A conference call was held by Triple H, as he spoke about NXT staying in Full Sail University rather than going to the Amway Center. Hunter also discussed the SummerSlam location plans, one of which included having the event take place on a boat (i.e. Chris Jericho’s Rock n’ Rager Cruise).
* Triple H was introduced by Adam Hopkins and welcomed everyone onto the call. He said that it’s an “exciting time in the world” and that everyone’s trying to put out content in the most effective and safest way possible, and promoted tonight’s NXT which he put over as leading into NXT Takeover XXX on Saturday. He talked about how the first NXT Takeover was in Full Saul in May 2014 and are ironically back there again after so many big venues in the meantime from Brooklyn to London to Japan and everywhere else. He notes that he said in the beginning that they were doing this five or six years from then he’d be happy about it, and he feels that way.
* He talks about the card, starting with the Adam Cole vs. Pat McAfee feud and how McAfee came from football and was interested in WWE. He talked about how bringing someone from the outside in is done for a clear reason — a lot of press, ESPN, and fresh eyeballs on it. While some purists will ask “why,” he says that McAfee will show them why and that it’s not just a one-off for him. He called the match a big sleeper for him before going on to talk about the NXT North American Title match being about the next wave of main eventers. He said Io Shirai is one of the best female performers in the world and Dakota Kai has opened a lot of eyes in the last year, and then talked about Keith Lee’s big 2020 and his match against Karrion Kross. He then began taking questions.
* The first question was about why NXT is not joining Raw and SmackDown at Amway Center for Thunderdome. Triple H said that moving SmackDown, Summerslam, and Raw to the Amway Center is a big undertaking and says it’s spectacular, but they have enough on their hands and the partnership with Full Sail University is essential. He says never say never, but he’s happy where they are right now. He promotes the debut of Thunderdome on Friday and says that the fan interaction is the secret sauce and he can’t wait to get them back. For now though, NXT is still at Full Sail for the immediate future. They’re figuring it all out day by day like everyone else.
* Asked about the Velveteen Dream investigation and the accuser who claims WWE didn’t reach out to him, as well as Nia Jax’s online negativity about the investigation, Triple H said they took it very seriously. He stands by what he said which is that they looked into it and didn’t find anything there. They will always look at anything new that pops up, but he wants to move onto other topics.
* The next question asked about research they’ve done to prepare for going back on the road with NXT. He said it’s constant research on options, whether it’s fans for TV or live events or virtual fans. When the world gets to a place where they can return to running shows safely for everyone, they will including possibly different technologies and if something comes up that seems legitimate, they consider it.
* Triple H declined to comment about Renee Young’s status and said that he loves Renee and having her in WWE has been awesome. He put her over as a large part of what they do, and said that he’s loved working with her.
* Asked about the reports on whether SummerSlam on a boat was an option, he said that every option was looked into and most of them didn’t have a chance. The key is doing things safely and doing things on a boat aren’t easy. He said that when we see Thunderdome on SmackDown and SummerSlam, we’ll see why they chose that route and put over Kevin Dunn’s team.
* Asked about Lars Sullivan’s status, he says he has no update and didn’t know that Sullivan had been putting out workout videos, so hadn’t seen them. Asked about Randy Orton expressing interest in working with NXT talents, he said there’s always talks and that with all the TV they do, making changes across brands and days is a lot harder than people thing. The option is always there, but the challenges are too. He said Orton is vocal about it but he gets calls all the time about people wanting to work with people in NXT.
* Asked about their lessons learned while filming shows during the pandemic and if there’s a new head writer for NXT, he said they shift things around as things happen and that their team includes Shawn Michaels, Brian James, and himself, saying it’s business as usual. As far as lessons learned, there are lessons everywhere and the biggest challenge has been how how everything has shifted and that COVID-19 has made it all exponentially harder; you can have great stuff written but then you have to wait to see if any of it can even take place. He said that dealing with that and not having the energy of the fans has been hard and how not having reactions changes things entirely, and how the young talent they’re training is not able to learn how to work with the crowd. They are very happy with where they are right now and that it’s nice to be able to train talent, which they haven’t been able to do due to the Performance Center being sued for TV. He noted that they now have a secondary facility to help work on talent that will come back into play.
* Asked about talent being moved from NXT from Raw to SmackDown and how that’s changed, he said that they’ve made changes due to NXT airing on the USA Network and we’ll see more of that when the Draft returns later this year. He said that people can now go to new brands and try different things and how when he arrived, he’d talk with Undertaker about people who were there for five or six years and it seemed unthinkable and unreal to him that people stayed that long; now people are in WWE for 10 years and more which is due to the brands, all of which need to be supported.
* Asked about Karrion Kross and what he brings to NXT, Triple H said that he’s a great talent who he’s been aware of for a great time and he could always see so much in the X-factor to him which is king for talent. He noted that the learning curve in NXT is steep for anyone and that Kross is a sponge for the business, always asking questions and learning similar to Keith Lee. As to matches and if they rush matches in fear of losing names to Raw or SmackDown, he said it’s not about that but instead getting them to the fans in the most meaningful way possible while thinking long-term. They take into account when talent are going to another round such as Matt Riddle moving to SmackDown and their booking him against Timothy Thatcher in the Fight Pit.
* Triple H answered a question about what part of the rating he focuses on for Wednesdays (demo or viewers) and said he’s focused on NXT. He said that he’s glad people care about the ratings at the level they do because they care about the industry and the product, and are passionate about it. For him at the end of the day its about their product and fans; they put out the best show they can and fans hopefully like it. He does look at the numbers but not the way people do online, and he doesn’t worry about the arguments online. He focuses on NXT. He talks about the fans coming back and how he can’t wait for it and looking forward to the true reactions in the arenas.
* Asked about Raw Underground and using NXT talent, he called it a unique environment and good for talent who can display an appropriate set of skills there can appear there. He said that there could be appearances that don’t necessarily involve brand moves and it’s a great opportunity to expose talent to a larger audience.
* Asked about the mental difficulty of talent performing without crowds, he acknowledged it’s hard and said that as a performer there’s no bigger adrenaline rush than that crowd reaction; it’s incredibly difficult to create that in your own mind and doing matches without the audience is much harder. His hat is off to all the performers as they try to bring their own energy — wrestlers, broadcasters, men, women, everybody. They’re doing a fantastic job and delivering for the fans.
* Asked about Pat McAfee’s future and if he’ll have more matches, he said they’ll see and put McAfee over as an amazing athlete and an all-around talent who could do multiple spots. He recalls first meeting McAfee and not realizing how much of a fan he was at first, but he gets it now. He said he’s not looking to just do the celebrity spot and he wants to be a wrestler. Triple H has seen him train and he’s a natural with plenty of personality. He’s working with one of the top guys in Adam Cole and expects it to be spectacular, but that his future depends on him because he has a lot going on.
* Asked about Bronson Reed as the last question, Triple H says he loves that Reed isn’t just a clone of everyone else and loves people that are different and stand out. He said there was a process to get him to this point and he’s there now. He added that he was talking to Keith Lee, who said he was proud of Reed coming into his own similar to what Lee did. Triple H said that it takes a minute to do that, but that he’s done so and has been doing great every week. He said that Reed in a ladder match will be wild considering his size and that everything can happen.
(Credit to 411Mania for the full transcript below. Video provided by Fightful Select.).
