8 WWE Busts Who Revived Their Careers
1. Triple H
The debut of All Elite Wrestling was the beginning of the end for the "black-and-gold" era of NXT.
Even if WWE's quasi-developmental hadn't been used as reduction fodder by the market leader upon the launch of Dynamite in late-2019, the writing was on the wall as soon as the challenger brand revealed what it was set to offer. For yeas, despite operating within the walls and budget of WWE, NXT had intentionally felt like an opposition of sorts - a version of the company more palatable than the slop being served up by Vince McMahon's increasingly unhinged main roster product. At the front and centre of the divide was Triple H, not-that-quietly auditioning for the role he'd assume when McMahon resigned in disgrace in 2022 and 2024.
Before that remarkable turn of events though, the corporate future of 'The Game' was infamously unknown. NXT comprehensively lost a ratings war to AEW between October 2019 and April 2021, and by September 2021 the entire show was rebranded to a version that looked like AI rendering of "the complete opposite of what Paul Levesque likes". Health issues removed him from day-to-day running of it, but it was jarring to see just how far removed he was from the in-house process before the first stories on McMahon dropped and the main roster required his steady hand.
With WWE's ability to re-write history, the story of this strange period has now been forgotten, instead presented as Hunter presiding over a prosperous era of developmental before assuming the spot he'd waited years for. The wilderness period - perhaps best exemplified by the atrocious "One Final Beat" episode of NXT in April 2020 - at least features Hunter looking a bit silly in his increasingly insignificant role as the show's chief authority figure.