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August 17, 2016

Triple H reveals cruiserweight plans for Raw, NXT


During his usual pre-TakeOver conference call this afternoon (Aug. 17), Triple H gave us some insight into what to expect for cruiserweights as WWE Network’s Cruiserweight Classic (CWC) tournament nears its halfway point, and promotion ramps up for a new division featuring the sub-205 pound wrestlers on Raw.

The Executive Vice President of Talent, Live Events, & Creative responded to recent remarks from SmackDown Live (kayfabe) General Manager Daniel Bryan that it didn’t make sense for the division to be on Mondays when the two voices of the CWC, Bryan and Mauro Ranallo, are on Tuesdays.

Raw’s extra hour, and the ability to present something which really stands out, outweighed any announcer synergy SmackDown offered:

Daniel's a bad negotiator, I guess. I think that, to me, the cruiserweights, the place for them... I agree with the Daniel Bryan and Mauro Ranallo analogy. Those pieces weren't necessarily in place when we were putting together the Cruiserweight Classic but Raw being the three hour show and needing more and more content and more talent, I believe that is the right place for them. It's something different and I think you're going to see that. ... You'll see the presentation being different. It's all about creating something different for Raw given the three hour format.

There’s a lot of questions about who will make up the scene on Raw. Rumors have abounded of Hunter signing a lot of talent for and from the CWC, and in just the last week, he made a very public overture to Cedric Alexander at the same time WWE legal filed for trademarks on Gran Metalik (the name CMLL’s Máscara Dorada is working the WWE Network tournament under), while Kota Ibushi has been telling people he’s not ready to commit to WWE full-time.

It doesn’t sound like Haitch is worried about being able to fill out the roster, though:

As far as who we're bringing in, yes, we're signing a lot of cruiserweights now and I'm basically creating a division. So I'm going around and signing guys and I'm also keeping an eye toward the future as well. I don't need to have every single cruiserweight right now, I just need to have a decent amount.

An intriguing answer he gave during the call points to the cruiserweights being very much under his purview - including being used on NXT:

They will be working NXT, they will be working NXT live events, and they'll also be working Raw as cruiserweights. The opportunity is there to do both. I want these guys to be able to work.

source: cagesideseats.com

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