3 days Ago
After weeks of teases on NXT television, the developmental brand's latest new faction made its presence known at NXT Vengeance Day last night. For those not keeping up with regular NXT TV lately, we've seen short videos showing the silhouettes of four masked men. And now, those four have stepped out of the shadows, making quite the impact not once, but twice at Vengeance Day.
First up, this group appeared after Fraxiom had retained the NXT Tag Team Titles against Josh Briggs and Yoshiki Inamura. As the two teams shared a moment of respect in the ring, they were attacked by four masked men, with Corey Graves namedropping Dion Lennox and Cutler James. As for the other two attackers, they were Saquon Shugars and Osiris Griffin, although they were never named on commentary.
Later in the night, that same four set their sights on NXT Champion Oba Femi after the Ruler of NXT pinned Grayson Waller in a triple-threat match also featuring Waller's tag team partner, Austin Theory . Impressively, two of the men picked up Oba and threw him to the other two, who powerbombed Femi to the mat. Interestingly, last month saw a brief backstage interaction between Oba Femi and Dion Lennox, with Lennox congratulating Oba on becoming NXT Champion and mentioning how one day Dion might be challenging for that title himself.
In taking out Oba Femi at Vengeance Day, that surely puts Oba and this new group on a collision course. Whether this mysterious group has an outright leader remains to be seen. That said, the one person named several times at Vengeance Day was Dion Lennox.
Of these four men, Lennox is the only one with any notable TV time, becoming a sporadic part of main NXT programming since debuting in 2023. As for his gimmick, that's been the glasses-wearing book enthusiast, with the most notable use of Lennox being as part of a romantic storyline involving Brinley Reece, Nikkita Lyons , Karmen Petrovic, and Ashante 'Thee' Adonis . He last wrestled on TV back in January, where he lost to Wes Lee in barely two minutes.
The 27-year-old was previously a linebacker for the Oregon State Beavers and was at one point signed to the Los Angeles Rams Similar to Dion Lennox, Osiris Griffin is another with a football background, with the real-life Josh Black impressing during a 2023 WWE tryout. Prior to signing with WWE , he played defensive linesman for Syracuse University and made his formal in-ring debut last year, having since wrestled on some NXT house shows. For Cutler James, he's someone who's worked a few NXT Level Up matches and has been active at NXT live events, with a couple of NXT dark matches thrown in, too.
First seen on WWE Next Gen, James - real name Jonah Niesenbaum - has an amateur wrestling background, being a standout at Duke University. While the other three men are fairly new to the world of professional wrestling, Saquon Shugars is nowadays a seven-year pro, having competed as Lucky Ali before signing with WWE in late 2023. As Ali, Shugars competed on the independent scene for the likes of DEADLOCK Pro and also worked dates for notable promotions such as AEW , ROH , NJPW , GCW , and CZW.
It's worth noting that Dion Lennix and Osiris Griffin have recently teamed at NXT live events, as have Lennox and Cutler James, and James and Saquon Shugars have also tagged with one another. It could be that this was with the intention of bringing those talents together on NXT TV, or it may be that this was a case of random pairings impressing NXT officials. Either way, Lennix, Griffin, James, and Shugars certainly made their mark in impressive fashion at NXT Vengeance Day.
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