10 Most Important Milestones In WWE NXT History

8. FCW Ceases To Exist

Florida Championship wrestling had a very storied past. It operated as its own territory from 1961 until 1987 before being resurrected in 2007 as WWE's secondary developmental territory behind Ohio Valley Wrestling. FCW was started, the second time round, by Steve Keirn after WWE ended their relationship with the Georgia-based Deep South Wrestling. Then, in early 2008 FCW became WWE's sole developmental territory when they ceased affiliation with OVW. Every young top star in the company appeared in FCW before its rebranding to NXT. Seth Rollins, Dean Ambrose and Roman 'Leakee' Reigns had a very high profile rivalry before making the step up to WWE as The Shield in late 2012. In March 2012, it was reported that Florida Championship Wrestling would cease operating which caused Keirn and Triple H to categorically refute the claims. However, around five months later WWE dropped the FCW name, deactivated the titles, and began running all of its developmental events and operations under the 'NXT Wrestling' banner. NXT as we know it today was born.