Vince McMahon and WWE let go several major names in WWE today including Samoa Joe, Billie Kay, Peyton Royce, Mickie James and others. According to Fightful’s Sean Ross Sapp, Vince McMahon got head of talent relations John Laurinaitis to call the talent personally, including Peyton Royce, informing them of the releases, citing cuts within WWE’s budget as the reason that they are being let go. Sapp tweeted out: “I’m told John Laurinaitis has been making the calls to talent and citing budget cuts as the reason for the WWE releases.” In total ten names have been released from WWE, however this situation is fluid and constantly being monitored. This recently released WWE star ‘angered’ Vince McMahon before firing.
Over on the Squared Circle subreddit, members of the WWE universe have been discussing the news regarding the various superstar releases. Gerardatron stated: “Triple H/NXT handed Vince McMahon/main roster a refined and well-developed Iconic Duo on a goddamn silver platter and they end up breaking apart a perfectly good female tag team (who would also still excel as singles stars in the event of an injury, which was Vince’s fear or whatever), put them in different tag teams anyway, and released them. They (IMO) are two surefire top stars anywhere they are and they’re let go. Samoa Joe was the one guy who could have believably taken down Brock Lesnar when Roman Reigns couldn’t.
Did Vince McMahon ‘punish’ this top Raw superstar backstage? While Hazelwood38 said: “Kalisto, Kay, Royce, and Joe will hurt in the locker room for sure. Joe is an interesting on, question on whether he can still wrestle as he;s a great commentator but not sure if one of the other companies need another commentator. The Iiconics will for sure be picked up in AEW, they hopefully we get the chance they deserve. Mickie James should walk away from in ring and start coaching. Chelsea Green is a surprise since she was having a big debut but got injured
I'm told John Laurinaitis has been making the calls to talent and citing budget cuts as the reason for the WWE releases
— Sean Ross Sapp of Fightful.com (@SeanRossSapp) April 15, 2021
