Has the WWE "indie" era been a mistake?

[Fake Jesus]

I guess you could alternately call this the "NXT era", but they're sort of not synonymous.

Everyone knows how it used to work - WWE had the likes of OVW and FCW - farm feds pretty much geared toward producing the sort of talent that Vince McMahon likes - muscular, about 6'1-6'4" shoot, not slouches in-ring but definitely working the WWE TV style, which is the only way they know how to work.

From the early 10s this has been almost exclusively replaced by a system where the hottest indie talent is signed ready-made, and either comes to the main roster right away (AJ, earlier Punk and Bryan) or spends some time in NXT before graduating up. Many of the prominent faces in the company are products of this system, and the current WWE champion (Lashley) and top face (McIntyre) sort of worked themselves through it after being released by WWE.

In many ways this is a reversion to their traditional way of signing workers - taking hot prospects from the territories and bringing them pre-packaged into WWF.

But has it really worked? Obviously from my end, when I watched WWE these were the workers I wanted to see, but from the company's standpoint the people being signed from the indies and coming through NXT clearly aren't the sorts of wrestlers McMahon wants to work with, and I'm not sure if the company's fortunes would really change at all if they just reverted to the OVW method, although they would certainly be paying Mason Ryan #3 less than they're paying Fergal Devitt.

Obviously there are numerous examples of the company continuing to prefer home-grown talent over indie workers, and there even seems to be a trend of Vince purposefully taking NXT nobodies that fit his model and trying to make them stars over top NXT guys like Cole or Ciampa, who clearly don't fit what Vince wants in a wrestler

[Baldobomb-22-OH-MAN!!!]

considering they made basically no new stars between 2005 and 2012 or so and the 3 biggest stars they had since Cena (CM Punk, Daniel Bryan and Becky Lynch) all had years of indie experience I don't know why anyone would want to go back to the clone factory era.

[Dr. Bolty, Disaster Enby]

Jun 6, 2021 11:06:52 GMT -5 Baldobomb-22-OH-MAN!!! said:

considering they made basically no new stars between 2005 and 2012 or so and the 3 biggest stars they had since Cena (CM Punk, Daniel Bryan and Becky Lynch) all had years of indie experience I don't know why anyone would want to go back to the clone factory era.

Yeah, pretty much this. The OVW years had a lot of people who flat washed out of wrestling after brief, unsuccessful WWE runs, and the show was basically carried by 90's holdovers. The state of modern WWE is arguably the result of the failure of the OVW system combined with the booking getting worse and worse.

[This Player Hating Mothman]

The clone factory years were a big failure for producing talent, and frankly, I think WWECW stands as pretty good proof of that. How many people showed up, did a bit, saw Vince get bored of them, and then get booted? They hit so many of the same problems with jacked up boring dudes as they did with indie superstars. That says to me that the problem has always been one of booking and of effort. Vince didn't know what to do with the people he got who were more 'his type', and he proved that pretty consistently. And I think a good bullet in the head of the idea is the fact that homegrown big man Braun Strowman just got ejected into space while AJ Styles is still going strong as an ever-present fixture in WWE who's likely to retire on a WWE contract and will have had a massively successful WWE career on the way. Similarly, Seth Rollins.

There is no farm system and no mold you could cast a wrestler out of that the Vince McMahon of today would ever do anything good with. The people who have bucked the system and become solidified, 'safe' stars won the lottery in doing so. Nothing to do with their pedigree or the system they came up from. Vince is volatile and fumbling pretty cluelessly through what he thinks is a good idea as that changes by the hour, and people live or die by the word of whoever has his ear. The only difference between now and the mid '00s is that people know more of the names of who's failing to get Vince to buy in, and we get to watch them come up successfully inside a developmental system where what is unambiguously a WWE audience cheers for them. The only argument for the old system over the current one is an argument of austerity.

I think more accurately, WWE has been a mistake.

