Ricky Saints came closer to a catastrophic injury than anyone realized during his NXT title feud with Ethan Page. On the Insight podcast, Page revealed that the brutal chair spot from their North American Championship match last year nearly cost Saints his eye.
“So it could have been worse,” Page said. “And I don’t know. I know you do these great clips, and this might be a little zoom in freeze frame moment for you, but he almost lost his eye. After he ends up injuring his trachea across the way the chair was, the way the chair fell. I give him a twisted grin and I’m trying to pull his throat down in between the legs of the chair.”
The spot came during the May 2025 episode of NXT, when Page dethroned Saints for the North American Championship. Saints took Page’s Twisted Grin maneuver and his throat struck the crossbar of a steel chair, an impact that looked frightening in real time and drew a strong crowd reaction.
WWE later confirmed Saints suffered a laryngeal contusion and shared a CT scan image on television as part of the storyline. He was pulled from action before returning to resume the feud.
Page’s account adds a scarier dimension to a spot fans already remembered as one of the most violent of the NXT run. By his telling, the way the chair fell put Saints inches from an eye injury on top of the throat damage he did sustain.
Saints has since become one of NXT’s featured names, which makes the near-miss more striking in hindsight. The reveal is also a reminder of the real risk behind chair spots, even the more controlled versions modern wrestling favors.
