Killer Kross says it's hard to deny that WWE is purposely working against Triple H’s vision for NXT and the future of the company.
Killer Kross was the last defending NXT Champion of the black and gold era of the brand. Shortly after Kross lost the title to Samoa Joe, the brand moved over to NXT 2.0 and underwent a completely new vision.
Killer Kross also appeared on Monday Night Raw as the NXT Champion and lost a match within 2 minutes to Jeff Hardy. Now, Killer Kross is talking to Sean Ross Sapp about what he feels about WWE changing direction with NXT.
“If those conversations did take place from the top, they never were discussed with me,” Killer Kross said about losing on Monday Night Raw. "But, I mean, that was in the air for sure. I had so many people I didn’t even know—and I don’t like saying it like this—maybe looking up to me or looking at my career as a thing they would want to pursue for themselves. I had people coming to me going, ‘If they’re going to do this to you, what are they gonna do to me?’ This became a cautionary tale to people inside the company and outside the company going, ‘We know you. You’re not a disruptive person. You’re a professional. You do everything you’re supposed to do. If this can happen to you, what am I doing here?’ I try to be positive. That’s a hard thing for me to try to spin to people when I’m talking to them. I can’t bullshit them. I really didn’t know what to say to them. I had no idea. That’s not the way you want your roster and your team to feel. You don’t want them to feel like that.”
Regarding the loss to Jeff Hardy, Killer Kross said it definitely made him feel off and that it killed the momentum for his match with Samoa Joe at TakeOver 36.
"The loss to Jeff, too, the way that was booked, a lot of people felt like it shot the main event in the head for TakeOver with Joe, you know what I mean? It was just a lot of things that unfortunately could have been done differently and would have improved everything in general," said Kross.
"How can you say it doesn’t feel that way? It does feel really unusual. Thinking back, there’s just so many things that weren’t adding up and making sense from just before TakeOver to all the way on the way out. I still have a ton of friends that are there and there’s just so many question marks all over everything. If it’s ever going to come out, you know they’re just gonna do some two hour program and just find a way to monetize all the weirdness. But there’s so much, man. I even think too, everything during the pandemic when we were filming at the beginning of it, there’s so much backstage footage," said Kross.
Killer Kross says he is a guy who tries to stay in his own bubble in order to keep wrestling fun for himself as he has seen many become overwhelmed by The Backstage ongoings of wrestling.
"I have always been a guy that’s lived in my own bubble in wrestling because I see the cliquey stuff going on. You hear people gossiping, you hear people talking shit. Not everybody always gets along. A lot of people actually do get along. Some people need to vent in a car or whatever. I’ve always tried to shield myself from that type of stuff because I’ve always wanted to protect this. I wanted this to still continue to be fun for me. I know some guys that just become consumed with how other people are being booked and how much this person is being paid. I’ve always just been waiting the time that I’m going to be allotted to go out there and perform and try to knock that out. I don’t want my energy to be stolen by this type of stuff," said Kross.
Regarding Triple H’s NXT being dismantled, Kross says it's hard to not feel like the black and gold era of NXT is being torn apart.
“It does feel really unusual. Thinking back, there’s just so many things that weren’t adding up and making sense from just before Takeover to all the way on the way out. I still have a ton of friends that are there and there’s just so many question marks all over everything. If it’s ever going to come out, you know they’re just gonna do some two-hour program and just find a way to monetize all the weirdness. But there’s so much, man. I even think too, everything during the pandemic when we were filming at the beginning of it, there’s so much backstage footage.”
Continuing on, Killer Kross says that at some point, there could be an abundance of content released about all of WWE during the pandemic because there is quite a lot of footage of how the wrestlers banded together.
“I wish people could see how close we all got and banded together during such uncertain times. All that stuff was filmed. There’s gonna be programs about that one day for sure. There could be. Of how we had to adapt in those times and how we were living and what people were going through emotionally and how they were feeling. Maybe it’s too early to do a program on that right now, but I do wonder if they’re ever just going to tell everybody what the fuck actually happened. Because so many of us would actually really like to know, me being one of them. Like, what the fuck happened?”
Killer Kross will make his television Wrestling return for Major League Wrestling on Saturday, February 26 in Charlotte, North Carolina. Learn more about his upcoming debut at MLW SuperFight at this link.