Former NXT Star Comments On If He Nearly Quit Wrestling After Leaving WWE

Published: Mar 31, 2020 by Wrestle Talk | Last Updated: Mar 31, 2020 by Wrestle Talk

Sawyer Fulton (real name Jacob Southwick) joined WWE in 2012 at the age of just 22-years-old. He made his debut as a jobber in a tag team match against The Wyatt Family and made sporadic appearances on TV over the next few years.

After teaming with Alexander Wolfe on house shows, Fulton joined Wolfe, Nikki Cross and Eric Young in forming the SaniTy. faction. The duo entered the Dusty Rhodes Tag Team Classic and even defeated TJ Perkins and NJPW star Kota Ibushi.

In November 2016, Fulton suffered a rather serious injury that would rule him out of action for a number of months. Sawyer was subsequently replaced in the group by Killian Dain. He was replaced in November 2017 before managing to make a return.

A fair few wrestlers decide to quit wrestling and not compete on the independent scene after being released by WWE. However, the man now known as Madman Fulton told Fightful that this was never something he considered:

“No, [I didn’t think about quitting] I love professional wrestling. I love everything about it. I love the travel, being in the ring, crowds—every part of it. It’s absolutely amazing. For me it’s always like trying to put together a puzzle and when you’re kinda lost, when you’re in a bad area of your career like where I was, to have these guys dump out a whole new bucket of pieces right in front of you there’s nothing to do except put the corners down, and start on your edges. You gotta just keep trying to fit everything together.

“So, I like that aspect of it. I like trying to figure out how to put together the puzzle and see how do I advance myself and advance my career like that. I started wrestling when I was 20. So, I’m coming up on my ten year anniversary in October. I was still wrestling in college, so I didn’t graduate until 2012 and then I started in NXT right after that.”

It is great that Fulton didn’t hang up his boots after leaving WWE as he is now part of Impact Wrestling where he is doing great work as part of the oVe faction alongside Jake Crist, Dave Crist, and fellow former NXT star Sami Callihan.