Backstage News On WWE Bringing Back WarGames and Changing Planned NXT TakeOver Title Matches

WWE’s decision to revive the WarGames match came together very quickly.

According to Dave Meltzer on Wrestling Observer Radio, WWE’s original plan for NXT TakeOver in Houston, Texas was for Drew McIntyre to defend the NXT Championship against Adam Cole while SAnitY would defend the NXT Tag Team Championship against Bobby Fish and Kyle O’Reilly. Instead, they decided to have Undisputed Era (Cole, Fish, and O’Reilly) take on SAnitY (Eric Young, Alexander Wolfe and Killian Dain) and the trio of Roderick Strong and The Authors of Pain in a three-team WarGames match. Meanwhile, McIntyre will defend the NXT Championship against Andrade “Cien” Almas.

While the WarGames name and gimmick has been used in a variety of cage matches with other promotions, this is the first official WarGames match since a September 2000 episode of WCW Monday Nitro. It also marks the first WarGames match ever to take place under the WWE banner.

WarGames is a two-ring cage match pitting teams of wrestlers against one another with staggered entry. Dusty Rhodes is credited with inventing the match concept and, on Wednesday night, Cody Rhodes tweeted that he was made aware of the decision to bring back the WarGames match before it was announced at the latest NXT taping from Full Sail University.

I'm not mad. I was told. H worked for my Dad and then my Dad worked for him. They were friends. Care and effort will be placed into it.

— Cody Rhodes (@CodyRhodes) October 5, 2017

NXT Takeover: WarGames takes place November 18 in Houston, the night before Survivor Series.