Fredrick Douglas "Fred" Rosser[1] (born November 2, 1983)[5] is an American professional wrestler, currently signed to WWE under the ring name Darren Young. Prior to signing with WWE, Rosser competed in Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic independent promotions including Chaotic Wrestling,[6] East Coast Wrestling Association,[7] Independent Wrestling Federation and the National Wrestling Alliance. He is also the first, and only, WWE performer to disclose that he is gay while active with the company.
On February 23, 2010, Young made his debut on WWE NXT with a character described as a "South Beach Party Boy", losing his debut match to David Otunga. His storyline had mentor CM Punk showing apathy towards him, claiming he had no idea why he's in NXT and did not want to train Young unless he accepted his Straight-edge lifestyle.[14] Despite this, Punk and his disciples, Luke Gallows and Serena, helped Young win his rematch against Otunga the following week.[15] Young was ranked eight in the first Pros' Poll. After the pros' poll, Young decided to join the Straight Edge Society in an attempt to improve, only to change his mind before getting his hair shaved off. CM Punk decided to forgive him for standing up to him when he defeated Luke Gallows with Young's own hair on the line. Because of this victory, CM Punk had then been interested in Young's potential, but in turn started feuding with a jealous Luke Gallows. On May 11 in the second Pros poll, Young was ranked fifth out of the six remaining contestants and narrowly escaped elimination.[16] The following week, however, Young was eliminated from the competition.[17]
The week following the Season 1 finale, Young, along with the other season one NXT rookies turned heel and interfered in the main event match on Raw between John Cena and Young's former Pro, CM Punk, and attacked both wrestlers, the announce team, and the ring announcer Justin Roberts, before they dismantled the ring area and surrounding equipment.[18] On the June 14 edition of Raw the rookies attacked General Manager Bret Hart, when he refused to give them contracts.[19] The following week on Raw, Vince McMahon fired Hart and announced that a new General Manager had been hired, one that had signed all seven season one NXT rookies to contracts.[20] The following week, the group was named The Nexus.[21] On the July 5 episode of Raw, The Nexus tried to attack John Cena as he confronted Wade Barrett during their "truce" with one another. The segment ended with The Nexus leaving without Young, when other Raw wrestlers arrived to aid Cena, and Young was assaulted by Cena to end the show. Due to Cena's actions, the new general manager pitted Cena in a 7 on 1 handicap match against The Nexus scheduled for the following week.[22] Young however did not participate in the handicap match due to injuries caused by Cena the previous week, though The Nexus was successful in winning the match.[23] He returned on July 18 at Money in the Bank with the rest of The Nexus, sporting a new haircut and costing Cena the WWE Championship against Sheamus. After the match, Cena attacked Young and fellow Nexus teammate, Michael Tarver.[24] The Nexus continued to feud with Cena and the Raw roster, resulting in a seven-on-seven elimination tag team match at SummerSlam. Young was the first person to be eliminated from the match, when he submitted to Daniel Bryan in under a minute, and The Nexus went on to lose the match.[25] On the next episode of Raw the members of The Nexus fought in individual matches against members of the victorious Team WWE with the stipulation that losing a match would have them exiled from the group. Young chose to face John Cena but failed to win, and was exiled and attacked as a result.[26]
