Two more wrestlers have been given new ring names by WWE, and that’s the Grizzled Young Veterans.
Pwinsider reported that James Drake will now be known as Jagger Reid while Zack Gibson will use the ring name Rip Fowler.
On July 11, WWE filed to trademark the Jagger Reid name, while WWE trademarked Rip Fowler in May. Both filings were listed for entertainment purposes.
They started teaming together in 2017, where they worked for various independent promotions, including PROGRESS, which has a working relationship with WWE. They signed with WWE in 2018 and had been used on the NXT UK brand, where they were the NXT UK Tag Team Champions.
In February 2020, they were moved to the NXT brand. They haven’t wrestled since April 19 on an episode of NXT where they lost to World Wrestling Entertainment Legado del Fantasma (Cruz Del Toro & Joaquin Wilde).
After the match, they did an interview for WWE’s social media, where Gibson said he’s going home while Drake stated fans won’t be seeing them in NXT anymore. This led to speculation about their future in NXT.
Before being pulled from TV, WWE removed their first names because of the edict of not using the real names of wrestlers or names they used on the indies.
After another frustrating loss, Drake & Gibson walk off saying the NXT Universe will no longer see Drake & Gibson. đŸ‘€#WWENXT pic.twitter.com/jQsp8GMwWN
— WWE NXT (@WWENXT) April 20, 2022
Interestingly, the report didn’t mention a new tag team name for them or if they will remain a tag team. WWE may be splitting them up, and both will be singles wrestlers.
