Breaking: WWE announces release of several Superstars

The WWE announced numerous releases on its website today. Take a look below at the many talents who will no longer be gracing Raw or Smackdown.

-Drew McIntyre

-Jinder Mahal

-Evan Bourne

-Brodus Clay

-Yoshi Tatsu

-Aksana

-Curt Hawkins

-Camacho

-Theodore Long
-JTG

While none of these Superstars were setting the world ablaze lately, it was still a surprise to see many of them “future endeavored” by WWE.

At first I thought the releases of McIntyre and Mahal meant that 3MB would be no more, but I would wager that rather than just scrap the group, they’re going to be turned into the permanent foils of Los Matadores. They’ll probably pair someone with Heath Slater so that it’ll be a tag team and Hornswoggle, just like the Matadores and El Torito.

It seemed that Brodus Clay had been trying to fulfill his “monster heel” destiny lately, though it never panned out. He had an NXT Title shot against Adrian Neville a few weeks ago, but failed to capture the title. I guess knocking a few teeth out of the mouth of “The Man Gravity Forgot” will be the last thing Clay did of note in WWE.

Evan Bourne’s release surprised me, though I guess it shouldn’t have. With his talent for high risk maneuvers, I always figured that WWE would find something for him. But with guys like Adrian Neville and Kalisto coming up from NXT in the future, losing Bourne wouldn’t hurt the company too much. I wouldn’t be surprised to see him turn up in Dragon Gate USA, Ring of Honor or Pro Wrestling Guerrilla before too long.

I was also pretty surprised to see Teddy Long be let go. Long started with the WWE as a referee all the way back in 1998 and transitioned from that role to a manager and eventual became General Manager of Smackdown. He also became widely known for interrupting in-ring squabbles by saying “Now hold on a minute, players” and making tag team matches.

Camacho, Yoshi Tatsu and Curt Hawkins have been largely directionless for...man I don’t even remember the last time any of them did anything. Well, that’s not entirely true. Hawkins and Camacho have had a few matches on NXT in the past few months to a year but honestly, I’ve been watching WWE again since about 2011, 2012 and I can’t recall ever see Yoshi Tatsu once.

Aksana’s release hurts my heart the most. She seemed like she had really been improving in the ring lately, but I guess breaking Naomi’s face with a knee drop a few months back didn’t win her any favor. I thought that maybe Alicia Fox turning on her last week would be the start of something for the Lithuania beauty but that is apparently not the case.

JTG, however, is still employed.

I was wrong folks. JTG in was released a little bit later in the afternoon.