Shawn Michaels: WWE Are Still Reaching Out To Indy Talent

While WWE have predominantly focused on recruiting athletes over the last year, which included an all-athlete tryout during SummerSlam week, Senior Vice President of Talent Development Creative Shawn Michaels revealed to My San Antonio the company are still reaching out to independent wrestlers and talent in Japan. 

"We are still reaching out to other people with experience that have wrestled on the independent scene or been out in Japan or in other companies. That is something NXT will continue to do in the future. Nothing is off the table. We simply want to continue to find people that are just as passionate about the WWE product as we are," Michaels said.

WWE have brought in Roxanne Perez in 2022, although she is very much the exception, and the company have signed a number of former college athletes since September 2021. If WWE will look to bring in more independent wrestling talents at future tryouts remains to be seen.

WWE have also reportedly reached out to several former talents in All Elite Wrestling since July and at least two of those wrestlers asked for their releases from Tony Khan's promotion. Others, however, said they were not interested, including Swerve Strickland who was said to have referred WWE to his attorney.