11 Implications Of WWE's Brand Extension 2016

4. Are Further Raids On Non-WWE Talent Inevitable Now?

wwe brand extension
WWE.com

As mentioned earlier, in order to give both RAW and SmackDown enough star power to sustain themselves it is likely that the top guys from NXT will be called up. Theoretically this means Samoa Joe, Finn Balor, Shinsuke Nakamura, Austin Aries and others could be gone from NXT sooner rather than later, and does that then leave us an NXT Championship feud between Mojo Rawley and No Way Jose?

I'd wager not, as WWE's stance when it comes to signing talent from outside the company has relaxed remarkably in the last year or so. 2016 alone has seen Shinsuke Nakamura, AJ Styles, Austin Aries, Karl Anderson, Luke Gallows and Eric Young arrive in WWE, with Bobby Roode and a whole host of names in the Global Cruiserweight Series hot on their heels.

Will WWE continue to raid the independent wrestling scene? With NXT likely to be gutted to fill out RAW and SmackDown, should companies like Ring of Honor be looking to tie talent up just a little tighter?

Contributor
Contributor

Born in the middle of Wales in the middle of the 1980's, John can't quite remember when he started watching wrestling but he has a terrible feeling that Dino Bravo was involved. Now living in Prague, John spends most of his time trying to work out how Tomohiro Ishii still stands upright. His favourite wrestler of all time is Dean Malenko, but really it is Repo Man. He is the author of 'An Illustrated History of Slavic Misery', the best book about the Slavic people that you haven't yet read. You can get that and others from www.poshlostbooks.com.