RUMOR: Bad News For How WWE Views NXT

Three’s a crowd? WWE is the biggest and more powerful wrestling promotion in the world, to the point that they are regularly running four television shows, all with their own unique rosters. That alone is going to be tricky, as it can be difficult to keep track of everyone on every show. There is also a pecking order to the whole thing, and WWE has certainly figured it out.

According to Jon Alba of Living The Gimmick, NXT is still considered the developmental show rather than the third brand of WWE. This comes after several instances of NXT being presented as a third brand, including winning the Battle For Brand Supremacy at Survivor Series 2019. Earlier this week, NXT Champion Karrion Kross made his Monday Night Raw debut, losing to Jeff Hardy in less than two minutes.

Sources in #WWE tell me #WWENXT is officially viewed internally as "developmental," rather than the third brand as Paul Levesque's team has promoted over the past few years.

Read more now on @theLTGpodcast Patreon.
https://t.co/y7YnuQYjmJ pic.twitter.com/3uHiBaiHUu

— Jon Alba (@JonAlba) July 21, 2021

NXT, of course, was quite literally established as developmental initially, but it has been promoted often over the past few years as the "third brand."

Though there were many indications this week on TV that is no longer the case. https://t.co/y7YnuQYjmJ #WWENXT #WWE

— Jon Alba (@JonAlba) July 21, 2021

NXT has come close before. Check out some of their time on the main roster:

The night NXT took over SmackDown: SmackDown, Nov. 1, 2019

Triple H, Shawn Michaels & Road Dogg ride Team NXT into battle: SmackDown, Nov. 22, 2019

Team NXT brings the fight to Team SmackDown: SmackDown, Nov. 15, 2019

Opinion: I can see both sides of this but ultimately, NXT really should be seen as developmental. The roster and show exist to feed Monday Night Raw and SmackDown, with a lot of the top NXT names already moving up to the other shows. NXT might be a better show to watch, but that does not make it on Monday Night Raw’s level. Now on its same TV network and on the same time as SmackDown sure, but that isn’t the same thing…for some reason.

What do you think of NXT? What is the best current wrestling show? Let us know in the comments below.

Thomas Hall has been a wrestling fan for over thirty years and has seen over 60,000 wrestling matches. He has also been a wrestling reviewer since 2009 with over 6,000 full shows covered. You can find his work at kbwrestlingreviews.com, or check out his- Amazon author page with 30 wrestling books.

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