[fw91]

It a weird catch 22 imo. Indie may have more talent per say, but I can’t say that this era is more entertaining than the days of the inferior clones.

[Dave at the Movies]

Considering NXT is in my opinion the best WWE show I'd say yes it has worked. The old developmental system worked to a degree but too many things changed for it to be sustainable.

[xxshoyuweeniexx]

I don't think it's a failure on the talents part, I just think Vince doesn't have a clue how to just let people have their strong points and just let them be. There's always a caveat or a 'this guy/girl's not over, their catchphrase/chant/mannerisms are", or the fact that when Vince just has HIS GUY/GIRL, it's super super hard to break him out of the mindset that anyone else matters.

This same principal applied back in the OVW/FCW days and applies to current day NXT. How much talent from those two groups were or are being absolutely wasted for YEARS because Vince had his 'it's Orton/Cena/Reigns/Rollins and no one else' mindset?

[Wieners=$$$]

I believe Vince falls ass-backwards into talent. I don't think he ever had a grasp on the developmental system of the '00s. Hell, if it wasn't for Steph, Vince would've passed hard on Cena. Vince owes a lot, and if I may be so bold to say, ALL of his success to talent breaking out on their own. Vince can market a talent, to the point of overkill, but he has never "created" a top-talent.

[06vwgti]

I don't think the indie era was a mistake, but the clone era from OVW/DSW/FCW was not working, but it seems like the WWE has not found that balance in developing wrestlers from the ground up while having indie talent.

I am curious to see how much has changed, like I recall the WWE used to not like signing indie talent b/c of "bad habits" and the need to retrain them to learn their way of working. Because even with all the trainers there with indie experience, there still seems to be disconnect with the leadership up top (Vince).

[Cyno]

Well, when you take everything that made the indie workers popular in the first place, strip them of that, and give them a dumb WWE-ized randomly generated name, is it really any surprise that they can't get over? Their "development" brand is basically a WWE-backed indie promotion and it's generally really good. But it also exists in a bizarre alternate reality from Raw and Smackdown as nothing from there really carries over to the main roster shows.

It's not the talent, it's the people up top.

[J. Hova]

I don't think it has been a failure and I don't think OVW was a failure either. The biggest stars of the past 20 years have been products of the OVW system to varying degrees (Cena, Orton, Lesnar, Batista, Punk, etc.). I'm of the opinion that cream usually rises to the top obvious exceptions excluded. The biggest problem has been Vince and his god awful writing team.

I don't think there was a factory mentality in OVW, FCW, or DSW. It is just the ones who get any time or effort were 6'3" or taller and 270 and heavier. There was an amazing amount of talent in those systems that either got terrible gimmicks (Nick Dinsmore, Spirit Squad, etc.) or got called up and never had anything done with them. I really like NXT but I watch it knowing that if someone gets moved to Raw or Smackdown, they are screwed. I still can't get over how badly they screwed up Black and Andrade and are screwing up Keith Lee.

[Deleted]

Jun 6, 2021 11:06:52 GMT -5 Baldobomb-22-OH-MAN!!! said:

considering they made basically no new stars between 2005 and 2012 or so and the 3 biggest stars they had since Cena (CM Punk, Daniel Bryan and Becky Lynch) all had years of indie experience I don't know why anyone would want to go back to the clone factory era.

I'd argue that the Johnny Ace era was a very dire period in WWE history as virtually none of the talent that would debut on TV from developmental in that time frame you mentioned (especially Deep South alumni) ended up mattering, since they were often thrown to the wolves instead of given an opportunity to develop.  This was particularly gruesome if you watched SmackDown! regularly and saw acts like the Dicks, Gunner Scott, KC James, the Gymini, Little Boogey (I know that one's a joke, but it's forever caked in my head as my first WWE experience), Drew McIntyre the first time he was on the main roster, Bam Neely, and that whole slew of guys they kept promoting in 2008-09 that they refused to use.  While Jim Ross was sort of infamous for valuing wrestling over anything else, Johnny Ace was the opposite; he valued appearances over everything else, and combined with how SmackDown was filled with a bunch of old-timers who had that mentality that young people are ungrateful bastards who need to learn the hard way about "diz bizness" both as performers and writers, it made it so nobody new would ever rise to the top.

