WWE reportedly received an “eye-opening” lesson from Sunday’s doubleheader featuring AAA Ola de Calor and NXT Heatwave at the Bert Ogden Arena in Edinburg, Texas.
The two events were held back-to-back on the same day as AEW All In: London 2026, with AAA going on first before NXT Heatwave followed later in the evening.
Speaking on Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer of F4WOnline.com said WWE scheduled NXT second under the belief that the brand would be the bigger attraction for a United States audience.
According to Meltzer, however, the crowd reaction suggested otherwise. “I heard from even people in the company about that Sunday show, and it was an eye-opener, I would say, because they put NXT second and they put AAA first thinking that we’re in the United States and NXT is bigger than AAA.
And all the NXT people, it was pretty tough. A lot of the audience left after the AAA show. It was like a Collision, where people are just leaving after the thing.
They said that maybe half the people were left for the main event. The Mexicans were all way, way, way more over than the NXT wrestlers, other than Zilla Fatu. They said Zilla Fatu was so over in that building, but nobody else. Not Kendal Grey, not Tony D, or Myles Borne or anything like that. Even Nattie, who they figured would be super, super over, and really was not.
It was a Mexican audience that came to see lucha libre, and some of them stayed. But the thing is, the learning thing is, if you do this, you should probably put NXT first, rather than put them in three hours into the show.”
Based on Meltzer’s account, a significant portion of the audience was primarily interested in the AAA portion of the doubleheader and left the arena before NXT Heatwave concluded.
He was told that potentially only around half of the original crowd remained by the time the NXT main event took place.
Meltzer also noted a considerable difference in crowd reactions between the AAA and NXT talent. According to those he spoke with, the Mexican wrestlers were significantly more over with the Edinburg audience than most of the NXT roster.
One major exception was Zilla Fatu, who Meltzer said received a particularly strong reaction.
Other NXT names, including Kendal Grey, Tony D’Angelo and Myles Borne, reportedly didn’t receive comparable responses. Meltzer also noted that Natalya wasn’t as over with the audience as those involved had apparently anticipated.
The experience could influence how WWE structures similar AAA and NXT doubleheaders in the future. Meltzer suggested that placing NXT first and AAA afterward may have been more effective given that much of the Edinburg crowd appeared to have attended specifically for the lucha libre portion of the event.
