Arn Anderson Speaks Out On WWE Mass Releases During Coronavirus Pandemic, Cesaro Not Getting Pushed
Last week, WWE announced they were firing dozens of on-screen talents and furloughing a portion of their workforce.
On the latest episode of The Arn Show, Arn Anderson talked about the WWE releasing these talents. Anderson felt it was wrong to do it during the current Coronavirus pandemic.
"When you've got a world crisis like we have and things are the way they are, for all these people, a lot of them very good friends of mine, to lose their job just breaks your heart," Anderson said. "The reality of the matter is, which I read and I'm sure is accurate, after cutting all of these guys and before that, the company was in line even with everything that's happened to have its highest earning year. Unless that is a bold faced lie coming from an independent source, why did you need to cut all these guys if you're in line to have your biggest year yet?
"If you look at those T.V. contracts, you look at the Saudia Arabia deal, you're talking a whole bunch of money. That being the case, did all those people have to lose their job during the worst time possible? Breaks my heart, it's a s–t deal. Could it have been avoided? You tell me."
Anderson also discussed a previous experience while working with WWE where the company released 17 talents after WrestleMania.
"I've seen it before," Anderson said. "One year after WrestleMania there were 17 guys let go and there was no pandemic. It was one of those things where you just went 'Jesus'. Then when you get to TV you hear 'Okay, 17 guys got fired, who're we going to beat today?' Should've never let those guys get out of here without at least doing the business on the way out. And you know what the answer was? 'No they'll just fake an injury and we'll end up paying them for 6 months'. That whole theory just stinks to high heaven."
During the podcast, Anderson also gave his opinion on Cesaro while while discussing his match teaming with Tyson Kidd against The New Day at the 2015 Extreme Rules PPV.
"Cesaro, had he been allowed to continue doing the things that only he could do, because as time wore on, he's not a favorite guy of the front office," Anderson said. "For whatever reason that is, they're the only ones that know. Everybody else across the planet seems to think he's a superstar but he continued to get leaned on to stop doing that stuff as a heel and it was too flashy. When you can do things that no one else on the planet can do, why wouldn't you bring him to our audience? Aren't you cheating our audience by not giving him to them? Isn't it more of that 'I don't give a s–t what the audience thinks, I'm going to do what I want'? Isn't it some more of that mentality? It gets sickening.
"When you lived it for years and years and years and seen different characters just get pummeled and squashed because 'I said so', it gets mighty damn disturbing and it's such a downer when you're trying to get a guy to perform at the top level for the audience that he's capable of. That's what I was able to do, I knew what every guy did well and what every guy did right. When you see that just get buried when you come back through the curtain it just drives you nuts."
If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit TheArnShow with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.