Report on why NXT stars were suddenly called up to the WWE main roster

As seen on the July 9th 2021 edition of WWE Smackdown, Shotzi Blackheart (now known as Shotzi) and Tegan Nox were mystery opponents for the WWE women’s tag team champions Natalya and Tamina. There was also a “coming soon” video for Toni Storm. All of the women are now officially part of the Smackdown roster even though they had active storylines in NXT.

WWE television viewership has reached record-low numbers in recent weeks and some of the ticket sales for upcoming live events have been disappointing. The belief is that Vince McMahon is reacting to business being down by bringing in new characters to freshen things up and that’s why the call-ups happened so suddenly. Dave Meltzer of F4WOnline.com wrote the following regarding the matter…

“One person close to the situation noted exactly that, when the advances came in, Vince assessed it by saying there was nobody new, fresh or exciting on the roster and that’s when he went to NXT with the idea of freshening up the roster with new faces who would be pushed hard right out of the box (or until he gives up on some of them quickly).”