The real reason why Bray Wyatt is on a hiatus from WWE television at the moment is because he himself had requested for the time off. He has not appeared on TV since his alter ego, The Fiend was set on fire by Randy Orton at TLC in their Firefly Inferno match a month ago. Bobby Lashley dropped a Bray Wyatt return bombshell.
Recently speaking on the Nitty, Gritty Dirt Show podcast, Vince Russo asked Billi Bhatti why “arguably the biggest ratings draw on RAW” has not been on the show for four weeks while being healthy and work-ready. Billi Bhatti revealed that the hiatus is because of a time off that Bray Wyatt had booked beforehand, like a lot of superstars who have families did. However, that is not connected to how the Firefly Inferno match was booked, because that was an on-the-spot decision by WWE creative. Bray Wyatt was ‘left off’ a big WrestleMania 37 photo.
“Yeah, not only that, he booked the time off ahead. So, this is what a lot of family people are doing… Bray booked time off, but it doesn’t bleed into this period. It was basically supposed to be a couple of weeks off at Christmas, but that has nothing to do with the finish that they decided to do at TLC because that was booked on the fly.”
WWE did not have the Firefly Inferno match ending planned
Bhatti went on to detail how WWE had actually planned to let Bray Wyatt take his time off, and initially it was going to be much less exciting than being set on fire.
“They did not have that finish lined up when they went into TLC. That was just supposed to be a regular match that Bray won, and then he would have just taken his weeks off quietly. They probably would have pre-take Fun Houses. So, the two things aren’t interlinked. They didn’t create an angle to write him off TV because he had time off. He had a couple of weeks booked off like a lot of family people had over Christmas… They decided to make an angle out of it and they are deciding to keep him off TV for the extra amount of time.”
In The Fiend’s absence, his companion Alexa Bliss has taken revenge on Randy Orton by blinding him with a flamethrower on last week’s RAW.
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