Triple H approved current stars' requests to use their lineage from outside WWE; Vince McMahon made a slight change
Triple H approved a couple of WWE stars' requests to use their lineage from other promotions as part of their characters in NXT. However, Vince McMahon made some changes when they were called up to the main roster.
The Viking Raiders were called War Machine in NJPW and ROH, but WWE stayed away from the name because of the controversy surrounding the name. It was the same name of an MMA Fighter who was arrested for assaulting his girlfriend back in 2014.
In an appearance on Chris Van Vliet's Insight, Ivar discussed their time with NXT and working with Triple H. He was delighted they were allowed to use their lineage from Ring of Honor and New Japan Pro-Wrestling as part of their WWE gimmick.
"War Raiders is what we settled on. So we had a little bit of the element from the Indies where we were War Machine and a little bit more Viking going forward with the Raiders. No problem and the fans were fine with it. They were fine with it. And I think we asked if we could keep our Hanson and Rowe names because we were associated with that, with the titles in New Japan, Ring of Honor like. So if people did searches, they pop up, lineage. Hunter was totally cool with that," Ivar said. [17:30 - 17:59]
When the duo was called to the main roster, Vince McMahon changed their names from Rowe and Hanson to Erik and Ivar. They then endured the Viking Experience tag team name fiasco before the creative team changed it to the Viking Raiders.
The Viking Experience team name on WWE main roster still haunts Ivar
In the same interview with Chris Van Vliet, Ivar recalled the time they were set to make their main roster debuts, and their tag team name was changed to the Viking Experience. Fans heavily panned this change, and Ivar is still haunted by it whenever it pops up.
"We'd already given up on our real regular names, Eric and Ivar, no problem, whatever... That wasn't worth even trying. So we're just trying to change... because the tag team name was so bad. It was awful. It still is, still haunts us to this day. And when we are listing off these names, we got to Viking Raiders," Ivar said. [19:46 - 20:09]
The Viking Experience name lasted for about a week before they became the Viking Raiders. The WWE Universe thought this would ruin them, but they bounced back and even won the RAW Tag Team Championship once.
If you use any quotes from this article, please credit Insight with Chris Van Vliet and give a H/T to Sportskeeda.