WWE releases Luke Harper, Sin Cara and The Ascension

By Amish Patel - December 8, 2019

WWE has announced that 4 superstars have been released today – Luke Harper, Sin Cara and The Ascension.

WWE has come to terms on the releases of Jonathan Huber (Luke Harper), Sin Cara and Ryan Parmeter (Konnor) and Eric Thompson (Viktor) of The Ascension. WWE wishes them all the best in their future endeavors.

Luke Harper went public with his release request previously and was denied by WWE. He then returned to television for a short stint.

Following this, Sin Cara also made the decision to go public and ask for his release (and was denied) and has not appeared on programming much since.

While WWE has taken steps to lock down talent for their flagship TV shows over the last few years, and in part to keep them away from new competition like AEW, it’s clear there were no creative plans for these four superstars.

JAG

Did WWE ever really do anything with The Ascension other than job them out? hard to be a star when you have no story line other than jobbing
Hulstpower

John cena like hogan dud inthe 90s cpuld hurt aew
Rinn13

It is still crappy and bad business sense on their part, to “hold
people hostage” who want out. They will literally waste money, and part
of these people’s lives/careers, just to pay them to sit home, even
though they want to go elsewhere.

Also, I really wish fans would stop talking about who is a “draw” and who isn’t. There is this
idea, proliferated by WWE themselves, that you’re only a “Star” if you make it big in WWE. Otherwise, obviously, you’re a nobody who couldn’t “draw a dime”. Thing is, guys like HHH, Stone Cold, even to some extent Mick Foley, were “nobodies” and “couldn’t draw a dime”, until WWF pushed them, and suddenly they were “stars”. They became stars because fans
supported them. That’s how the wrestling business is supposed to work: fans deciding who they like and who they don’t, hence who’s “over” and who isn’t.

Point being, AEW isn’t “setting the world on fire” right now, no. But they also just started out a couple months back, their TV show anyway. Realistically speaking, any one of these guys could go elsewhere and become big stars. Sin Cara, if he could stay healthy, was already a big star in Mexico before WWE, and he certainly could be in AEW, or wherever.
Unique

Was just discussing this with a friend. Maybe Harper could draw…but the others? Meh.
But then we got to thinking….is there anyone anyone that could hurt wwe if they joined aew. I think only punk….and that would only be for a minute probably.
MT McGee

Maybe Konner will go to NWA and reform the original Ascension.
CC

I think the reason they are finally starting to let people go is because as far as viewing figures go, AEW is still not setting the world alight like many people expected. The fact is it is going back and forth with NXT rather than being the Raw/SD beater that many people predicted.
Maybe WWE just does not see them as major competition anymore, so is now willing to release people that they think will not exactly be huge draws anywhere else, including AEW.
Hell, the fact that Shawn Spears has hardly set the world alight in AEW despite some people predicting he was gonna be a big player outside WWE, is probably proof in WWE’s eyes that his failure in WWE was his own fault, not theirs.

Whether they are right or wrong is always gonna be open for debate, but I really think the relative lack of viewers for Dynamite has caused WWE to ease up. They will still tie down anyone they think is gonna be a big enough name outside WWE, but I can certainly see lesser names (in WWE’s eyes) being let go now.
I am just surprised Mike and Maria were not on this list.