Ex-World Champion’s Heartbreaking Confession About WWE Firing
A former WWE Champion said it felt like he had done nothing when he got fired by the company for the first time.
Jinder Mahal had two runs in WWE that had very different results. His first run lasted from 2010 until about June 2014, when he was part of the 3MB group with Drew McIntyre and Heath Slater, which was mostly there for comedic purposes.
It was two years later, in the summer of 2016, when Mahal returned to WWE, as SmackDown became a live show on Tuesdays, one night after Raw on Mondays. This time, Mahal looked more muscular and in the best shape of his life.
Even though Mahal wasn’t being used much in early 2017, he won a 6-Pack Challenge match to earn a shot at the WWE Title. At Backlash 2017, Mahal shockingly beat Randy Orton to win the WWE Championship in a move that stunned the audience because Mahal wasn’t even close to a main event performer before that.
Mahal’s first and only WWE Championship reign lasted for 169 days. He also held the US Championship and the “coveted” 24/7 Title as well, before being released for a second time in April 2024.
While looking back on the first WWE release of his career, Jinder Mahal told Inside The Ropes that he felt like he hadn’t done much in the company at that point.
“I got a full, packed calendar. All of 3MB is on a packed calendar; we’re on every show. I got a call in the morning, I can’t remember what day it was. It was actually Mark Carano.”
“He’s like, ‘Hey, I’ve got some bad news for you. Creative doesn’t have anything for you right now, we have to release you.’ Yeah, that’s a tough call. Your stomach sinks in. It’s a very tough call.
At that point in my career, I hadn’t done much. 3MB was the best thing I had done. It felt like we had done nothing. So yeah, that was the phone call I got. I was on my own for two years.”
How Jinder Mahal Found Out He’d Become WWE Champion
In another interview, where he spoke about his WWE Championship win, Jinder Mahal revealed that the late, great former WWE superstar Luke Harper told him about the big win on SmackDown and that Vince McMahon was impressed enough to put the big title on Jinder.
“So the draft happened, and I got drafted to SmackDown. And Rusev was actually supposed to work Randy at that pay-per-view. Rusev gets hurt. He has shoulder surgery and I guess I was just picked. We had a six-pack challenge match. How I actually found out, the night before we were on a live event and I remember I was taping my wrist. It might have been Luke Harper. I saw on Twitter that the six-pack challenge was for the number one contender.
I think it was Luke Harper, who told me you’re going over, you’re gonna work Randy because I was thinking Harper is gonna work Randy. I looked at the list of guys, me, Sami Zayn, Luke Harper, Erick Rowan, one other I can’t remember, maybe Mojo? I can’t remember who it was, I figured it was gonna be Luke Harper. And Luke told me and then Randy came a little bit later [and said] I guess we’re working.”
That led to Mahal revealing his conversations with Randy Orton prior to their Backlash match.
“And then before the match, Randy told me, ‘I think it’s just a one-off because I’m still supposed to work Rusev.’ I’m like okay, whatever, that’s great. I get a number one contender match at Backlash in Chicago. Okay, great. Even if that’s it, just one title shot. I was just released not even a year ago.
And then I don’t know what changed. I got some momentum leading up to Backlash. Cut a couple of promos Vince really liked. And I found out the day of, like the afternoon. Say maybe 5 pm I saw Road Dogg in the hallway. He said, ‘Hey, you’re going over.’ And I believe he told Randy ‘Hey, go talk to Vince’. Randy went and talked to Vince, we put the finish together and yeah that was it.”
Don’t hinder Jinder, WWE fans.