Jonathan Coachman Recalls Why WWE Return Failed, Says Corey Graves Was Disrespectful

Jonathan Coachman is a former WWE announcer that had a failed run with the company when he returned in 2018 and now Coach is claiming that Corey Graves didn’t want to work with him. Coach also added that there was a “complete lack of respect” from Graves towards him.

Coachman started with WWE in late 1999 and went to have a nearly ten-year run in the company. During his time with WWE, Coach worked as a backstage interview, announcer during matches, a host of segments, a wrestler at times, and a heel authority figure as well. Coach spent a lot of time working on camera with heel bosses like WWE Chairman Vince McMahon and Raw General Manager Eric Bischoff as well. Coach left in 2008 after a run as a Smackdown announcer.

Following his WWE departure, Coach worked for the sports television empire ESPN over the next decade. There were times during his ESPN where he would show WWE highlights or do WWE interviews due to his past with WWE.

In January 2018, Coach returned to WWE as one of the three announcers on Raw joining Michael Cole and Corey Graves. Coachman’s run in that spot lasted until September 2018 when he was replaced by Renee Young. Coach was moved to the role of a host of PPV pre-shows.

Jonathan Coachman was recently a guest on Ad Free Shows where he spoke about how his WWE return happened.

“I’ll tell you, this is one of the stories I wanted to get into. So when they called me to come back, I left ESPN. Part of the reason I left is because I wanted to do more golf. I’d been there for 10 years and I had done all the big shows that ESPN had, but yet, they wouldn’t give me the ball and run with it. So I was allowed to go back and do a couple things while I was at ESPN, and I started talking to the executives, and Michael Cole, like, ‘Man, we’d love to have you back. You can do this. Then we’ll let you do all this other stuff, because it helps us credibility wise.’ So they were okay with everything. This, I think, is one of the things that I just don’t get to this day about the way they operate at WWE, because it doesn’t have to be this way. They could do it a different way and have more positive results.”

Coach talked about how he had a commitment with the Golf Channel that would affect his availability with WWE. Coach noted that WWE was aware of this.

“So what happened was, I already had a deal to be the voice of the World Long Drive Tour. I’d already signed it. Well, the one thing I’m not going to do is go back to somebody and say, ‘Well, I’ve already signed this contract, but now I’m backing out.’ That’s something that I’ve never done, and I never would do. It’s bad business if you do because guess what bridge you just burned? That one. That was on Golf Channel, and that was part of the reason why I left ESPN. Okay, so I had five Mondays that I had to miss. Again, they knew all of this. This is not something that I sprung on them one week.”

When Coach missed some episodes of Raw due to working for the Golf Channel, he was replaced on Raw by David Otunga and Renee Young. Coach said he felt bad for Renee having to be put into that position.

“So I could tell after I missed the first one, and whoever filled in, I can’t remember, and then Renee filled in. I actually felt bad for Renee, because I know how hard it is to do that. After the initial, ‘Oh, she’s awesome,’ then came the venom. That’s the one thing I wish wrestling fans just would let go sometimes, Damn, it’s just a TV show. It’s entertainment. It’s two hours and then you go back to your life. It’s not life or death. So when they go on social media and they crush these people, it just doesn’t make any sense to me. For somebody like me who has other avenues I can take it. I’m good.”

To correct what Coach said there, Raw is three hours, not two hours. Most wrestling fans (and some people in WWE) probably wish it was two hours again.

The discussion continued with Coach talking about problems with fellow announcer Corey Graves. Coach felt that Graves didn’t want him there while showing a lack of respect as well.

“So I also believe this; I think at his core, I think Corey is a really good guy. I don’t think he ever wanted a three person booth. When I used to work with King and JR, we would actually work together and they would give me lines to say. You’ve seen some of the great stuff, like when Kane’s fire would hit and I would fall over backwards. We all worked on that. Corey just didn’t want to do that. He just didn’t want me there. You could tell by the things he would say. There was certainly a complete lack of respect for me being a veteran. For me having the time at ESPN. I certainly never walked in and said, ‘I’m taking this over. This is my space.’ I never did that. You could ask anybody. So every single week it just got more and more difficult to work with him and it was clear he wanted Renee because they’re very, very good friends.”

When Coach was on commentary during the 2000s, he was often portraying the cocky “Heel Coach” character. When he returned in 2018 he wasn’t allowed to be that character again.

“To be honest with you, I didn’t enjoy it. I wanted to be heel Coach. I wanted to bring that character back. Vince, again, this was him trying to take care of me, and this is where sometimes I wish they would just trust us a little bit more. Because of my time at ESPN, he wanted to protect that credibility and he felt like if I went back to talking trash, being a manager of somebody, they wouldn’t have the credibility on Monday Night Raw with me at the desk that I had and I would lose it from ESPN. None of the places that I work with, not even the PGA Tour, and you would think they’d be the most conservative — they don’t care if I do professional wrestling, because that bridge has already been crossed. I was the first one to do it.”

“The reason it was so important is so that others could do both. So you wouldn’t walk into a room and say, ‘I want to do wrestling and boxing or wrestling and basketball,’ and somebody would tell you no. That’s why it was so important at that time for me to stay in both. To stay doing golf, to stay doing sports, while I was also doing Monday Night Raw, it was very, very important, because now you see with the AEW’s coming in, you’ve got to have guys that crossover. Whether it’s somebody like me, whether it’s The Rock, or Cena or Batista. You have to have guys that are bigger than your audience so you bring in other people. That short-sightedness is affecting them to this day.”

It was noted by Coachman that being removed from Raw led to him hosting PPV pre-shows, which meant only one show per month instead of every Monday. Coach didn’t seem to mind because “the check didn’t change” after his role changed.

“To be honest, I was ecstatic to go back to the pre show. That was awesome, because that’s where I thrive is being the host of a panel or being a character, not sitting on Monday Night Raw or Smackdown, when you’re just miserable because the people don’t want to work with you. I couldn’t make Corey want to work with me. Just couldn’t do it. So I was very happy. You know, people used to tweet at me, ‘You idiot, you got demoted.’ The check didn’t change, I had more fun, and I travelled only once a month instead of every single week. I see that as a win if you ask me.”

Coachman left WWE a few years ago while commenting matter of factly that he will never return to the company.