Real Reason WWE Fired Braun Strowman
New details on Braun Strowman's WWE release, which was chalked up to "budget cuts".
That old chestnut, "budget cuts", was cited as the official reason for this week's WWE releases, per John Laurinaitis in a text message sent out to inform Raw and SmackDown wrestlers that Braun Strowman, Aleister Black, and co. had been let go.
This is difficult to take at face value, given that WWE is fresh off generating record profits in 2020 and currently has multiple billion-dollar content rights deals on the table. Nonetheless, "budget cuts" remains the company line.
Dave Meltzer has a report on the departures in this week's Wrestling Observer Newsletter. As well as noting that Vince McMahon didn't understand Buddy Murphy and Aleister Black's wrestling styles, he writes that Braun Strowman had been deemed obsolete as a main roster giant with Omos and Shanky now on Raw, and Commander Azeez on SmackDown.
Strowman's guaranteed $1.2 million/year deal likely worked against him as well. In addition, the report states that Strowman hadn't pushed for a no-cut clause in his last round of negotiations, which is something many of WWE's bigger names have. This would have saved his job when WWE was deciding on who to let go.
Like the other WWE wrestlers released earlier this week, Strowman's 90-day non-compete clause expires on 31 August.