Posted in: Sports, TV, WWE | Tagged: tom phillips, wwe, WWE Raw, wwe release

The Hits Keep Coming As WWE Has Now Released Tom Phillips

Published Thu, 27 May 2021 12:07:09 -0500

In a bit of very surprising news, WWE has reportedly released long-time on-air personality and commentator Tom Phillips according to Fightful.com. Phillips had been with the company for nearly ten years, starting with them in 2012, and has been used on commentary on every WWE tv show, including Raw, Smackdown, NXT, NXT UK, Main Event, and Superstars. The news is surprising, as it seemed Phillips was one of the WWE's trusted go-to on-air guys and served as Senior Manager of On-Air Talent for the company. But with the recent string of releases by the company, especially in their media departments, maybe this is one people should have anticipated.

The Hits Keep Coming As WWE Has Now Released Tom Phillips — Tom Phillips has been released by WWE, courtesy of WWE.

While always used as something of a utility guy on WWE programming, Phillips' position had been in flux recently, along with the Raw commentary team in general. Phillips served as the lead play-by-play announcer on Raw since January 26, 2020, replacing Vic Joseph, who took that role with NXT. Phillips held the Raw position until six weeks ago when on April 12, WWE replaced him with Adnan Virk in a move that backfired quickly and they've now replaced Virk with MMA's Jimmy Smith.

Since the April move, Phillips was seen on 205 Live and had been working on special programming projects for the WWE Network on the Peacock app.

It was noted recently by fans that Phillips had changed his social media handles to his actual name of Tom Hannifan, so it is likely his release from WWE is either something he requested or something he anticipated.

In any event, the news of Phillips' release is just the newest in a steady stream of WWE releases and shake-ups post-Wrestlemania this year. The ratings, reviews, and fan interest are all at all-time lows and it seems the company's response to that is by cutting staff in a "cost-trimming effort", despite record-high profits over the past year.

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