Triple H On AEW: “They Beat Our Developmental System? Good For Them”
Triple H has spoken out about the “wrestling war” on Wednesday nights when WWE NXT was on at the same time as AEW Dynamite and the perception was that Dynamite won that battle.
It was August 2019 when WWE announced that NXT was moving to USA Network after running exclusively on WWE Network in the US along with other nations. It led to NXT becoming a two-hour show with AEW Dynamite, which debuted on TNT (now on TBS) in October 2019. It led to a “Wednesday Night War” as some fans called it.
When Dynamite was head to head with NXT, it was Dynamite who ended up with the bigger television. In April 2021, WWE and USA Network decided to move NXT to Tuesday nights. Later that year in September, WWE rebranded NXT going from the black & gold look to the more colorful NXT 2.0 presentation. It also led to WWE utilizing more talent that was less experienced, so NXT was truly a developmental brand while Raw & Smackdown remained the top two brands in the company.
There was some belief among those that cover the pro wrestling industry and fans alike that maybe WWE moved NXT because they were losing to Dynamite in the television ratings.
Triple H took part in a new interview with Ariel Helwani of BT Sport where they covered many topics. The 53-year-old Head of WWE Creative and Talent Relations talked about how changes to NXT were planned for a long time while dismissing the idea that there was pressure to beat Dynamite.
“People put so much pressure on this competitive war, it never was that. Look, first of all, they beat our developmental system? Good for them, right? [laughs]”
“No it was never that [competitive war]. There was never even a pressure of ‘You have to beat that.’ It was never that. It was put on the best product that we could. Like I said, it [NXT] shifted over time, in the pandemic all of that shifted over time.”
Also in the interview, Triple H talked about how the transition from NXT UK closing and starting NXT Europe in 2023 was orginally going to take place before the COVID-19 pandemic delayed things.