Did Jon Moxley stop Karrion Kross from being All Elite?
Before Kross made his NXT debut in 2020, the 39-year-old had been nearly everywhere on the independent circuit. However, most fans know Kross from his TNA/Impact Wrestling days as Killer Kross. Once he left Impact in 2020, Kross was back on the indie scene and he happened to be wrestling on the same show as current AEW World Champion Jon Moxley. The two were talking backstage and Kross revealed during the Notsam Wrestling podcast that Mox was the man that put his foot into the door:
“After the show, he’s like, he basically says ‘Hey listen. I’m not telling you where to go. I’m not telling you where to make money. But I’m just saying, you really should call Triple H, cause you could make a very, very good living there,'” Kross recalled (h/t to Wrestling Inc). “He was like ‘Work wherever you want, go wherever you want. But I just have a feeling that if you call him, things are going to be good for you.'”
He continued, “And I was like…that’s like ‘What do you mean? Call Triple H? What do you mean?’ He’s like ‘Nah, just call him…I’m giving you his number. I want you to call him.’ And I was like ‘Oh my god.’ Well now I can’t [not call him]…So now I had to…So I sent him a text. He calls me and is like ‘Is this really Killer Kross?’ ‘Cause like, I don’t know, it could be a crank caller or somebody gets his number. So we talk, and a few months later, I was in ‘NXT,’ and that’s kind of how that worked.
Kross’ first run in NXT was notable because he was on a massive undefeated streak. Then Kross made his debut on RAW as the undefeated champion and quickly jobbed to Jeff Hardy. That ultimately killed his first run.
He came back in 2022 and it took some time for the WWE star to get into a groove. Part of it was booking as Triple H was inconsistent in the way they wanted to handle Kross. The other part was his act, which just wasn’t clicking with the fans. However, Kross has really turned a new leaf in 2024. Once The Final Testament got out of that forgettable feud with The Pride then he started to showcase why many felt that he had one of the best characters in wrestling.
Check out the full interview where Kross talks about his wrestling career in length. He discusses his time on the indies to the scrapped Bray Wyatt feud he was supposed to have before his sudden passing.