Trick Williams talks NXT Deadline, transition to WWE, more

[Chris]

Trick Williams is headed to Saturday's WWE NXT Deadline to compete in the men's Iron Survivor Challenge in Bridgeport, Connecticut, and perhaps earn a future NXT Championship match in the future.

He joins Dijak, Josh Briggs, Bron Breakker and Tyler Bate after qualifying with a mid-November win over Joe Coffey.

The former football player signed with WWE in February 2021, making his NXT debut that October. For the majority of his time with NXT, he was seen more as the sidekick to rising star Carmelo Hayes. It wasn't until August of this year where Williams told Hayes that he was ready to be on his own, saying, "This is no breakup, but I gotta be my own man."

Since then, we have seen him win several singles matches against the likes of Breakker, Dijak, Drew Gulak, Joe Gacy, Damon Kemp and even Dominik Mysterio at No Mercy. That win saw Williams capture gold for the very first time, winning the NXT North American Championship.

However, it didn't last very long because the following week saw him lose the title back to Mysterio, aided by Rhea Ripley. Since then, Williams has been trying to recapture gold, leading to this Saturday.

Here's some highlights from our recent conversation that you can watch on YouTube above:

From football to wrestling

Williams had been previously been pursuing a career in football. However, in the spring of 2018, he was cut by the Philadelphia Eagles. His backup plan was to go to the XFL, but was contacted by WWE to attend a tryout.

"I get cut from the Philadelphia Eagles and I worked very hard to get to that position and my football career came to a sudden stop. It's competitive, it's tough. But from my agent, he told me it's all good we're going to get to another team. Worst case scenario, you know, we get to do the XFL and at the time, the XFL was owned by Vince McMahon.

"So I don't know what happened in the paperwork or how it crossed over, but somehow or another, the day after my agent tells me that, the next day, WWE reaches out to me and they say, 'Hey, if you're interested, we like to bring you in for a tryout.' Now, I'm be honest with you: I watched wrestling up to, I would say, the Attitude Era. I opened a can of whoop ass at three years old.

"And my mom said, 'Okay, we need to probably back off the wrestling a little bit.' But, you know, I wasn't really up to date with wrestling, if I'm being honest, because I was so heavily involved into football and into what I was doing at the time. But when the opportunity came, I thought to myself...this is actually a great opportunity.

"You know, I'd be a fool to just not go to the tryout and I probably could have done my thing with football and who knows what would happen there but I would try this out. I went to to try out and they say, 'Yo, like, you athletic, charismatic, you can talk, but you never wrestled. So you need to know how to wrestle if you're going to be here.'

"So I take the steps to become a superstar. I moved back to South Philly. I was where my uncle and I trained at CZW. Then COVID broke out. Then I end up leaving there and I trained at Knox Pro in L.A. And then from there. I went to my second tryout and I got signed from there.

"It was a journey but like, man, to be honest, that time in between that time of them saying no the first time was exactly what I needed to lock my mind and say, 'Okay, I'm a superstar. This is what I want to do. I'm gonna commit my life to this, and I'm a train and I'm going to get it.'

"So this is best thing that ever happened to me because I'm much happier in WWE than playing football."

Going solo

As mentioned above, Williams spent the majority of his early career in NXT alongside Carmelo Hayes until this summer when he finally broke off on his own.

Williams shared what his experience has been like since going solo, how the moments came about, and how he's handling it.

"Firstly, this is the vision that I have had for myself all along. So, this is this what I wanted for myself. I wanted to be a superstar. I wanted to be the guy. Now, with that being said, I was brought into WWE alongside of Carmelo Hayes, which is one of the best NXT Superstars to ever do it. I'm very fortunate for that. That was my boy. And with me being so close to him, I got to learn a lot. I got to see how you how you conduct business, your mindset going into these big matches. I got to be in the light, even though it was kind of more of his light.

"But I didn't have the pressure. So now, being at those big stages, this is what it feels like -- being able to build connections with the crowd. It was awesome for me and also, I was able to build my hunger because when you see your boy eating, it makes you want to have some success on your own, too.

"So you know, that is what it was to the point where I had to go to Shawn Michaels myself and say, 'Shawn, I want the ball.' You know, Denise, I played football before I was wrestling and I played wide receiver. Wide receivers are the guys who catch the ball. And if you don't catch the ball, you can't eat. You can't score touchdowns. The camera's not on you.

"So, you know, me being able to go to Shawn Michaels with all of this and say 'I want the ball' was probably the best thing that I could have ever done because he looked me straight in the eye and said, 'You know, a lot of people come in my office and they say they want the ball, but they're not ready for it.' And, you know, we just go from there and he gave me an opportunity. And thus far, I've been making plays with it.'

https://www.f4wonline.com/news/nxt/trick-williams-on-why-wwe-turning-him-down-was-the-best-thing-for-his-career

 

[Deezy]

Vince's XFL gave us Trick Williams......that makes it a success right there.