Shawn Michaels: We Don’t Put Anybody In A Box At WWE Performance Center

Before Shawn Michaels was leading the charge with NXT, he trained the next generation of wrestlers after he retired from wrestling the first time at the Shawn Michaels Wrestling Academy. 

Wrestlers such as Bryan Danielson, Brian Kendrick, Paul London, and more came through the Shawn Michaels Wrestling Academy on their way to fruitful wrestling careers. 

Speaking to Connor Casey of Comic Book, Michaels was asked how his approach has changed from training at his wrestling academy to training at the WWE Performance Center. 

“I’ll say this, most of the overall coaching aspects lie with Matt Bloom, who is a phenomenal head coach at the Performance Center. But the great thing that Hunter set up many, many years ago is that we cover everything. You’ve got people from a number of different eras, a number of different styles, and we’re continuing to build on that. I think all of us would admit that the business, like every sports or entertainment genre, continues to change and grow, and we have to continue to change and grow with it. I will say that one thing that I know we do have in common, what I know we do at the Performance Center and we definitely did at the Shawn Michaels Wrestling Academy is we don’t put anybody in a box. The one thing that we like to do is make it a collaboration between ourselves and the individual talent. That’s something that we are obviously implementing in great, a great success,” he said.

He continued, “Obviously, we teach the basics, we teach the fundamentals, but then you’re allowed to grow into the style of the superstar you want to become. We don’t want to paint you as this of how you just have to stay in that box. We want them to be able to find who they are, experiment, take chances, take risks, and that’s what NXT is for.”

While making the media round to promote NXT Halloween Havoc, Michaels discussed NXT focusing on developing talent. You can find his full comments by clicking here. 

Check out the current lineup for NXT Halloween Havoc by clicking here. Fightful will have live coverage of NXT beginning at 8 p.m. ET on Tuesday.