Former WWE star Ridge Holland is not acting like getting called up to WWE’s main roster was some nightmare. He knows it was a huge spot. He also knows it may have come at the worst possible time for his growth.
During his conversation with Sports Jedi Network, Holland, real name Luke Menzies, talked about his WWE journey and admitted that moving up after his NXT injury might have cut off a key part of his development. He said he was supposed to be learning from top-tier NXT names, but instead ended up on the main roster before he was fully established.
Holland explained that the wrestling game did not really start slowing down for him until the middle of his main roster run, and he believes losing that extra NXT time hurt him.
“Because if you think about it, like, I haven’t had that many matches with the injuries and things like that, like, and it comes with reps. And that was one thing that really annoyed me because I was going back back to that NXT period where we had all those names and those great individual performers. I was going to be amongst that and start, you know, getting a little bit of a push, as it were, and going into war games and working with the likes of Adam Cole and, and these people. And I got hurt, and then when I came back from the injury, I got called up. So I feel like I missed a lot of lessons out and, and, and that kind of integral part of your, of your career, where you’re learning from people that are much better than you, Right.”
He said the main roster was a different animal because people were not as quick to help. Money was on the line, spots were limited, and everyone had their own thing going.
“And then who are very giving as well. And I would have learned and Adam Cole would have given. The other guys would have been giving to make sure that I would, I would have come up. But then to go to the main roster where things are a little bit more cagey, people aren’t that forthcoming to help because there’s. There’s money. There’s money that needs to be made. There’s people at the top of the card. They’re doing their own thing.”
When asked why WWE called him up instead of letting him stay in NXT longer, Holland said he still does not know what sparked the decision. He said there were a lot of things above his pay grade, but he made it clear that he thinks more time in NXT would have helped.
“I honestly don’t know. There’s so many things that go on and decisions that get, get made that are above our pay grade. You know, I’m, am I grateful that I got called up? Yes. Do I think it was the best for my career? No. I think I would have benefited from at least another 12 months in, in NXT.”
Holland said WWE may have wanted to freshen things up around the draft, and he recalled seeing Vince McMahon walk through an all-in meeting with Triple H shortly before he got the call.
“I probably just think they were looking to freshen, you know, the draft was coming up. I think they were looking to freshen the roster up and yeah, it’s weird. I really, I really don’t Know what the, what the genesis was of the idea of calling me up? I remember we had a, a big all in meeting where everyone was in the ring wrestling and Vince walked through being led by Triple H.”
The problem, according to Holland, was that he had not built enough of an NXT identity for the main roster writing team to know what to do with him.
“But then it’s shortly after I got called up, so I think maybe Vince was wanting to kind of shake things up a little bit, but then kind of on the back side of that, I didn’t have, I wasn’t established in nxt, so therefore the writing team on the main roster didn’t have a reference point on how to book me, so I had to start again.”
That is a pretty brutal way to describe a call-up most wrestlers dream about. Holland got the WWE main roster spotlight, but in his view, he lost valuable time learning his craft in NXT before being thrown into a much tougher system.
Do you think Ridge Holland was called up too soon, or did WWE just fail to figure him out once he got there? Sound off in the comments and let us know what you think.
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