On Tuesday's edition of NXT, Tony D'Angelo, the most made man in WWE, as some might say, gave his buddies Troy “Two Dimes” Donovan and Channing “Stacks” Lorenzo a pair of shiny new gold watches as a sort of predictive award for the next accomplishment he wants to achieve in The Fed: Championship gold.

The segment, though incredibly dated now considering Donovan was released from the promotion due to a “Policy Issue,” was set up to further a feud with Carmelo Hayes, “The Overdog” of NXT, who D'Angelo will be wrestling on the next episode of NXT 2.0 and encourage that belief that maybe, just maybe, the Garden State's favorite Wiseguy could actually pull out the W over this very decorated foe in pursuit of the North American Championship.

Could gold be in D'Angelo's future? Sure, that seems entirely possible, but after less than a year in the ring, now probably isn't the time.

Tony D'Angelo needs more time before he deserves the strap.

Tony D'Angelo made his debut in NXT on October 5th, 2021, when he defeated Malik Blade in a match that came in at just under five minutes. He then beat Ru Feng and, surprisingly enough, Dexter Lumis, before having his career shotgunned forward in a major way by being named to Team 2.0 in the December 5th edition of WarGames alongside Bron Breakker, Carmelo Hayes, and Grayson Waller versus the OG Team Black and Gold of Johnny Gargano, LA Knight, Pete Dunne, and Tomasso Ciampa, none of whom are still in NXT as per the time of publication.

Since then, D'Angelo has taken a tour through the best of the best NXT's midcard has to offer, facing off against everyone from Andre Chase to Pete Dunne (x3), Von Wagner, Santos Escobar, and the trio of Legado del Fantasma before setting his sights on his very first title match, which will be televised on the next episode of NXT 2.0. In his forthcoming contest, which is only 13th singles match in NXT, D'Angelo will face off against his War Games teammate Hayes, who has been wrestling professionally since 2014 according to Cagematch and has 329 matches under his belt, including big-time NXT bouts against Cameron Grimes, Roderick Strong, and Adam Cole, and indie matches when he was known as Christian Casanova against everyone from Myron Reed, to Alex Zayne, Daniel Garcia, Kip Sabian, and even Leyla Hirsh.

Now sure, in the world of wrestling, anyone can beat anyone on any given day; one mistake and three seconds is all it takes to find oneself on the wrong side of the win-loss record, but if D'Angelo can't even take care of Cameron Grimes in a #1 contenders match, how is he going to beat the man who defeated “The Alpha of Omega” for the title back at In Your House?

Answer: He probably can't… at least not yet.

No, for Tony D to take a step forward and become the sort of performer WWE clearly incision him to be, he just needs to get a little more seasoning – like the razor blade garlic added to the sauce in Martin Scorsaesee's 1990 film Goodfellas. He needs to get his crew in order, punch a few frozen meat carcasses, and maybe make a lap around Broad Street on his way to the Philadelphia Art Museum. Then it's bada-bing, new gold for everyone, including most importantly of all, “The Don of WWE.”