Posted in: Sports, TV, WWE | Tagged: bleeding cool, cable, coronavirus, Maria Kanellis, mike kanellis, NXT, nxt uk, pro wrestling, Raw, Smackdown, sports, streaming, television, tv, wrestling, wwe

Mike Kanellis Didn't Want WWE Release in the Middle of a Pandemic

Mike Kanellis, along with his wife Maria Kanellis, is one of more than forty wrestlers and backstage talent released from WWE in the last week. WWE announced cutbacks due to the coronavirus pandemic on Wednesday morning, bizarrely boasting at the time of $500 million in reserves to survive the difficult economic conditions. It was truly a coldhearted move by the Fed, especially when they announced stock dividends for investors the next day of over $9 million and will likely make a big profit this year even if live events don't return. Kanellis has been known for requesting his release from WWE multiple times over the last few years, though he had recently signed a new deal before his release.

Kanellis was interviewed by WrestleTalk and he talked about his situation, including addressing the argument mad by some of the duller members of the WWE Universe that wrestlers who were unhappy at one point in their WWE career and asked for releases should be happy to get one under the current circumstances. "Nobody wants to be let go from their job in the middle of a pandemic, but it is what it is and when s*** hits the fan you just keep going forward," Kanellis said. "We two, we've got two kids. There is no stop for us now it's onward and upward."

"So, I mean in the sense that in my head it was always like if there is going to be releases, it's probably going to be me and probably going to be my wife, just because my wife has been out on maternity leave and they were doing anything with me," Kanellis continued. "I had already asked for my release in the past, but we did work things out after that. I didn't want it to happen during a pandemic. I think that's a hard thing to explain to people, not to go off topic, but there are a lot of people who are like "well he did ask his release", which I did, but my wife never did and I want to get that clear, my wife was happy to stay there. But it's like, you thinking's the back of your head, yes I did ask for my release, but no one wants to be released in the middle of a pandemic. You ask for your release when you think you can go and do other things. I asked for my release because I wasn't working and I wanted to work."

The interview is really interesting so you should go and read it. Kanellis talks about why he enjoyed his time in WWE, how he got brought in-directly to the main roster, what he thought of taking his wife's last name in WWE, and more. While Kanellis may be quite forgiving, personally we think WWE really dropped the ball with Mike and Maria, who were great in Impact Wrestling and were entertaining whenever they were actually allowed to be onscreen in WWE.

Enjoyed this? Please share on social media!

Stay up-to-date and support the site by following Bleeding Cool on Google News today!