Real Reason For Surprise WWE Release Revealed
WWE has trimmed its roster once again and one of the stars cut caught some by surprise but the real reason they were let go has now been revealed.
On April 19th, WWE released Jinder Mahal, Xyon Quinn, Xia Li, Veer, and Sanga. The departures caught many by surprise with the news breaking while SmackDown was on the air. To add to the confusion, Xia Li had just been featured in a video setting up a Battle Royal to determine a new Women’s World Champion on Raw.
However, several days after that news broke Fightful Select revealed that Von Wagner had also been released at the same time.
Von Wagner Release A WWE Main Roster Decision
Speaking on Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer explained why the decision to cut Von Wagner surprised him given how highly some in the company were touting him not too long ago:
That one surprised me not like the other ones. The thing on him that surprised me, it wasn’t that many years ago where people from the company were talking about that this guy was a future WrestleMania main eventer, which I didn’t see and I never did see that.
He doesn’t have charisma to be at that level. I was thinking ‘what because he’s tall and blonde?’ This isn’t like the 80s, tall and blonde isn’t enough and as a wrestler he was passable.
As for the reason why Wagner was ultimately let go, Meltzer says it was a main roster decision and because he wasn’t being used on the main roster, he was cut:
The only thing I know about this one is that it was a main roster decision. Even though he was not working on the main roster – he was working in NXT – he is technically, like Xyon Quinn, they are main roster wrestlers. They were considered main roster wrestlers, therefore because they were not being used on the main roster the decision was made to cut them.”
Essentially they felt that he had been a main roster wrestler for a year and they hadn’t used him and it’s been a year and they weren’t gonna use him. And if they’re not gonna use you you’re gonna get cut.
Like Xyon Quinn, Von Wagner was considered a free agent following the WWE Draft in 2023. But following that move to free agency, both men were barely used on the main roster. Wagner had a battle royal appearance on Raw and two matches on Main Event to his name but continued mainly working on the NXT brand.