10 Worst First Days For WWE NXT Call-Ups

10. Tommaso Ciampa

...this then-reigning NXT Champion. Troublingly, he's not the only case of this on the list.

There was more than a spoonful of sugary schadenfreude to be found from Triple H's suffering during a bewildering segment on the February 18th 2019 edition of Monday Night Raw. There, 'The King Of Kings' had to hit pause on his own programme with Batista and play head coach promoting his favourites to the first team. He just really didn't want to.

Reigning titleholder Ciampa was called up alongside Johnny Gargano, Aleister Black and Ricochet in what now appears in hindsight to be Vince McMahon's last attempt at falling in love with his son-in-law's pet project.

He'd asked for his elite tier four, got them, and presumably thought they were too small and shoved them in tag teams. Ciampa's match here and on the following evening's SmackDown tapings were disastrous. Fine in execution, these middling contests aggravated a neck injury that forced him to miss a blockbuster planned showdown with Gargano just over a month later. He's not strayed from the black-and-gold brand ever since.