Grayson Waller comments on how he “took a risk” by returning to the WWE NXT brand
WWE NXT Champion Grayson Waller did an interview with Chris Van Vliet. During the discussion, Waller discussed his return to the NXT brand…
Van Vliet: “How did this move from the main roster to NXT come about?”
Waller: “Shawn [Michaels] called me and asked me to come and meet up with him.”
Van Vliet: “So you said that this wasn’t a demotion; you took a risk. What do you mean by that?”
Waller: “I don’t see it as that because I wasn’t told to do anything. I was asked. I was given an option by Shawn, and I chose to go and do that. So I didn’t look at it as a demotion because I’m on TV every week. I’m competing every week against some of the best kids in the world right now.”
Van Vliet: “So if you don’t go back to NXT, where do you think your career ends up going?”
“Maybe Chipotle. Maybe I’m giving out extra avocado at Chipotle. I don’t know.”
Waller: “The one thing I’ll say, and I mean it, is that I’m always upfront and honest about situations. I could see the writing on the wall. They’re bringing up these kids from NXT who are super talented, and they’re giving them all the chances. I’m in the background, and it’s disappearing. You go lower and lower. You get more forgotten about. I was gone for sure.
So when I say I took a risk to go to NXT, it’s a risk because you never know if it’s going to work out. But I trust in my ability, and I just needed a platform. So I think it was something that I needed to do because I need to show them who I am. I need to show them I love this. I’m so good. You are the guys who haven’t seen it. It’s not me; you’re fumbling the ball.
I have everything ready to go, but you just don’t know. So I took it upon myself to kind of force it on them. I’m like, ‘Hey, you want to know what I can do? I’m going to show you.’”
Van Vliet: “When you say you’re hungry, are you hungry to continue to do things in NXT, or do you want to accomplish everything in NXT and then say to Raw and SmackDown this is what you’re missing out on?”
Waller: “I kind of said it the first time I went out there. My goal is to make this championship mean something [again]. You think of that black and gold era, the NXT title meant more than titles on the main roster. That Saturday TakeOver show, more people were excited for that than they were the Sunday, and I think we’ve lost a lot of that.
I don’t think it’s anyone in particular who’s done it. But that title used to mean something. So I’m proud to have this. This means a lot to me personally because watching wrestling when I was starting out, I loved NXT, and that’s what I want one day. I never got it when I was here, and that burned me. That really burned me inside.”