companies like AEW and TNA for talent, instead of searching for college athletes.

It’s near impossible to think of the WWE without what NXT has done for the company. Over 70% of the current main roster started in NXT. Yes, that includes the BIGGEST stars in the company – Roman Reigns, Rhea Ripley, Seth Rollins, Bianca Belair, Charlotte Flair, Becky Lynch, Gunther, Bayley, and so many more. So imagine how different that list looks if NXT is changed in any way. Now think about this year’s WrestleMania. If NXT 2.0 never happens, there’s a very good chance that you never have Oba Femi, Trick Williams, Je’Von Evans, Lash Legend, Stephanie Vaquer, and many more who weren’t on the show but should’ve been (Tiffany Straton and Giulia come immediately to mind).

Luckily, this isn’t something we’ll ever have to find out. But as much as I may love the old NXT, the new NXT has been one of the best things to happen to the WWE. Without it, there’s no telling how different things could be.

FIN

TheChairshot.com asks the question…What If? Rob Bonnette discusses what if the Women’s Evolution never happened!

To fully understand how far things have come, you have to go back to 2012-2013, which was the worst it had been on the women’s side since the bra and panties match days of the Attitude Era.  They had a run where five out of six Diva’s champions outright left the business after dropping the title because they just didn’t want to be bothered anymore. Battle Royals were over the second rope for eliminations. TV matches, when they even happened, rarely lasted five minutes and PPV matches didn’t even get 10. Speaking of PPVs, they usually had one women’s match and never more than six women wrestling on the card. Fast forward to 2019 when things were at their peak, and there were two or three and sometimes four women’s matches on a PPV (2.5 exactly). Women’s matches main evented three different times, and just under a dozen (11.9 to be exact) women wrestled per PPV.  That is an astronomical jump over the four years that the Women’s Evolution had gone through at the time.

The Evolution didn’t just affect wrestling inside WWE. AEW for one may not have even bothered to create a division when it was formed in 2019. Women’s wrestling in ROH was on life support at the time, and the TNA Knockouts Division was not what it once was.  It existed on the indies, but before WWE began to take it seriously, there wasn’t much of a pipeline to anything significant there. So if WWE hadn’t made that step, we’d still likely be there today. With the main feeders of talent of AEW not doing much to promote women’s wrestling, there would have been little incentive for the boys club that put AEW together to even be interested, beyond some token representation here or there. But with their big goal being to provide an alternative to WWE, then they had to offer all the forms of wrestling that the Big Bad Fed was offering, which meant fielding a women’s division that did more than have one or two matches a month. WWE’s Women’s division being what it was in 2019 forced AEW’s hands, lest they wanted to be out-progressived by WWE of all people. TNA would ultimately step their game back up on that end and their revived Knockouts division would be a big reason they turned a corner over the past few years. ROH has bulked up it’s women’s content since being bought by Tony Khan, and even MLW has gone from featuring little women’s wrestling for years to the point of having a lot more lately.  And outside the US, New Japan has added two Women’s championships since 2022.

None of that happens if the baseline for women’s wrestling in WWE is not raised like it has been. Showing that women’s wrestling can go as far as to headline their biggest show of the year if done right has opened the door for everyone else to feature it more and give it higher spots on their respective cards. It’s not uncommon now in TNA and ROH for the women’s championship to main event a PPV, and AEW has had at least one show where the women’s title should have been the main event (Revolution 2025) and a few others that could have without anyone blinking. We’re at the point where on any given night one of the other companies may put on a show that outdoes WWE’s women’s wrestling offering that week or that month on a PPV/PLE. In 2026, AEW has had four women’s matches on both of it’s PPV’s (yes I count matches on the preshow, I do the same for TNA and for WWE when they have one). Athena has headlined several ROH PPVs since she’s been women’s champion. And WWE’s developmental arm in NXT routinely books more women’s matches and in higher spots on the card than anyone doing pro wrestling on television, whereas in their infancy, they were a one woman’s match per show operation as well. WWE’s rising tide has indeed lifted all boats.

So, imagine the domino effect in the opposite direction if that evolution never happens. TNA’s Knockouts division may never return to it’s previous glory. AEW and ROH may have never gone beyond token women’s representation on it’s shows. MLW may never bother with women’s wrestling, and New Japan leaves it up to Stardom to handle it instead of incorporating it into their own shows.