Quincy Elliot thinks WWE NXT didn’t know what to do with his character, credits Shawn Michaels for being encouraging

Photo Courtesy: WWE

Inside look at Quincy Elliot’s character.

As the NXT 2.0 product was rolling out new characters and talent, one of the names introduced was Quincy Elliot. He made his NXT in-ring debut on Level Up in March 2022 and his TV debut was in September of that year

Elliot is no longer with WWE as he was released in the fall of 2023. He was interviewed by Bryan Asbury of Developmentally Speaking and dove into how his on-screen character came to be.

Pretty early honestly (is when I started to craft my NXT on-screen character). I signed with WWE in November. I was there in September. They kind of had an idea of my charisma and things I wanted to do. But the actual character that I presented on TV, I want to say around maybe my second match in WWE on Level Up, they kind of started to see, okay, this is a character here. It stands out. So I would be showing creative different things and you know, it just kind of happened with time.

Elliot would go on to state that outside of a few people, everyone was supportive of his character. He credited Shawn Michaels for always being encouraging. Elliot was told to be himself and if it ever became too much, he’d simply be reeled back in. 

Everyone (was supportive of the direction my NXT TV character was going in). There’s definitely people that definitely, you know, was like, ‘Oh, what is this?’ Or gave me a little side-eye but, the people that mattered really cared and really pushed me to just go out — one thing Shawn Michaels and everyone always told me, ‘Just go out there and be you, and if it’s too much, we’ll pull you back. But give us everything you got. Go out there and be you’ and I was like, ‘Oh, alright. Bet, man.’

Looking back at his time therewith hindsight, Elliot thinks there was not a solid plan for him.

It was just all over the place honestly. At the time, the company was trying to push me as a heel at first. But the live audience was reacting to me like a babyface. So it kind of forced their hand in a way and I honestly — I think looking back at it, I don’t think they knew what they wanted to do with me. I know they knew they had someone with charisma and got crowd reactions and I’m not saying that egotistically. That’s just what was happening at the time and the character was so thought-provoking and intriguing and different to what wrestling’s used to. So, they were just, you know, all over the place, seeing how it was gonna plan out, and then I had one match on Level Up in August 2022 where I just got a massive reaction. I came out on a moped and I got a massive reaction and I remember afterwards, the head writer at the time told me, ‘Yeah, you’re gonna be on NXT TV next week. Start thinking of vignettes and all that.’ So it kind of really happened really fast.

The last time Elliot was in action was in June at an independent show in Mexico. He revealed that he’s currently dealing with an injury.

I’m actually dealing with an injury right now. A little minor injury. Life’s a rollercoaster. So I feel like, you know, I don’t have the necessarily best luck but, once I’m healed up and ready to go, I’m gonna start putting a little fire to the flames.

The NXT brand is gearing up for their No Mercy Premium Live Event on September 1st and POST Wrestling will have written and audio coverage of the event.

If the quotes in this article are used, please credit Developmentally Speaking with an H/T to POST Wrestling for the transcriptions.

About Andrew Thompson 9725 Articles
A Washington D.C. native and graduate of Norfolk State University, Andrew Thompson has been covering wrestling since 2017.