Swerve Strickland Knows Why He Clashed With Triple H In WWE

Swerve Strickland has explained the cause of his clash with Triple H in WWE.

Strickland joined WWE in 2019 as part of NXT. There, he used the name Isiah ‘Swerve’ Scott and was a member of the popular Hit Row faction. His time in the company was short-lived, though, as he and the rest of the group were released from their contracts in November 2021.

While the rest of Hit Row were rehired by WWE in 2022, Strickland went in another direction, signing with AEW and soon becoming a central part of the main event scene.

During an interview on VladTV, Swerve recalled feeling like he was “bulls***ted around” the Performance Centre.

“The one day I knew I was getting bulls***ted around the PC was when I was there for three or four months, and I got called to do 205 Live against Drew Gulak, who had the Cruiserweight Championship. 205 Live is a show that takes place after SmackDown. So after SmackDown, you see the Roman Reigns, you see all those big names. They close off SmackDown, then they do another show for the extra content on the WWE Network at the time.

“It was three matches, and we were the last one. It was me and Drew Gulak, we went 18 minutes in the ring, straight, for the Cruiserweight Championship. Everybody’s on their feet, going crazy. I have Swerve’s House signs, going after Roman, I have Swerve’s House signs. They’re not chanting, ‘This is awesome.’ They’re chanting, ‘Let’s go Swerve.’ They’re actually rooting for me to win this title.

“I end up losing to Drew Gulak. Got great praise in the back afterwards. Charlotte [Flair], Bayley, Kofi [Kingston], Samoa Joe, everybody’s giving me crazy praise. I come back to the PC, and they’re trying to teach you arm drags again. I’m like, get the f**k out of here with that [laughs]. They’re trying to tell me how to entertain 400 people in NXT when I just entertained 6,000 in a stadium. I’m like, why are you trying to backtrack me? I already showcased what I can do in front of 6,000.

“Mind you, that’s the end game to all this. The end game is to get me there, of what this product is. That’s like, you don’t bring the guy from the G League, he drops 30 in the NBA, and come back to practice back at the G League, and it’s like, ‘Let’s put him on the bench. He needs more development.’ I’m like, I just dropped 30 on Giannis. What are we doing?”

Strickland admits he was maybe “too brash” at the time, and that led to him clashing with Triple H over his position.

“So that was the mindset I had. It was kind of too brash, it was too over-thinking, and there’s where I kind of clashed with Triple H, as far as we didn’t gel. I really gelled with Shawn Michaels. Shawn Michaels was the one, because he didn’t have the full power, he was just an advocate, and he as a partner to Triple H because he was more hands-on with the talent. Out of all the coaches and all the people and the staff there, Triple H still had to go to the main roster and SmackDown and Raw and do a lot of these public appearances. He still had to do the shareholder meetings and all that, so he couldn’t be there every day, but he was there pretty often.

“Shawn is the only one out of all those coaches that could really teach you how to be a top main event star. That’s the only one there. So I’m like, that’s who I need to get with. Why can’t I get with him?”

That mindset led to him seeking Michaels out to ask for his advice even though HBK didn’t do any formal classes at the time.

“I was like, ‘I want to get in Shawn Michaels’ class.’ ‘Well, Shawn, he’s not really doing classes right now. He’s not really holding classes because he’s so busy with the show.’ I was like, ‘Well, can I get a meeting with him.’ He was like, ‘I mean, his office is right over there.’ Bet. Went over there, found Shawn.

“I was like, ‘Hey Shawn, do you mind if I do tape studies with you?’ He’s like, ‘Absolutely.’ I’m like, it’s that fucking easy? I’ve been here a year and a half, and I could have just walked up to his office? But that’s those things, they don’t give you those curriculums. That’s not part of it. That’s the game. They want that run-around until you earn the ‘sweat equity’ to be able to go over there, to be like, oh, now you’re worthy of talking to Shawn because you put in all this stuff.”

Swerve Strickland Believes Member Of Hit Row Had “Significant Heat” With Vince McMahon

During the same interview, Swerve Strickland explained how heat with Vince McMahon led to Hit Row being released from WWE. The star said that the first hint that B-Fab would be fired came when her expected flight to a show wasn’t booked. A member of the group who tried to find out what was happening was accused of being “aggressive,” leading to McMahon getting upset with them.

Strickland believes the heat from that incident never went away, and soon led to the rest of Hit Row being shown the door.

H/T to Fightful for the above transcription.