Zoey Stark‘s big win on night one of NXT TakeOver: Stand & Deliver certainly gave her some momentum, but the loss didn’t exactly make Toni Storm lose any either.
Triple H and Shawn Michaels were the guests on Wednesday night’s post-show media call and were asked by WrestleZone’s Bill Pritchard about the more positive reception to Stark’s win over Toni Storm, rather than having the focus on Storm’s potential next move.
Earlier in the call, Triple H had mentioned the notion that a loss signifies talent switching rosters, and why it wasn’t the case with NXT. In response to the attention Stark’s win got (instead of people asking where Storm would go from there), Triple H took time to praise Stark’s work ethic and said they really hope to make stars and then have those people lift up the next group of talent.
Triple H: “I think first of all, Toni Storm is one of the most talented women in the world. Incredibly talented performer, but you sorta said it best when you’re talking about Zoey Stark, and what an incredible—she’s one of the women that when she came in the door, you threw something at her and man, when she got out there, you were [blown away]. ‘OK we’re going with this.’ We’re going to give her more opportunity and she knocked it out of the park, you give her another one and she knocked that one out of there. You just kept moving forward, but when you get to something like tonight in this pre-show, there’s a lot of eyeballs on it and a lot of momentum, but moving Zoey Stark forward does not hurt Toni Storm. It moves Zoey Stark up and it gives more people to step into the ring with.”
“The art of what we do, to me, has always been to be in the position where you are on top of the ladder, if you want to say it that way, and you reach down and pull other people up to you without losing your spot on the ladder. That’s the art of what we do, and you’re just pulling people up so that there’s more people for everybody to work with. Building stars around you, that’s when you get great, and that’s what this game is about. Sometimes I think people feed too much into the—and I don’t mean this like it doesn’t mean anything—but the momentum of a win or a loss is where it really matters. If it doesn’t shift momentum, then the loss or the win didn’t really matter, but if it shifts your momentum, if was done for the right reasons. I don’t believe this loss shifted momentum at all for Toni Storm, but it did for Zoey Stark.”
Michaels added that Stark has taken everyone by surprise, noting that she’s been tremendous and “keeps delivering with everything she’s done.” Triple H closed by saying Stark has been overdelivering and she’s only been there a few months, so the sky is the limit for her.
Triple H: “You just keep adding to the opportunity, waiting to see where it’s all at and she’s overdelivering on everything we do. [I’m] really excited to have her here and really excited to move forward with her. Look—she’s in the mix of everything we’re doing right now and we just were talking with her a few minutes ago—she’s been here three months and she’s moved herself right into that mix. It’s impressive; what she’s done is impressive and I can tell you, I think I walked in this place the first thing this morning and the first thing I walked in [to see] in the gym at the Performance Center was her training. We were close to show time, and she was still training, and that was before going out there to wrestle Toni Storm. She’s a machine, the work ethic is unbelievable, so the sky’s the limit.”
Related: Triple H And Shawn Michaels NXT TakeOver: Stand & Deliver Night Two Post-Show Media Call
