[#1-norm-fan]

Originally Posted by Mr. Nerfect I said they felt like their hand was forced. Could they have done Daniel Bryan vs. Fandango or whatever the fuck was available on the SmackDown side at the time? Sure, probably. But they had half (maybe more) of their roster over in Saudi Arabia unable to make it back to SmackDown so they used NXT talent (and Pat McAfee in the booth). If they had the talent back, they probably wouldn’t have done it at all. Once NXT were in it, they decided to put them over at Survivor Series. Was the intent to give them a little boost? Sure, probably. But what were they supposed to do? Have Raw and SmackDown demolish them and send them back to Orlando in a crate? They put some of their guys over because that’s the situation they were in — right, wrong or otherwise. It wasn’t some massive grand plan to make NXT the dominant brand in all of WWE. It doesn’t mean that NXT was forever going to have a heavy presence on either Raw or SmackDown. It was a glorified cameo. And the fill-ins got the wins, which is pretty standard. It also could have been more about the other shows losing. Not that that went anywhere.

Actually, you said their hand WAS forced. Multiple times. But alright. So now they just FELT LIKE their hand was forced. The Saudi deal made them FEEL LIKE their hand was forced to have main roster vs NXT matches one night on Smackdown. Not the worst thing in the world. Now make the leap from there to having to do a brand war between the main roster and developmental on a major PPV/Network special.

And once this bad idea train was rolling... While your “demolish them and send them home in a crate” is an exaggeration yes, your developmental guys should not be booked to win a “battle for brand supremacy” over your main roster. Lol

Unless of course you’re trying to push your developmental brand as a legit on-par brand with the rest... Which is dumb... Which is my point.