Will Ricky Saints become the new NXT Champion?
The situation between Ricky Saints and Shawn Spears escalated very quickly on Tuesday. The 35-year-old was doing a sit down interview until the North American Champion intervened. Spears talked about their time in AEW (without mentioning the company’s name) and how Saints always creates enemies everywhere he goes.
The backstage face-to-face was civil, but Saints made one thing very clear: he’s coming after the NXT North American Championship. A short time later, a NXT North American title match was made official between Saints and Spears on next week’s episode.
But the interview wasn't the final time we would see these two interact as Saints was on commentary for Ethan Page’s match against Andre Chase. Following the former NXT Champion’s win, Page started smack talking Saints and the NXT newcomer snapped back at Ethan.
That distraction allowed Shawn Spears to blindside Saints and leave him lying on the ground. It’s very interesting that NXT has given Saints a championship match this early in his run. The former AEW star has only two matches in NXT so far, where as Shawn Spears just won the NXT North American title. Plus, the 44-year-old has formed a new faction, so it would be shocking if NXT quickly pulled the plug on Spears’ act by having him lose.
However, WWE has been about twists and turns as of late and it’s quite possible that Saints winning the NXT North American Championship is another one. Should Saints win, it'll be his first WWE Championship. Given how popular the former AEW star is, it wouldn’t be surprising if he wins more gold sometime down the road.
As for Spears, him losing means he would’ve only kept the title for less than 30 days. It won’t go down as the fastest title reign in WWE history, but it surely won’t look good for Spears and The Culling going forward. So far, the NXT North American Championship match is the only confirmed bout on next week's card. Given everything that happened on Tuesday, there's a strong indication on where officials are going heading into their next episode.