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Hypothesis: Paul's strong push to get the Black and Gold era guys over (to either neutral or positive results based off the ratings trend) has given the audience a reason to invest their time back into NXT knowing that they aren't destined to die on arrival like the last 10 or so people that got called up. You can't sell people on the hopes of a future all-star when all you produced the last 2 years in the majors were jobbers or people that got cut.
It probably never sniffs the ratings that it got during the Wednesday Night Wars, but if they get enough to where they're constant back in the top 20 and even scratching the top 10 every so often while truly being a development show, you'd have to call that a success.
