Rumors of WWE potentially re-signing Bray Wyatt (Windham Rotunda) reportedly boosted ticket sales for last Sunday’s WWE Hell In a Cell event, although WWE has yet to re-sign the man behind The Fiend.
A new story on Wrestling Observer Radio offered some intriguing details regarding Wyatt’s WWE release last July.
“[Wyatt] was fired for reasons having nothing to do with being over or not over and he was not fired having to do with his gimmick,” Meltzer said. “He was fired having to do with things that I probably shouldn’t talk about, so I’m not going to start a can of worms. It’s got nothing to do with that. He also had health issues, as far as being kept out of action and everything like that.”
There were various rumors about why WWE let Wyatt go last summer, despite the stated reason being budget cuts. Last year, Mat Men’s Andrew Zarian wrote that Wyatt was “a little difficult in the lead-up to his release,” with ring performance concerns as well as weight issues. Wyatt was also alleged to be unhappy. Before being released, Wyatt had been out with a “undisclosed physical ailment” that was not concussion-related, according to Sports Illustrated’s Justin Barrasso. Wyatt was apparently cleared medically just days before being released.
WWE Chairman & CEO Vince McMahon was unhappy with Wyatt for not performing his characteristic spider walk during a bout, according to AEW’s Matt Hardy.
Hardy, who feuded with and later teamed with Wyatt from November 2017 to July 2018, mentioned on a recent episode of his “The Extreme Life of Matt Hardy” podcast how McMahon was furious with Wyatt following a match in which he failed to complete the spider walk.
“He [Vince McMahon] said, ’Bray, why didn’t you do that spider walk. What’s wrong with you? You’re not in shape, can you not do it anymore?’ He really laid into him and then he said, ‘you’re not even playing the gimmick’. It was just like reaming,” Hardy said.
Hardy previously noted McMahon and Wyatt’s “very strange relationship,” remarking how there appeared to be a father-son dynamic there.
“Windham has always had a very strange relationship with Vince, very strange, like, I almost felt like Vince looked at him like a son in some ways,” Matt said on a different episode. “When he would do things that he liked, he would love him and he would really give him everything that he could possibly give him. He would bend over backwards to try and accommodate him. But then when he did something he didn’t like, he hated, like he was going to lock him away for good.”
“It was almost like a really weird, a really strange and different duality that Vince shared with Bray. When he liked him or loved him, he was all about him. But when he disliked him, oh my god, it was really bad and he would like punish him and insult him. To me, it was so strange. It was almost like a parent.”
Wyatt has been working on some Hollywood projects and has recently made a few signing appearances, with more on the way, but he has not been in any wrestling promotion since his WWE release. Wyatt was once linked to AEW and Impact Wrestling, but it never materialized.
Wyatt recently posted some cryptic comments, which was seen as a teaser for his potential return to the ring, you can check them out by clicking here.
Stay tuned to PWMania.com for more.
