WWE NXT New Year's Evil 2023 Date, Early Lineup Announced
WWE's NXT will finally be back on the road next year when the NXT Vengeance Day pay-per-view takes place at the Spectrum Center in Charlotte, North Carolina. But before that takes place, the developmental brand will have its annual New Year's Evil on Jan. 10, 2023, inside the WWE Performance Center. Shawn Michaels confirmed on the post-show conference call following Saturday's NXT Deadline that the show will be headlined by NXT Champion Bron Breakker vs. Grayson Waller and NXT Women's Champion Mandy Rose vs. Roxanne Perez. A yet-to-be-named return was also teased for the show.
Waller and Perez won their respective Iron Survivor Challenge matches on Saturday night. Both won by getting the final pinfalls of their matches in the final two minutes.
Shawn Michaels on the First Iron Survivor Challenge Matches
The Iron Survivor Challenge was the newest match concept created by Michaels and the other members of the NXT Creative Team. "The Heartbreak Kid" gave his thoughts on the concept's debut after the show.
"First of all, I thought it was executed phenomenally and one of the challenges with matches like this is making them different, and we did that. I will say that I had one person come up to me that was in the match and said, 'Man, that is one of the coolest things I've ever been a part of. Don't ever put me in one of those again.' So look, it's a lot mentally on the talent. There's a lot that is required in those types of matches," Michaels said (h/t Fightful). "From a developmental standpoint, one of the things back when I was coaching, one thing I would always try and tell talent is when you get up to the main roster, you're in WrestleMania moments, you have a number of different things you have to remember out there. There's the match that you got, there's also the huge entrance for you that's also probably going to be very overwhelming, you're going to be dealing with the crowd, you got camera angles, and commercial breaks. I used to tell people that it's like spinning plates and you have to keep all these things in your head while keeping in character and keeping the psychology of what you're doing in the match. That's one of the reasons we wanted to challenge them with this match because that's sort of a developmental tool you could say that we can use this match for,"
"I'll say this, I think it has legs. I guess that's one of those things that after this we'll gauge and see if we feel it's a success. I feel it went really well. I think there were a lot of people that weren't sure about it. There were a lot of people that expected it to flop and we didn't know either. That's what I love about here. We're allowed to try a lot of stuff and we're going to continue to do that," he later added.