["Evil Brood" Jackson Vanik]

It probably should've started sooner. Look at the dire midcard in the mid 2000s. The amount of guys who burned out pretty quickly. Like there's no reason they couldn't have had a Joe or a Bryan or an AJ then. They just didn't see anything in them. And they still came in and made an impact but they missed a lot of their prime.

[kingoftheindies]

What are we considering the indy Era? If we are saying signing the top names from the indies? No it was not a mistake. Are we talking basically making NXT a super indy? Depends on your expectation of NXT. In terms of a quite show and putting on great matches? No if you are talking in terms of getting people ready for Raw and Smackdown? It hasn't been great especially considering the people who got super over on the main shows developed the acts that got over... on the main shows

[Deleted]

Jun 6, 2021 14:32:08 GMT -5 "Evil Brood" Jackson Vanik said:

It probably should've started sooner. Look at the dire midcard in the mid 2000s. The amount of guys who burned out pretty quickly. Like there's no reason they couldn't have had a Joe or a Bryan or an AJ then. They just didn't see anything in them. And they still came in and made an impact but they missed a lot of their prime.

You gotta remember who was in charge of the talent relations at the time, not to mention the amount of pull Kevin Dunn, of all people, has in describing what makes good TV.  Really, you can throw a dart at anyone (Pritchard, Hayes, Ace, Dunn, Vince) and they would be a reasonable contender that would explain why mid 2000s WWE sucked.

While these wrestlers would immensely have improved the WWE product, the people making the decisions had different ideas about the industry cause they looked at what worked in the 80s as well as for a brief period a few years ago and felt it would work again, just the fans needed to get their heads out of their asses and come back around to it.  Obviously, this thinking has only hurt the industry overall since WWE has lost the potential at new fans staying fans for more than a few years, but delusion is often how a promoter behaves.

[Deleted]

Jun 6, 2021 14:32:08 GMT -5 "Evil Brood" Jackson Vanik said:

It probably should've started sooner. Look at the dire midcard in the mid 2000s. The amount of guys who burned out pretty quickly. Like there's no reason they couldn't have had a Joe or a Bryan or an AJ then. They just didn't see anything in them. And they still came in and made an impact but they missed a lot of their prime.

This is mostly what I was thinking.

[clifford]

It hasn't 'worked' cause Vince hasn't let it work. Most NXT stars called up have been cut off at the legs and failed by the WWE. There's a reason all the dudes from the late 2010s are still so prominently featured- Miz, Dolph, Kofi, Sheamus, Morrison, Drew, Lashley among others- cause Vince made them stars. He wants to prove that it's his guys and not Triple H's NXT darlings. There's still a place for all these dudes in the WWE in 2021 don't get me wrong, but if the WWE had handled all other NXT callups as well as they did with the Shield, you'd have a host of bonafide, young WWE main eventers. Instead they will be making other companies millions of dollars over the next decade.

[Bo Rida]

No. The level of raw talent available to them is higher than ever, they just can't book anymore. If Rocky Maivia came through today he'd never become The Rock and Steve Austin would have stayed stunning not stone cold.

That said I have no idea why the hell AEW do better with their hosses than WWE, that is a failing. Nothing to do with who they're recruiting though, Brodie and Braun had different backgrounds but still got released, again it's booking.

Their weird obsession with endless fitnes drills also probably drives away some of those that might have gotten by with charisma alone.
They also can't seem to successfully transition people with athletic backgrounds. They've struggled to find giants to replace Show and Kane.

[Hit Girl]

No

The mistake is letting a senile elderly lunatic continue to write the product 20 years after he should have retired.

[chazraps]

No, next question.