After watching the WWE Universe descend on St. Petersburg for the first Premium Live Event of 2024, fans will be afforded another commercial-free showcase of what the promotion has to offer at NXT Vengence Day.
With the show set to serve as something of a transitional moment for Shawn Michaels' brand, with Bron Breakker being courted for a spot on RAW and SmackDown by the show's respective GMs and Carmelo Hayes likely to follow suit sooner than later, some of the performers fans have come to know and love on the Black and Gold brands may be giving their swan songs at the F&M Bank Arena in Clarksville, Tennessee, with a new class of talents having to pick up the slack when they exit the brand.
And the best part? With so much up in the air at the moment, the show really could go in a variety of different ways, which makes for an interesting opportunity to make bold predictions about the future of NXT.
5. Joe Gacy begins his post-Schism act with a bang
When Joey Gacy was tossed into a massive dumpster off the top of the NXT Performance Center in Orlando, it looked like the former Schism leader was going to be out of action indefinitely, as WWE Superstars don't take that sort of a bump and live to tell the tale.
Gacy, however, isn't your usual WWE Superstar, as he came up in the barbed wire cages of CZW on the indies and jumped, metaphorically speaking, at the idea of a No DQ match against his current NXT rival Dijak.
Will this match be entertaining? Probably, especially if Shawn Michaels lets Gacy do whatever he wants at the F&M Bank Arena in Clarksville, Tennessee, but it needs to end with a win by the 36-year-old Schism founder, as he needs something big to help him jump forward in his WWE career following the end of his spooky faction. Fortunately, Gacy is a very creative dude, so if anyone can make it work, it's the “Chainsaw.”
4. Dragon Lee heads to the WWE main roster full-time
When Wes Lee was placed on the shelf with a back injury, it shook up the NXT card for the foreseeable future.
With Lee out of action, Dominik Mysterio working overtime on the main roster, and Mustafa Ali released to become a certified force on the indies, Shawn Michaels tipped his hat to Dragon Lee, the SmackDown Superstar who jumped to the main roster in Q3 of 2023. Filling the role of transitional champion, Lee held the belt for 31 days before being dethroned by Oba Femi, who cashed in his Breakouts Tournament open contract to shoot his shot at the title.
With a rematch booked for Vengence Day, could Lee win back his title and start a legitimate feud with Femi, legitimizing the bright young star against a well-respected performer in the process? Sure, but it would make more sense to give Lee a clean loss and allow him to jump back onto the main roster, RAW or SmackDown, for good.
3. Bron Breakker turns on Baron Corbin after tag team win
Unfortunately for Shawn Michaels, after building up a big money match for Vengence Day over the past few weeks as part of the Dusty Rhodes Tag Team Classic, it looks like three of the four performers in the match, Bron Breakker, Carmelo Hayes, and Trick Williams, may all be main roster bound in the not-too-distant future, with the former two expected to appear on SmackDown after appearing in the 2024 Royal Rumble.
But how should HBK book the match? Should Trick and Melo win the match? Or could the Wolf Dogs earn their massive W and take their talents to the main roster?
The boldest solution of all? Breakker and Baron Corbin secure the win and then immediately break up after the former turns on the latter in his final NXT act before moving to the main roster. Unless there's another NXT Championship match in his future, why not send Breakker off on a high note as he moves on to bigger and better things?
2. Jade Cargill doesn't appear during Lyra Valkyria's match.
After making multiple appearances on NXT television after officially signing with WWE last year, fans wondered if Jade Cargill could become a full-time member of the Black and Gold brand moving forward, dominating the women's division in the same way she dominated the TBS Championship picture in AEW.
… but then Cargill made her debut at the 2024 Royal Rumble and looked like she belonged in the ring with performers like Bianca Belair and Becky Lynch, leading to a borderline guaranteed spot on RAW or SmackDown moving forward.
Could Cargill show up to mess with Lyra Valkyria's title defense against Roxanne Perez? Sure, but frankly, I wouldn't bet on it.
1. Carmelo Hayes leads to an Ilja Dragunov NXT Championship win
So, if Carmelo Hayes and Trick Williams drop their match against the Wolf Dogs in the Dusty Rhodes Tag Team Classic, how would that affect the latter's match against Ilja Dragunov?
Probably a lot, just not in a good way for Trick Willie.
Assuming Hayes and Williams suffer a loss due to a miscommunication against the Wolf Dogs, pushing further and further toward an inevitable breakup, what would happen if the former came out during the latter's match at Vengence Day and tried to “help,” only for that help to backfire in a spectacular way and cost Hayes the win? If that happens, it's safe to say Shawn Michaels will have his Stand and Deliver main event in the bag, as that match would mean more than any title bout he could put at the top of the card.
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